We Spoke To Scott Patterson About The Possible Return Of ‘Gilmore Girls’: “Everybody Is On Board”
At Melbourne's Oz Comic-Con, Scott Patterson -- co-star of the long-running TV series -- expressed his excitement about a potential revival. "The fans deserve it."
“They’re trying to silence me, and I won’t be silenced,” jokes Scott Patterson, best-known for his starring role in all seven seasons of Gilmore Girls as grumpy diner-owner Luke Danes. We’re speaking at Melbourne’s Oz Comic-Con, about a rumoured revival. “I think the fans deserve it,” he says. “I’m as big a fan of the show as anyone, and I feel your pain.”
Gilmore Girls was cancelled during its seventh season back in 2007, but its creator Amy Sherman-Palladino had left at the end of season six after a “botched negotiation”. The series’ debut on Netflix last October brought a new generation of fans and renewed interest, sparking a popular episode-by-episode review podcast Gilmore Guys.
While a potential movie or an eighth season has been spoken of in only vague terms so far, Patterson gives me his most confident assertion yet that the show could be revived. “Everybody is on board,” he says, referring the show’s key cast. “They’ve all expressed their desire to be involved. If a movie or a limited-run TV series comes about, everyone is there.”
Outside of the death of cast member Edward Herrmann, there are no ostensible barriers to Gilmore Girls’ return. Sherman-Palladino has said she still hopes to give the show the ending she’d always planned, and Warner Brothers are clearly reaping rewards from its resurgence. “There are a million moving parts to these things, and it’s never just one,” Patterson says. “I just want the fans to get what they deserve. This type of loyalty will be rewarded and I’m doing all I can to make it happen. Now is the time to create.”
At present, “doing all he can” includes joining the travelling sci-fi/fantasy/cosplay festival OzComicCon, where he seems happily out of place. Though passionate, Patterson baulks at endorsing the method by which a similarly beloved show, Veronica Mars, was resurrected: crowdfunding.
“No,” he says firmly. “Film funding is not something you want to do with multiple sources. It’s tough enough with one source. You have to be very careful how you fund your stuff. A lot of wonderful things have come to fruition because of crowdfunding, but you can make yourself very vulnerable.”
During the height of the show’s success, Patterson went to Warner Brothers with the idea of opening a franchised chain of Luke’s Diners around the country, and internationally. “I thought, ‘This is a great business opportunity!’ A brick and mortar store, selling merchandise. I’d go around and serve coffee a couple of times a year, there’d be contests…but they didn’t go for it.”
“See,” he leans forward, “I’ve always known from the outset that Gilmore Girls was not just a show, and the fans are not just average fans. The show is pretty much a religion. It hits people very deeply. People – families especially – have all these associated memories from the show. To give them that experience would be a lot of fun.” He pauses and shrugs: “I tried!”
Patterson, who has featured in three of the Saw films and around a dozen TV series, hasn’t been idle in the years since the show went off air. But while it’s obvious that Luke Danes is the role closest to his heart, a series return would not simply be for selfish reasons.
“It really would be an event, wouldn’t it!” he says, with a smile that would melt a pre-coffee Lorelai. “It would be a hell of a lot of fun. It would be a big celebration for all the fans, and I think everybody wants to come together and do it and enjoy those moments.”
With pop-up Luke’s Diners maybe? “I’m gonna go back at em again! This time with a business plan.”
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