“He should give us a call”: Charlie Day’s dream ‘It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’ guest star
It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia has continued to make history with each passing season, but there’s one three-time Academy Award winner that Charlie Day has his sights on.
Rarely has television ever seen a success like It’s Always Sunny, as the cult comedy series transformed from being a small independent project from a group of friends to one of the most consistent and challenging programmes of the 21st century. While showrunners and cast members Ron Mac, Glenn Howerton, and Charlie Day had never made a television show before, when the first season of the series aired in 2005, they ended up creating a brilliant premise with infinite creative possibilities.
In December 2021, the show surpassed the record set by The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet to become the longest-running live-action sitcom of all time, growing to 17 seasons, with season 18 currently in production. Although it has never been given any attention by the Primetime Emmy Awards, It’s Always Sunny continues to level-up in terms of its guest stars.
It all started in the second season when FX felt that the show needed a more established name, given that all of the main actors were relatively unknown at this stage in their careers. While the inclusion of Danny DeVito as Frank Reynolds seemed like a strange bit of celebrity casting at first, he slowly became an essential part of the series. Even if DeVito is an icon to older generations for his work in Batman Returns, Throw Momma From The Train, Twins, and Get Shorty, among others, there’s an entire wave of younger people who know him best as Frank.
Over the course of its run, the show has managed to pull in an impressive array of guest stars, including Dolph Lundgren, Alex Wolff, Sean William Scott, Bryan Cranston, Jason Sudeikis, Dax Shepard, Christopher Lloyd, and even Guillermo del Toro, but Day revealed that there is one elusive guest star whom the creators have dreamed the most about casting.
“Well, you know, honestly, Danny and Jack Nicholson are good friends, so when he’s ready to start doing television, he should give us a call,” Day said.
Nicholson and DeVito first appeared together in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, the ‘Best Picture’ winner that also earned the former his first prize for ‘Best Actor’ at the Academy Awards. In addition to being close friends over the years, DeVito also directed him to an acclaimed performance in the crime biopic Hoffa.
Nicholson has officially been retired since 2010, during which he has only appeared in the James L Brooks romantic comedy How Do You Know, and while there’s been no suggestion as to whether he would be interested in making a comeback, he hasn’t entirely been out of the public view, appearing at the 2013 Academy Awards to help present the ‘Best Picture’ prize, and more recently was seen in the crowd for the 50th anniversary celebration of Saturday Night Live.
DeVito has completely revitalised his career with It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and there’s always the possibility that Nicholson would want to play in the same universe, so even if he’s sceptical about committing to an entire film, he might find a guest role on a popular show to be something more agreeable.
