Brian Krause only knew that he was playing a love interest for Piper, and knew nothing about Leo's true identity. He even recalls panicking when he first read the script for "Wicca Envy" and saw that Leo had powers, assuming it meant he was a warlock and therefore about to be killed off. Shannen Doherty had to reassure him "don't worry, you're good".
Drew Fuller didn't know that Chris was actually Wyatt's little brother until midway through Season 6. Holly Marie Combs and Brian Krause didn't know either.
Michael Bailey Smith played Belthazor, the Source and a handful of other demons on the show.
The season 6 finale "It's a Bad, Bad, Bad, Bad World", where Mirror UniverseEvil Counterparts of characters interact with good ones, with their actors playing both halves.
Prue becomes quite The Fashionista halfway through Season 1. This is inspired by Shannen Doherty, who would often accompany costume designer Eilish on shopping trips and choose her own clothes.
Paige's romance with Richard was partially the idea of Rose McGowan. She also contributed most of Paige's wardrobe in Season 4.
Constance M Burge has said that Alyssa Milano brought a sexiness to Phoebe that wasn't there as originally written.
Actor Leaves, Character Dies: Prue, though in this case the actor was fired, as Milano threatened to sue the network if they didn't. Notably, Doherty directed the episode in which Prue was killed off, which she revealed on her podcast in December 2023 that she didn't know was gonna be her character's death. The show even asked Doherty to return for the finale in 2006, but she turned it down, which she also revealed on her podcast. Prue never appeared on the show again (except for a clip of her from behind and one from when she was turned into a dog).
At the beginning of the series, Phoebe moves back to California from New York. Alyssa Milano was originally from New York and had to move to California when she became an actress. This makes Piper's line "you've been spending too much time in New York" rather amusing. Especially since Holly Marie Combs herself grew up in New York.
Holly Marie Combs was raised by her grandmother and a single mother, like how Penny and Patty raised the Halliwells. There's also a subplot at the end of Season 4 where Piper is told that it'll be very hard for her to have children, only to later have three anyway. Holly herself experienced something similar, as a result of a surgery she had to have during the first season, and of course she became pregnant twice in the series.
When Rose McGowan first joined the show, she would sometimes write her lines or doodle in the prop Book of Shadows between takes - not realizing how much sentimental value it had to the cast and crew. During Season 5, Paige attempts to color-code the Book of Shadows and Piper gets annoyed with her for 'defacing' it.
In "Charmed Noir", Paige takes the time to praise the aesthetic of the 1930s, setting up her getting sucked into the noir novel. Rose herself has a fascination with the 30s, and collects memorabilia for Marlene Dietrich and Shirley Temple. Understandably, that's one of her favourite episodes.
Leo was a medic in World War II prior to becoming a whitelighter. Brian Krause had been planning to study medicine before he got into acting.
Awesome, Dear Boy: Kaley Cuoco had never seen the show when she was offered the part of Billie. But she accepted as soon as she was told the character "kicked butt and fought demons".
Billing Displacement: Mostly averted. The opening credits only credited the actors who appeared in the episode, different versions of each season's credits accommodating the missing cast members. The Season 2 episode "Morality Bites" is the only episode of the series where the sisters are the only main cast members credited. Although after Shannen Doherty's departure, Alyssa Milano took first billing in the credits, when she had been billed with the And Starring title. Holly Marie Combs had been second-billed and she was given the And Starring afterwards. Plenty of fanmade credits usually bill Holly first, due to Piper being the eldest sister.
Career Resurrection: Was part of one for Alyssa Milano. After becoming a child star on Who's the Boss? and a teen pop star in Japan, she was desperate to shake her nice girl image with parts in low-radar erotic films. Melrose Place got the ball rolling, but this put her back into the spotlight. With it came plenty of magazine covers and cosmetic endorsements.
Brian Krause, Julian McMahon and Kerr Smith all originally auditioned for Andy in Season 1. Krause got the last laugh, staying on as Leo for eight seasons, while Andy was written out at the end of the first (Leo had been written as a recurring character first, and didn't become a series regular until Season 3).
