Eric McCormack, who starred in the iconic sitcom Will & Grace, has made his thoughts known on straight actors portraying gay characters.

McCormack is famed for his portrayal of gay lawyer Will Truman on the NBC sitcom Will & Grace.

Will & Grace, created by Max Mutchnick and David Kohan, revolved around the lives of Will, a meticulous lawyer, and Grace (Debra Messing), a neurotic interior decorator, sharing an apartment in New York.

Originally airing from 1998 to 2006, with a brief revival between 2017 and 2020, the sitcom was heralded for its groundbreaking portrayal of LGBTQ+ characters in an era where such representation was scarce on television.

Speaking on Monday's episode of ITV's Good Morning Britain, McCormack, though straight himself, emphasized the importance of casting the "best person for the role," regardless of their sexual orientation.

“That’s a tough one for me, because I didn’t become an actor so that I could play an actor,” McCormack shared when questioned about his stance. “There’s no part I’ve ever played where I wasn’t playing something I’m not. It’s part of the gig. And I’ve always said, if gay actors weren’t allowed to play straight actors, Broadway would be over."

Continuing, McCormack expressed his perspective: “So this is what we do. I’d like to think that I represent it well. I came from the theater, and one of my best friends was a gay man. So I think I took their spirit and their message in what was otherwise just a sitcom and, represented it, I hope."

Asked if he believes he would land the role of Will in today's climate, McCormack replied: “Well, I guess the answer would be, they’d have to say in the casting room, ‘And you’re gay, right?' which I don’t think they can say,” he responded.

"I would like to think in general that the best person for the role, the one that comes in and knocks it out of the park, is the one that gets the part.”

Elsewhere in the interview, McCormack revealed that his longtime friend Elton John and the musician's partner David Furnish might have been among the first viewers of the sitcom in the UK.

"I sent VHS tapes to David and they watched them on their vacation," he said.

McCormack is set to make his West End debut in the musical Wild About You at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane in March.

Featured image credit: Ron Davis/Getty

A surprising trend over the last few years, at the movies and on our television screens, is the sheer amount of reboots we are getting. Remaking popular movies has been done for years, and while there are a few good examples, most of them are pretty bad. But now the new trend is bringing back old favorites once we've had a few years to miss those old characters.

We've seen it with Full House, Twin Peaks, Will & Grace - and even current Netflix sensation Queer Eye is actually a reboot of a show from the early 2000s. And the latest series to get the reboot treatment is the sitcom Roseanne. After ten seasons and 224 episodes from 1988 to 1997, the sitcom was a huge success in its time, but eventually came to a close.

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However, as of this week, Roseanne is back, and did pretty damn well with its season premiere too. It was a smash hit for ABC with more than 18 million viewers tuning in - that's almost two million more than the 1997 series finale. But there were plenty of surprises in store for those watching.

It turned out that the character Roseanne, like the actress who played her, voted for Trump in the 2016 election. In addition to this it was revealed that Jackie, played by Laurie Metcalf, voted for Jill Stein. Many were shocked to see that the show made the attempt to stay up-to-date, even broaching politics in a way that many sitcoms avoid as much as they can.

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There have been a wide range of opinions on this opening episode and the political preferences of its characters, from those who don't want politics in their television (good luck with that) to those who don't think they handled it correctly.

All this talk about the political leanings of sitcom characters led Buzzfeed reporter David Mack to ask the inevitable question: "if they reboot Friends and try to make it topical which one of them voted for trump?"

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The writer had his own opinions about where the Central Perk regulars would land on these issues, believing that Joey and Phoebe would probably have voted for Trump.

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But once the tweet was out there, plenty of other Friends fans needed to have their say. The characters were never specific about who they voted for in the past, but many believed they could figure it out based on their personalities and beliefs.

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There was a lot of debate over the issue, however.

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It's a pretty hard call to be honest, as I can see these characters going either way for a variety of reasons. Now, imagine if that desperately-wanted Friends reunion actually came about, but ended up being all about Trump and Clinton?

It's not likely (and neither is the show's return, let's be honest) but it would be a hell of a way to hit our TV screens again, wouldn't it?

Just because a beloved sitcom was cancelled doesn't mean it's over. This year NBC brought back Will & Grace, and ABC brought back Roseanne. Both shows featured the original cast members, while adding a few new ones, and picked up decades later, pretending like their series finales never happened. And both 'revivals' have been massive hits. It's only a matter of time before bring back every old show - I can't wait for 'Modern Urkel.'

In fact, NBC is considering bringing back The Office' for the 2018-2019 television season. The workplace comedy has been off the air for five years, but people sorely miss it. Since all the episodes are streaming, there's been a phenomenon of people rewatching it, over and over. Clearly, the demand is there. The only problem is, some of the cast members are committed to other projects. So, NBC is considering a reboot with new and old characters. (Which, sadly, would not include Steve Carell's Michael Scott.)

