Christmas is coming early, at least to the Frasier set, and there will be a lot of holiday shenanigans for fans to see in the season 2 finale.
“The center of the Christmas episode, the holiday capper, is mostly about Alan reuniting with his estranged daughter,” Anders Keith, who plays David Crane, exclusively told Us Weekly of the upcoming Thursday, November 14, episode.
Throughout the first two seasons of the Frasier reboot, viewers learned that Professor Alan Cornwall (Nicholas Lyndhurst) a.k.a. Frasier Crane’s (Kelsey Grammer) best friend, hasn’t seen his daughter in years — even after she had a baby.
While Keith told Us his character isn’t fully involved with Alan’s heartwarming story line, he teased that David does assist Frasier when he “hatches a plan” to help with the reunion.
Anders Keith. Chris Haston/Paramount+
“I’m tasked with creating something for the both of them. I would say that David gets a little mad with power, let’s put it that way,” Keith explained. “He loses track of the goal, but they get there. We’ll see if it works out. Who knows? Maybe it doesn’t.”
The actor, who was introduced in the reboot as Frasier’s nephew, has since become Alan’s assistant at Harvard, which has bonded them even further. (David is Niles Crane and Daphne Moon’s son.)
“Nicholas Lyndhurst, I think he could sell anything. Maybe I could be replaced with a sack of potatoes, and he could still make it funny,” Keith said of their onscreen dynamic. “In terms of the characters though, a classic team-up is the cynical, jaded, demanding authority figure, and the innocent, youthful, uncorrupted pleaser who wants to just do right by him and gain his respect.”
He noted that Alan’s cynicism and David’s wide-eyed optimism makes for comedy gold. “It’s a comedy pairing old as time. It’s fun to see them work together,” Keith added. “I do think it comes down to one is corrupted, one is uncorrupted, and we see those two things clash.”
Kelsey Grammer is ready for the Frasier revival to go the distance. “I think we should go to another 100 episodes at least,” the actor, 68, told Variety in an interview published on Wednesday, November 22. “There’s enough groundwork laid between these human beings; they are wonderful characters. I want to see where they go. […]
Keith noted that even though David means well — and wants to help Alan — in the finale he will find himself over doing it once again.
“Let’s just say [there’s] aggressive arts and crafts. That’s the best way of describing it,” he teased of the shenanigans David gets involved in. “It’s a classic holiday arts and crafts activity. I don’t wanna spoil the wonderful work that set decorators and prop people did, but [it’s] aggressive arts and crafts.”
Keith, who called himself “so lucky” to be part of the Paramount+ cast, noted that Alan’s story line isn’t the only one highlighted in the finale.
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He hinted at a possible cliffhanger centered around Frasier’s grown son, Freddy Crane (Jack Cutmore-Scott), and Eve (Jess Salgueiro), who he has sworn to protect after Eve’s firefighter boyfriend died. (Eve’s late partner was Freddy’s best friend at the fire station where he works.)
“Last season’s Christmas episode, Freddy was doing all these things for Eve [and] a year’s gone by,” Keith told Us of the pair’s evolution. “Does she feel anything for him? That’s the thing.”
Keith played coy about what will transpire, adding, “Maybe that’s a cliffhanger,” confessing, “I’m still thinking about it.”
Frasier has not yet been renewed for season 3, but the season 2 finale airs on Paramount+ Thursday, November 14.