Kerr Smith was later offered the role of Leslie St Clair. When he turned it down and it went to Nick Lachey, he ended up in the significantly bigger role of Agent Brody.
Due to the punny nature of the episodes' titles, they are rarely directly translated and new ones are made up instead. For instance, the number of direct translations in the French dub is less than 10. See the entries on episode-specific pages for examples.
The Ukrainian dub somewhat bafflingly renamed the show "All women are witches", presumably to avoid repeating the same title as Bewitched. Rose McGowan wasn't a fan when she learned of it.
In a fan Q&A, Holly Marie Combs was asked which of Piper's outfits were her favourite. She responded that she "hated them all", especially the famous Coyote Piper one. Although later, when asked if there was one she wished she could keep, she responded the Valkyrie outfit from the Season 6 premiere.
Rose McGowan hated both the woodnymph dress and the Greek Goddess outfits from Season 5 (she has since reversed her stance on the latter, calling them "awesomely extra"). While she disliked the long hair she had at that point in her career (preferring to wear it short now), she said it fit the character.
Kaley Cuoco burst into tears when she saw Billie's superhero costume from "Battle of the Hexes" and outright refused to wear a cape with it. She also wasn't wild about the black vinyl outfit and wig Billie wears for her introduction episodes.
Brian Krause said that he hated the Elder robes in a convention interview.
Creator Breakdown: Rose McGowan joined the series after having been blacklisted by Harvey Weinstein, and mainly did it because she needed the work. The pressure of keeping the show on the air for two seasons to achieve syndication, coupled with long shooting hours and lingering PTSD, did nothing for her already-low mental health.
Creator Cameo: The series' costume designer Eilish appears in a photo with Paige in "A Knight To Remember".
Brad Kern viewed Chris this was in Season 6, and toyed with various possibilities and backstories for the character so that many of his early episodes were written without any clue of the direction his character was to go in.
The network really didn't like Holly Marie Combs, and didn't want her on the show initially, and made it very obvious in how they tried to force her to wear push-up bras and how one executive bluntly told her "I'm going to prove that the network were wrong about you."
The Danza: Alastair the chameleon demon, played by Alastair Duncan.
Dark Horse Casting: Holly Marie Combs was virtually unknown when she was cast as Piper. Shannen Doherty was the biggest name in the cast, with Heathers, Mallrats and of course Beverly Hills, 90210 to her resume. Alyssa Milano had child star fame from Who's the Boss? and was in the process of establishing her adult career. According to Shannen, she and Aaron Spelling had to argue in Holly's favour when the network didn't think she had "star power".
Dawson Casting: Albeit a minor one. Phoebe and Paige are younger than Piper, but their actresses Alyssa Milano and Rose McGowan are older than her actress Holly Marie Combs (and Holly was first approached about playing Phoebe because of this).
Brad Kern has mentioned that "Morality Bites" had eleven minutes' worth of deleted scenes that he would have really liked to include on the DVD.
"Charmed & Dangerous" supposedly had several deleted scenes too.
Directed by Cast Member: Shannen Doherty directed three episodes: The season two finale "Be Careful What You Witch For", the season three episode "The Good, The Bad, and the Cursed", and that season's finale, "All Hell Breaks Loose", where she gets Killed Off for Real.
Dueling Shows: With Buffy the Vampire Slayer - both supernatural dramas about heroines fighting demons. Buffy tended to be more comedic and high school-oriented (at first anyway), while Charmed was more melodrama. The two shows shared many guest stars, Charisma Carpenter being the most notable. None other than a pre-fame Amy Adams guest starred on both as well.
Dye Hard: Phoebe and Paige changed their hair colors a lot on the show. Phoebe went blonde in season 3, went three different shades of brown in season 4 and eventually went black. Paige was black in season 4, red in season 5, blonde in season 6 and then brown for the rest of the show.
In her memoir, Rose McGowan said she gained ten pounds for the role in order to make Paige "look super nonthreatening".
