Trivia / Party of Five

• Ability over Appearance: When casting Julia, producers wanted a relatively young actress (the character was 15 at the time) but ended up casting the 19-year-old Neve Campbell due to her strong attitude during the audition.
• Acclaimed Flop:
  • The ratings for Season 1 were incredibly low and it was nearly cancelled - but it had a small pool of loyal fans protesting the decision. After it won a Golden Globe in Season 2, the ratings went up.
  • Even as early as the early 2000s, before the advent of media streaming, broadcast viewership was starting to drop off to the point where series producers Chris Keyser and Amy Lippman admitted during the Season 1 DVD that if a show had those kinds of ratings in 2003, it would likely be renewed immediately, as no episode during the entire first season ever dropped below a 5 Nielsen rating, and only three episodes in the entire season pulled in under 8 million viewers. Unfortunately, while its performance was respectable in hindsight, it had the misfortune of Fox executives expecting it to be a Beverly Hills, 90210-level hit.
• Actor-Shared Background: Claudia ends the series by attending Juilliard university in New York. Her actress Lacey Chabert also attended. She also played the violin, although she'd only been playing for a year when she was cast and wasn't as proficient as Claudia is supposed to be.
• Cast the Runner-Up:
  • Jerry O'Connell dropped out of the role of Bailey to star in another Fox series, Sliders, so it was between Scott Wolf and Jonathan Whitworth. The former got the part, and the latter got a role in the pilot and later another episode as PK - a bad boy love interest for Julia.
  • Tara Strong nearly got the role of Julia before it went to Neve Campbell. The two were roommates at the time. Strong makes a small appearance in the episode "Homework" as a girl making out with her boyfriend at the start.
• Creator Backlash: While the cast and crew got along remarkably well - almost to the point of genuinely annoying tabloid sources - Matthew Fox later admitted to TV Guide that he frequently got into disagreements with the showrunners over the show's creative direction, as he came to dislike the overly-emotional tone of the show and expressed wishes for the show to be more 'visceral', and specifically for the male characters to be more emotionally centered. Having said that, he's still proud of what the show was, enjoyed working with his castmates immensely, and expressed a willingness to move forward, as before the show was officially cancelled, he and Lacey Chabert were the only cast members to renew their contracts.
• Dawson Casting:
  • Scott Wolf was 26 playing the 16-year-old Bailey. As he had a youthful face, it didn't start to become noticeable until Season 5, where they quietly stopped mentioning Bailey's age (and there's even a joke about him acting much older after he dates a mother). Co-creator Amy Lippman didn't believe he was that old at first and made him show his driver's license to prove it.
  • Neve Campbell was 19 as Julia, who's 15. A subplot in Season 1 however is that Julia is able to pass for over 21 with a fake ID and work in a bar.
  • Scott Grimes was 23 playing Will, who is the same age as Bailey.
  • Michael A Goorjian was 24 as Justin, although playing the love interest of Neve Campbell, he actually looked younger.
  • Jeremy London was 22 as Griffin, whose age isn't stated but he's sent to military school in Season 2. His previous actor James Marsden was likewise 21.
  • Jennifer Blanc was 20 as the 16-year-old Kate.
  • Maggie Lawson was 20 playing the Alpha Bitch Alexa in Claudia's high school.
  • Megan Ward was 27 as Jill in Season 1, but certainly didn't look it.
• Dueling Works: With My So-Called Life initially.
• Executive Meddling:
  • Charlie was originally intended to be a woman, but Fox execs felt audiences wouldn't accept a woman who didn't want anything to do with her family.
  • The initial cut of the pilot was feared to be a bit too depressing, so Fox asked they redub a line where the Salingers say how much money they have to increase the amount (to avoid audiences worrying too much about their financial state).
  • Midway through the first season, an exec asked for an episode where something catches on fire, for the sake of a "Hot Mondays" promo. The episode about a fire at Salinger's was then written.
  • Julia was going to get an abortion, but execs insisted it be a Convenient Miscarriage, so as a compromise Julia suffers a miscarriage right before she's about to get the abortion.
• Fake American: Neve Campbell (Julia), Paula Devicq (Kirsten) and Tamara Taylor (Grace) are Canadian.
• Fake Brit: Alison the gay English girl is played by Aussie Poppy Montgomery.
• Follow the Leader: The series was created to capitalise on the success of Beverly Hills, 90210. It's also credited with inspiring the likes of Dawson's Creek, Gilmore Girls, Freaks and Geeks and Friday Night Lights.
• Keep Circulating the Tapes: The first three seasons were the only ones out on DVD for years. The last three were only available in the US as video on demand. A series boxset was released in 2016 release.
• Mid-Development Genre Shift: The series was first conceived as a light-hearted premise, just about a group of kids raising themselves. Series creators Christopher Keyser and Amy Lippman disliked this and took it in a more dramatic direction by having the teens face more realistic consequences of being orphaned.
• Never Work with Children or Animals:
  • The twins cast to play Owen in the first season could already walk, so they would have to put double sided tape on another baby's shoes, but the baby would peel it off and just run around.
  • They had to cover Lacey Chabert's face in peanut oil, butter, bacon oil and cream cheese to get the dog playing Thurber to kiss her whenever it was required.
• One-Take Wonder: For the scene in Season 1's Thanksgiving Episode, where Charlie confronts the drunk driver that killed his parents, they were having technical difficulties with equipment, so Matthew Fox was able to do it perfectly on the first take.
• The Other Darrin: Griffin was played by James Marsden in the season 1 finale and by Jeremy London for the rest of the series. Owen was played by six different actors, rapidly aging the character to an elementary schooler by the end of the show.
• The Other Marty: Jerry O'Connell was cast as Bailey at first but quit just before the pilot was filmed - to star in Sliders.
• Real-Life Relative: Tamara Taylor, who played Grace, is Neve Campbell's second cousin.
• Real Song Theme Tune: "Closer to Free" by the Bo Deans.
• Star-Making Role: For Neve Campbell, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Matthew Fox, and Lacey Chabert. Scott Wolf's career, on the other hand, didn't really go anywhere after the show ended.
• Typecasting: Neve Campbell as a Shrinking Violet.
• What Could Have Been:
  • The role of Kirsten was quite small as originally written, and Word of God is that Paula Devicq was only cast "to open the door and look beautiful". Fox executives loved her though, and she was featured in more episodes until getting promoted to regular.
  • Sarah was meant to only appear for nine episodes. Her popularity soared and she ended up staying on for five seasons, and even getting a spin-off.
  • Only thirteen episodes were initially ordered for Season 2, but the Golden Globe win saw the rest of the season being ordered.

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