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However, John Krasinski, who played Jim, took a break from staring blankly into a camera to tell IndieWire his idea for 'Office' revival. And it's actually pretty brilliant:

"I think the U.K. thing that I always have pitched and wanted to do is that Christmas special thing, where we do a Christmas special this year and then two years from now, or three years from now, we do another one. I love that idea coming back finding out where everybody is. I would totally be down for that. It’s one of those things where I’m sure people don’t believe me when I say I would totally do it, because the truth is I would totally do it."

In case you haven't seen the original, British version of The Office - WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU?! Sorry. Both the British version and the American version are great, just in different ways. Where was I? Oh yeah. If you haven't seen the original British version of The Office, they ended the series after two seasons, and then they brought it back for a two-hour Christmas special that doubled as the perfect series finale. (Since then, Ricky Gervais brought the David Brent character for a 10 minute film and a Netflix movie, but no other 'Office cast members' appeared.)

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The upside of doing a one-off, seasonal special is that would be easier to get the original cast members back together. You'd get to see all (or most) of the characters you know and love, and find out what they're about to today. Meanwhile, the upside of doing a reboot with half-new characters, would be that you'd get much more content every season. John prefers doing occasional specials, for creative reasons.

"I don’t think anybody in our show sees that we didn’t end it the way we wanted to end it. We’re one of the very lucky shows that got to end when we wanted to, how we wanted to. So I don’t know how it exciting it would be to do a run of the show, ’cause you don’t want to retread old things and have people not be as excited about it as they are now."

Also, he misses the other cast members, who became a family on the set:

"I remember talking to other people on TV shows and they were like, ‘Fifth season, right? That’s when you all started hating each other?’ and I was like, ‘No, was that when you started hating each other?’ and they were like, ‘Hell yeah, fifth season and I was like nope. Right until the end, we were a family, we were emotionally connected, we all cried our eyes out on the last day."

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And just to seal the deal, Pam Fischer, who played Jim's wife, Pam, is totally down. "I think the idea of an Office revival is a great idea," she told The Hollywood Reporter. "I would be honored to come back in any way that I am able to. I loved playing that character."

You heard them, NBC. Do the specials, not a season! And try really hard to get Steve Carell.

In related news, this artist re-imagined the cast of ‘The Office’ as cartoon characters...

Did you hear the news? Every hit TV show from the 90's is coming back! The revivals of Will & Grace and Roseanne were huge successes, proving that there's an audience for nostalgic sitcoms. As long as the actors don't make racist jokes on Twitter and then try to blame their racism on Ambien, the shows could go on forever!

Now the Murphy Brown revival is on the horizon, and everyone's wondering which beloved sitcom the networks will bring back next. Will it be Friends? Home Improvement? Or how about The Nanny? In The Nanny, Fran Drescher played Fran Fine, a fashion queen from Queens who becomes a nanny for a widowed millionaire, British Broadway producer Maxwell Sheffield.

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The Nanny lasted six seasons, airing from 1993 to 1998. At a Broadway charity concert, Entertainment Tonight caught up with Fran Drescher to see if there's any chance of doing a revival. "People really love that show," said Drescher. "It's unreal. ... We're talking about it. Peter and I are talking about it." (Peter refers to Peter Marc Jacob, her ex-husband, who co-created the sitcom with her.)

In the series finale of The Nanny - spoiler alert! - Fran ended up marrying her former boss and having twins. However, she says the revival would not just be more of the same thing. "The thing is our show would be the same characters 20 years later. We can't just pick up where we left off," said Drescher. "But in a way, that could be really good because the show can have a whole fresh bend to it."

That "fresh bend" could include taking inspiration from the Roseanne revival and getting political. Fran the character would reflect the real-life interests of Fran the actress. "She would've maybe gotten involved in more things [that] Fran Drescher is involved with. All kinds of things from environmental issues, to health, to civil liberties, that's what I think Fran would be doing now - opening her big Queens mouth for the greater good."

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Over the past two decades, Drescher has been heavily involved with charity work. After getting diagnosed with uterine cancer, she beat the disease and wrote about her experience in the book Cancer Schmancer. Then she went on to create the Cancer Schmancer Movement, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping women prevent cancer and identify cancer at its earliest, most curable stages. Maybe Fran Fine would also take up this cause.

Drescher revealed she's working on something 'big' with Jacob, but did not describe it as a revival. "We're working on a very big project. It's going to be very exciting for the fans, but I'm not at liberty to announce it yet. But it's gonna be big." (Maybe it's a one-off reunion special?)

Well, I've got a pitch for a revival: Fran Fine and Maxwell Sheffield have triplets, and hire a new nanny to take care of them. And that nanny is...Roseanne! Boom. Instant ratings.