Alyssa Milano learned to belly dance for "Y Tu Mummy Tambien".
Enforced Method Acting: For a stunt where a door flies open and sends Billie falling back, they told Kaley Cuoco it was just a rehearsal. As a result, when they started rolling and the door startled her, it got a genuine reaction out of her.
The creator, Constance M. Burge, left the show in Season 3 due to creative differences; she wanted to focus on the sisters and their relationship, whereas the producers and executives were more interested in doing more stories about their boyfriends, which is why the Cole storyline stretched on as long as it did.
After the heavily serialized Season 4, the network asked production to make Season 5 to be more stand-alone. This was a particularly odd request as the ratings were strong and final episodes of Season 4 were highly rated. Tellingly, after Season 5, the series returned to more season-long arcs.
Network executives kept requesting for "more skin". This is notable in the change from Season 2 to Season 3 - the latter featuring much more form-flattering outfits for the actresses. In Seasons 5 and 6 this went up to eleven, and the three lead actresses protested about this before Season 8 went into production.
Holly Marie Combs revealed years later that she often found push-up bras among her wardrobe selections, in a not so subtle message from the higher-ups. As they provided no other options, she went braless for lots of episodes as a form of protest.
One of the stipulations for an eighth season was an inclusion of a younger character who could potentially star in a spinoff. The budget was also cut in half, resulting in Brian Krause having to be written out of the show temporarily and Dorian Gregory getting Put on a Bus completely.
An interesting one for the eighth season - they demanded that demons look more...well...demonic and that the vanquishes be more exciting.
Brad Kern says that pictures of Prue vanished because he was told by the executives that they would have to pay Shannen Doherty's per-episode fee to feature them. He however suspects that they could have been lying so they wouldn't still be promoting her.
And Peter Woodward is likewise British putting on an American accent as the Source in "Charmed and Dangerous". When he plays a different character in "Someone to Witch Over Me", he uses his own accent.
Lady Godiva is played by Kristen Warren, who is American, but had played an English character on the sitcom USA High too. In the same episode Lord Dyson was played by Maury Sterling, who is American.
Elsewhere averted with other English accented characters portrayed by actual Brits - Neil Roberts (Rex), Gildart Jackson (Gideon), Stephanie Beacham (Martha), Desmond Askew (Gith), and Siobhan Flynn (Melody).
Holly Marie Combs and Shannen Doherty had been friends for years when they played Piper and Prue, and it was Holly who even convinced Shannen to sign on in the first place. They remained friends for years but admitted to losing touch in the 2010s. Holly is also the only one of the leads who still gets on with everyone else (see below).
Kaley Cuoco describes her first day on the job being a photoshoot for the Season 8 promotional pictures, and Alyssa Milano came over to give her a hug and say "welcome to our show". This would then be reflected in Phoebe being the sister Billie became closest to (she was introduced as Paige's charge).
Holly Marie Combs and Brian Krause became fast friends and are still close all these years later, along with their on-screen son Drew Fuller. The latter has joked about Holly being "other mom", and they eventually started a rewatch podcast together called House of Halliwell.
One of the biggest rumors from the set was that either Shannen Doherty or Alyssa Milano offered an ultimatum that one of them would have to go at the end of Season 3. Both actresses denied it, and the former maintains that she was actually pushing for Prue to be killed off. Word of God is that she wanted to leave by the middle of Season 3 but didn't get "the call" until they were on hiatus.
A persistent rumour was that Chris was originally intended to be Phoebe and Cole's Kid from the Future - a highly unlikely scenario, considering both characters' lack of whitelighter powers (Phoebe's literally the only sister he definitely couldn't be descended from). Brad Kern denied it in The New '10s and insisted that he always was intended to be Piper's son, calling Holly Marie Combs's pregnancy "convenient timing". He also denied that Chris was meant to be Wyatt, which was another popular fan theory.
Holly Marie Combs debunked the myth that there were two endings filmed to "Something Wicca This Way Goes?" in case the show wasn't renewed for Season 8, saying that they only had the budget to film one.
