It all started when Jack Tripper (John Ritter) ended up in Janet Wood (Joyce DeWitt) and Chrissy Snow’s (Suzanne Somers) bathtub after a party. Since the girls were already looking for a roommate, they decided to offer the place to jack, who pretended to be gay to crystallize his position in the house. The trio became roommates and their story captured a million American hearts in the 1970s and 80s.
But it is every fan’s dream to know about what went behind the scenes as the show was being shot. On screen, everything looks perfect. But a lot of hassles and bloopers cram the sets during the shoot. Here are a few interesting facts about your favorite show, Three’s Company.
1. The inspiration for the American Three’s Company came from a British sitcom called Man About the House.
2. Guess who almost got the role of our main guy, Jack Tripper…none other than Billy Crystal! But we all know who bagged the price at the end.
3. Turns out, Billy Crystal wasn’t the only star to be turned down. Loni Anderson also auditioned for a role in the show.
4. While other stars were being turned down, Suzanne Somers got an offer to play her part at the very last minute. She literally became a part of the show just a day before the shooting began.
5. Stanley Roper, the Casanova landlord, was played by Norman Fell who actually based the character off of someone he knew in real life!
6. The writer of the Three’s Company theme song also wrote the Sesame Street theme song. Interesting connection, there.
7. As we know, Norman Fell reluctantly had to leave the show for a spin off called The Ropers. But before he left, the Producers made a promise that in case The Ropers came to an end, Fell would be added back to the Three’s Company cast. Unfortunately, the producers didn’t keep their end of the promise.
8. Talking about pay disparity, Somers had to leave the show as she demanded to have the same pay as her male co-star. She left when the show was at it’s peak.
9. Heather Locklear is now a big star and needs no introduction. But at the time Three’s Company was going on air, she was a regular actress, hoping to get a big break through her role in the show. However, her auditions were a tad bit embarrassing as she started sweating profusely. To stop that, she stuffed tissues in her arm pits that darted out at the time of her audition.
10. Three’s Company was seamlessly made into a spin off called Three’s a crowd, featuring Tripper and his girlfriend. But the show did not do too well, despite Ritter and the original show’s fame.
11. The show had quite a few pilot episodes and the name Three’s Company stuck around only after the final pilot episode was filmed.
12. There really was no ice breaking ceremony for the three main characters, as they met each other for the first time on the first day of the shoot.
13. In the opening credits cameo, we see a beautiful woman walk past Tripper as he is on his bike. Seeing her, he loses balance and falls off. This woman was Suzanne Somers herself, donning a black wig!
14. The chemistry between Richard Kline and John Ritter was hard to miss in the show. And that’s the reason Larry Dallas was asked to stick around despite being called in for only a single appearance.
15. Fans across the country were saddened by John Ritter’s premature death. As a way to cope, people started buying the series in DVD format in really huge numbers. The year 2003 saw the highest sales of the Three’s Company DVDs.
