re: #147 Belafon

I think the reason they chose Roseanne was because it would appeal to a lot of the people they were hoping to communicate with. Not a single one of us needs to hear anything of what they are saying. But they thought they could control the beast.

I wish it had succeeded. There’s no way, around here, someone like me was ever going to be able to get through to people the way a show like that would. And there’s no way you could produce a similar sounding show without having it’s history. It would have been cancelled before you could build up the audience. If the actress were dead, maybe they could have done an after-Roseanne, but not now.

DING DING DING

I won’t go nearly as far as Frank did on Gilbert, but one thing she isn’t is stupid; you have to remember, Gilbert grew up on the set of Roseanne, she knew Roseanne very well, and tried to do right by her and the rest of the cast by helping to bring the show back, even with Roseanne’s cringe-worthy behavior and comments in the intervening twenty years.

I don’t think Gilbert’s intents were “mercenary” or driven by greed or ego because she’s had and continues to have a good career outside of Roseanne, but she did read the tea leaves and no doubt thought a Roseanne revival would work, but there was only one problem, one she no doubt tried to solve or mitigate but ultimately couldn’t: Roseanne herself.