50 Fun Facts About Cheers

On which night of the week did NBC air Cheers?

Thursday. When The Cosby Show joined the same night in 1984 it pulled in a huge new audience, and many of those viewers discovered Cheers for the first time.

Cheers was created by James Burrows and which pair of brothers?

Glen and Les Charles wrote and produced Taxi, where Burrows was their regular director. The three then formed their own company and created Cheers together.

Which NBC programming chief championed Cheers and kept it on air through its dismal first-season ratings?

Brandon Tartikoff backed the show while it sat near the bottom of the ratings. It helped that the reviews were glowing and NBC had no hit comedy to put in its place.

Cliff Clavin appears as a contestant on which real game show?

Jeopardy. Cliff had the game locked up, wagered everything on the last clue and blew it, and fans of the real show now call an all-in bet like that a breach of Clavin's Rule.

Before owning the bar, Sam Malone was a relief pitcher for which team?

The Red Sox. Sam was written as a retired football player until the part was cast; the creators decided their new lead was far more believable as a pitcher.

What was Sam Malone's baseball nickname?

Mayday. Sam Malone bought the bar in his drinking days and now tends it as a recovering alcoholic, pouring what he can no longer drink.

In the pilot, Diane Chambers is abandoned at the bar by her fiancé, a professor named what?

Sumner Sloane. He flies off with his ex-wife on the tickets booked for his wedding trip with Diane, leaving her without a job or money until Sam offers her work.

What is the title of the Cheers pilot, in which Diane's fiancé abandons her at the bar?

Give Me a Ring Sometime. He goes to collect a wedding ring from his ex-wife, and by the time Diane phones the airport the two of them have used the honeymoon tickets.

The actor who became Norm first auditioned to play a Cheers customer whose entire part was which single word?

Beer! Before the pilot was filmed the one-word customer had given way to Norm, a regular who never leaves the bar.

What is Cliff Clavin's job?

Postal worker. John Ratzenberger thought he had blown his audition, so on his way out he asked whether the bar had a know-it-all and improvised Cliff on the spot.

What is the name of Norm Peterson's never-seen wife?

Vera. When she finally walks into shot, at a Thanksgiving dinner that has turned into a food fight, a pie hits her square in the face before viewers can see it.

What is Norm Peterson's occasional profession?

Accountant. One of the show's creators based Norm on a regular at a bar where he worked after college, a man who always came for just one and had to be helped out.

Carla names one of her twin sons after which singer, her idol?

Elvis Presley. The twins are Elvis and Jesse, and Carla, who is sentimental about almost nothing else, makes a pilgrimage to Graceland every year.

Which Cheers cast member won four Emmys for the show?

Rhea Perlman. She had been sweet Zena, Louie's girlfriend, on Taxi, the Cheers creators' previous show, before they cast her as the venomous Carla.

Before playing Coach on Cheers, Nicholas Colasanto was a mob boss in which Martin Scorsese film?

Raging Bull. Colasanto was the menacing Tommy Como two years before he became the lovable Coach, and like Sam Malone he was a recovered alcoholic in real life.

Whose portrait from Nicholas Colasanto's dressing room was hung on the Cheers set after the Coach actor died?

Geronimo. The portrait stayed on the bar's back wall for the rest of the run, and in the very last scene of the series Sam walks over and straightens it.

Farm boy Woody Boyd comes to Boston and Cheers from a small town in which state?

Indiana. Woody travels from Hanover to meet his pen pal Coach, learns that he has died, and is hired on the spot to take the old man's place behind the bar.

Why does Sam Malone sell Cheers after Diane leaves him?

To sail the world. Sam sinks his boat instead, and comes home to find a corporate manager running the bar and has to beg her for a bartending job.

For how much was Cheers sold back to Sam in the eighth-season finale?

85 cents. The corporation offered Sam the bar for a dollar as thanks for exposing a tycoon's insider trading; he had no cash on him, so he passed the hat.

Where does Diane abandon Frasier Crane, ending the romance that first brought him to Cheers?

At the altar. Frasier was written as a short-term rival for Sam, but after Diane walks out on their wedding in Europe he stays on as one of the bar's regulars.

Kelsey Grammer was Emmy-nominated as Frasier Crane on Cheers, Frasier and which third sitcom?

Wings. The Nantucket airport comedy came from three Cheers writers, so Frasier dropped in for a 1992 episode, and that one guest spot brought Grammer the nomination.

Frasier's wife Lilith Sternin was played by which actress?

Bebe Neuwirth. Lilith was written for a single scene, one disastrous date with Frasier, but the writers enjoyed her dialogue so much that they kept bringing her back.

Which Cheers star received the Golden Globes' 2025 Carol Burnett Award?

Ted Danson. He was Emmy-nominated as Sam Malone in every one of the show's eleven seasons, and lost seven years running before he finally won in 1990.

Diane leaves Sam and Cheers in the season-five finale to finish what?

Her novel. Diane promises Sam she will be back in six months, and does not walk into the bar again until the very last episode.

After years of chasing millionaires, Rebecca Howe ends Cheers by marrying a man in which trade?

Plumber. Don turns up to fix the taps at the bar, and the woman who had pursued one rich executive after another quits her job to marry him.

Which Cheers actor was Emmy-nominated six years running for the show without ever winning?

George Wendt. Norm lost all six, the last of them in 1989 to Woody Harrelson, the bartender who spent his evenings pouring Norm's drinks.

