⭐8.6
Description: Watch the Irish American family the Gallaghers dealing with their alcoholic father Frank. Fiona, the eldest daughter, takes the role of the parent to her five brothers and sisters. Lip, Ian, Debbie, Carl, and Liam deal with life on the South Side of Chicago. Fiona balances her sex life and raising her siblings. Every episode is another crazy situation that one or more of the Gallagher six get into. Watch them grow and learn how to make their way in life with what little they have.
Creators: John Wells, Paul Abbott
Stars: Emmy Rossum, William H. Macy, Jeremy Allen White
Taglines: The Gallaghers. Absolutely, Wildly, Unapologetically… Shameless
Trivia
- Unusual for a television show, creator John Wells has a very strict policy of no scripts allowed on-set. The actors and actresses have to know their lines by heart.
- A unique show trademark is the main character breaking the fourth wall at the episodes’ beginnings, inquiring as to why the viewer supposedly did not view the previous episode, before recap flashbacks are shown (with unaired scenes).
- Steve Howey, who plays Kev, spent the entire season three recovering from a torn Achilles’ tendon.
- This is an American remake of an English series, Shameless (2004). The UK counterpart (same title) is set on the Chatsworth council estate, a fictional borough in Manchester. It originally ran from 2004 to 2013 for eleven seasons, and 139 episodes.
- With the renewal for season 11, it became the longest show in both episodes (134) and seasons of all of Showtime’s history.
- The show goes to Chicago twice for a week to shoot exteriors, after filming every six episodes on Warner Brothers’ sound stages.
- According to details written in the early script of the show’s pilot episode, Fiona Gallagher was originally supposed to be very average-looking and overweight, with rattier clothes and messy blonde hair; a huge contrast from the slender, brunette beauty (Emmy Rossum).
- The cast admits that sometimes the scripts and story lines are outrageous, even to them.