I grew up watching Gilmore Girls, back when it was on Nickelodeon. I then rewatched it a couple of years ago on Netflix just as the revival began to air. I’m now midway through the Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life revival, and whilst it isn’t as good as the original, it does feel good going back to Stars Hollow with the coffee-addicted, food-loving, quick-witted mother-daughter duo. Both shows are on my recommend list of TV shows, and always will be.
Now, here are some fun facts about the original series…
1 Although Lorelai and Rory were famed for their love of coffee. Alexis Bledel, who played Rory, actually hated coffee. Her cup was usually filled with Coca-Cola instead.
2 Lauren Graham would also have water instead of coffee occasionally. But the reason for this was because she generally drank a lot of coffee off-set, so felt it was safer to replace her caffeine on-set once in a while!
3 Average TV episode scripts are usually 45–50 pages, but because of the fast-paced dialogue, the Gilmore Girls scripts were often 75–80 pages.
4 Ryan Gosling auditioned for the Gilmore Girls! The Hollywood star wasn’t a well-known actor at this point, and apparently his audition just wasn’t good enough. I wonder who he would have played…
5. Another now-Hollywood heartthrob also auditioned for the show: Chris Pine! It was his very first audition ever. My guess is that he would have played Dean if his audition had been successful.
6 Liza Weil, who played Paris on the show, originally auditioned for the role of Rory.
7 Jackson Douglas, who played Jackson on the show (convenient), was originally meant to feature in just two episodes as a guest role. When creators saw the chemistry he had with Melissa McCarthy (Sookie), they made him a regular character.
8 Kieko Agena (Lane), was 27 when the show started, whilst her character was 15!
9 The character of Lane was based on creator, Amy Sherman-Palladino’s best friend Helen Pai, who was a producer on the show. In addition to this, Lane’s band, Hep Alien, is an anagram of Pai’s name.
10 Scenes featuring the infamous town meetings usually took hours to film; sometimes a whole day. This was due to the amount of cast members and dialogue that would feature.
11 Carole King re-recorded her song, Where You Lead, with her daughter for the show’s theme song. The famous singer also appeared in a few episodes of the show as Sophie Bloom, a record shop owner.
12 John Cabrera, who played Brian for the final few seasons of the show, invited most of the cast to his wedding, with Sean Gunn AKA Kirk even officiating it.
13 Although Kirk was a staple of the show by the time it ended, Sean Gunn originally appeared in the second episode of the first season as a completely different character: Mick; a guy who installed DSL (Wi-Fi installation thing) for Lorelai, and then again in the following episode as the ‘Swan guy’.
14 Milo Ventimiglia, who played Jess, was only meant to be on the show a handful of times, but producers loved him so much (obviously!) that he remained for two seasons. (Find out more about Milo on his current show, This Is Us, right here).
14 Milo (Jess) and Jared Padalecki (Dean) are still close friends after all these years, despite playing enemies on the show.
15. The show almost had two spin-offs. The first was going to be about Jess and his life. But ultimately, it was too costly to shoot a whole series at Venice Beach (where Jess’ family live), so this was scrapped. The second spin-off idea came about when the show was ending. This was going to be about Rory’s life, however, it was deemed too complicated and the idea was scrapped.
16. Lauren Graham said the infamous Friday Night Dinners were her favourite scenes to shoot, but she also said the food was actually terrible. No wonder Emily was always complaining!
17 Alexis Bledel’s first language is Spanish. She only learned English when she started school, which makes Rory’s poor attempt at speaking Spanish in season six, simply great acting.
18 The original writers and producers, Amy and Daniel Palladino, left after season six. After this, for the final season of the show, Lauren Graham was a co-producer.
19 Stars Hollow is based on a small town in Connecticut called Washington. I want to visit!
20 The new, A Year In The Life, revival takes place a decade after the original ended, and sees the life of our favourite characters in the four seasons, AKA a year.
Hope my fellow Gimore Girls fans loved this post, make sure to like, comment and follow if so!
With Love, Abi X
Abi's World 