Judy Hart Angelo co-wrote the Cheers theme "Where Everybody Knows Your Name" with which singer, who performed it?

Gary Portnoy. The producers first wanted a number from a stage musical he and Judy Hart Angelo had written, and only when that fell through did the pair write a new song for the show.

The real Boston pub used for the exterior shots of Cheers was originally called what?

The Bull & Finch, said to be a play on the name of Boston architect Charles Bulfinch. Tourists who knew it from the show flocked there, and in 2002 the owner renamed the pub Cheers.

The pub seen in the Cheers opening stands on which Boston street, facing the Public Garden?

Beacon Street. Only the outside made it to television: the basement pub's interior differs from the studio set, so the owner later added a replica of the TV bar upstairs for visitors.

What is the name of the fancy restaurant upstairs from Cheers, whose owner feuds with Sam?

Melville's. The feud starts when its new owner shows Sam a deed proving that the bar's pool room and toilets belong to the restaurant, and Sam has to pay him rent.

Which rival bar did the Cheers gang wage a running prank war with, almost always losing?

Gary's Olde Towne Tavern. The feud ran for years and ended only when a con man tricked Gary into bulldozing his own bar for a million dollars that did not exist.

Which actress joined Cheers in 1987 as corporate bar manager Rebecca Howe?

Kirstie Alley. Rebecca arrived as an icy executive, but Alley turned out to be a gifted klutz, so the writers remade the character as a self-pitying mess.

What is the title of the final episode of Cheers, first shown in May 1993?

One for the Road. The episode ends with Sam alone in the empty bar, calling to a latecomer knocking at the door, 'Sorry, we're closed.'

Which Monty Python star won an Emmy for a Cheers guest spot as a marriage counsellor pestered by Sam and Diane?

John Cleese. His counsellor tells the couple they are hopelessly mismatched, and they keep turning up at his hotel room until he gives in and says what they want to hear.

After the Cheers finale, NBC aired which late-night show live from the Boston pub that inspired the bar?

The Tonight Show. The cast had been celebrating at the pub for hours, and host Jay Leno later called the live broadcast a mistake because his guests were too drunk to interview.

What was the 1987 Cheers spin-off following Carla's ex-husband Nick to Las Vegas called?

The Tortellis. NBC cancelled it within months, so Nick and his new wife Loretta simply went back to turning up at Cheers to make Carla's life difficult.

In the spin-off Frasier, which premiered in 1993, Frasier Crane moves from Boston to which city?

Seattle. Newly divorced from Lilith, Frasier goes home to host a radio advice show, and finds himself sharing his smart apartment with his retired policeman father.

Which first-season Cheers episode has Sam's former teammate come out as gay?

The Boys in the Bar. Sam stands by his friend in public, and his regulars panic that Cheers will now be taken for a gay bar.

Cheers was filmed before a live audience on Stage 25 at which Hollywood studio?

Paramount. When the bar set came down in 1993, the same stage was handed straight to the spin-off Frasier, which filmed there for the next eleven years.

Which future Night Court star recurred on Cheers as a con man known as 'the Hat'?

Harry Anderson. A touring magician off screen, he played Harry the Hat, a grifter Sam wants thrown out on sight, yet the gang calls him in whenever a bigger crook needs fleecing.

Which elected office does bartender Woody Boyd win in the final season of Cheers?

City councilman. Frasier puts Woody on the ballot purely as an experiment in voter psychology, and is shocked when the bartender goes on to win the seat.

Which sports car is Sam Malone's pride and joy, alongside his hair and his little black book?

Corvette. Sam loves the red sports car so much that selling it, to Lilith of all people, is the sacrifice he makes when he needs money to buy back his bar.

The Cheers finale drew the largest audience for a series farewell since which show ended in 1983?

M*A*S*H. NBC cleared a whole evening for the Cheers farewell and promoted it as a record-breaker, but it fell well short of the audience for the Korean War comedy.

The creators of Cheers modelled Sam and Diane's sparring on which classic Hollywood screen couple?

Tracy and Hepburn. The creators wanted that battle of well-matched opposites, so they put an educated snob to work for an ex-jock and let the two argue for five years.

How does Carla's husband Eddie LeBec, a hockey player turned ice-show penguin, die?

Struck by an ice resurfacer. Eddie dies a hero, saving another member of the ice show, and at his funeral Carla learns that he also had a second wife.

In the final season of Cheers, Lilith leaves Frasier to live with another scientist in what?

An underground eco-pod. Lilith breaks it off and comes back later that season to reconcile with Frasier, though by the time he gets his own show the two have divorced.

The creators considered making Cheers an American version of which British sitcom?

Fawlty Towers. While swapping hotel stories the creators noticed that all the best action happened in the hotel bar, so they dropped the hotel and kept the bar.

Which actor was a finalist to play Sam Malone, first written as a retired football player?

Fred Dryer. The part went to another finalist, but the show found room for Dryer, who turned up in later episodes as an old teammate of Sam's turned sportscaster.

Which Welsh-born actor played the wealthy Robin Colcord, Rebecca's love interest?

Roger Rees. His tycoon is Rebecca's great hope of marrying money, until Sam exposes him for insider trading and he flees the country on his private jet.

Which Top Gun actor played Evan Drake, the boss Rebecca Howe pines for in her first Cheers season?

Tom Skerritt. Rebecca spends a whole year scheming to make her boss notice her, and he moves to Japan without ever working out how she feels.