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Elton John made a splash on The Nanny when he made a cameo in 1997 in the season five episode “First Date.” Star Fran Descher revealed just how hard she worked to get the music great to appear on her sitcom.
“It took me a year or two get him on the show,” she told USA Today. “I was always an Elton John AIDS Foundation supporter and we were very warm to each other at all of his events.”
The episode was about Fran going on her first date with Maxwell Sheffield, played by Charles Shaughnessy, and hilariously pulling all the stops to prevent Elton from recognizing her after a prior embarrassing run-in.
As for how they got Elton to agree to appearing on the beloved sitcom, Drescher said it came down to good timing.
“When his documentary Tantrums & Tiaras was coming out, his publicist said, ‘Maybe this would be a good time to put him on the show to promote the documentary,’” she recalled. “There’s a scene (in the film) where he throws a tantrum because he’s trying to play tennis and a fan starts saying, ‘Yoo-hoo! Yoo-hoo!’ So we thought it’d be funny if Fran was actually the ‘Yoo-hoo’ lady and gets in trouble when she has the opportunity to meet him through Mr. Sheffield.”
The sitcom star praised Sir Elton for being such a good sport. “That was an amazing episode and he couldn’t have been more gracious,” she said, adding that the cast came up with a special way to thank him. “We heard that he loves red roses, so we filled his dressing room with red roses.”
The Nanny ran for six seasons on CBS.
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