Billie was not intended to headline a spin-off, and Brad Kern said years later that, while the idea may have been in the writers' minds, it was never more than talked about casually. The main reason for Billie's introduction was to a) give the three leads less stunt work to do, and b) fulfil the Fanservice requirements that the others were getting sick of doing (although Holly Marie Combs denies that she was brought in because they refused to wear sexy outfits anymore).
Hey, It's That Place!: Glen and Paige-disguised-as-Jessica have their wedding in the same church in Heathers - where Heather Chandler's funeral is held.
Holly Marie Combs became pregnant halfway through Season 6 and, while it was eventually written in, they had to resort to plenty of tricks to hide it. Notably in the headless horseman episode, Piper is the first to be decapitated. And once the pregnancy was written in, the next episode skipped ahead six months to accommodate it.
Holly was pregnant again in Season 8 but this one wasn't written in. She just wore a lot of black and looser clothes.
The three leads were initially good friends when the show started airing - enough that Shannen Doherty and Holly Marie Combs were bridesmaids to Alyssa Milano's 1999 wedding. Tensions started when Alyssa Milano attempted to drive a wedge between Doherty and Combs while Combs was hospitalised with cancer at the end of Season 1, which Combs did not know. Alyssa Milano's mother has denied that this was the case. This lead to a temporary schism between Doherty and Combs, with the former revealing she “cried every night” while filming Season 2. Both Doherty and Milano have stated that some days they would only speak to each other to say their lines. By the end of the third season, Doherty's character was Killed Off for Real. On her podcast in December 2023, Doherty revealed that she had gone along with the party line which was that she quit, when in reality, she was fired. Combs, also on Doherty's podcast in the same episode, got emotional when revealing that she had gone to the producers to say that she would not continue on the series without Doherty. In response, the show threatened to sue Combs and dock her pay in whatever job she would take next, even if it was "bagging groceries". Combs said she felt it was like the mafia and she was being blackmailed into staying on the series. Doherty and Combs revealed that Alyssa Milano had put an ultimatum that either she left or Doherty was fired and threatened to sue the network citing a hostile work environment, if they did not fire Doherty. Combs added that this kind of threat wouldn't be considered legitimate today, referring to the post-#MeToo environment in Hollywood where people who are actually creating a hostile work environment, which Doherty did not do, are facing consequences. Doherty prefaced the discussion by stating that there is no animosity, but that she and Combs wanted to be truthful about why Doherty wasn't on the show after Season 3.
Combs also stated that Brian Krause, who was dating Milano while she was working to have Doherty fired, knew about the situation and that he only apologised to her while they attended a Con in France in 2022.
Milano has stated she felt "like a third wheel", because the other two had known each other years in advance.
In Season 1 it was rumored that TW King was written out was because he and Shannen Doherty didn't get along. There were supposedly reports of her being "very pleased" when he was written out.
Danielle Harris describes her time on the show as being miserable, saying that the three leads were "always fighting". On her podcast, she says that Alyssa Milano would tell her what to do, but didn't clarify if that meant trying to direct her or just bossing her around. Shannen Doherty was also very mean to her in particular, and it only increased when a crew member she'd previously dated started flirting with Danielle to get back at her. She later said she was glad Aviva wasn't brought back, as she didn't know if she could return to that set. She was however happy to appear on House of Halliwell with Holly Marie Combs, seemingly on good terms and speaking more positively about her time on the show.
Armin Shimerman stated at a con that the Charmed actresses were the most-difficult performers he'd ever worked with on TV. (Keep in mind that the episodes he guest-starred in were during the Alyssa Milano/Rose McGowan/Holly Marie Combs era.)
In August of 2020, Rose McGowanwent on a tirade on Twitter, accusing Alyssa Milano of making the set "toxic af" - allegedly one day throwing a fit on the set screaming "they aren't paying me enough to do this s***". At the point when Paige was introduced, Alyssa was also acting as an on-set producer (see below), adding to their hectic schedule. Oddly enough, prior to the rise of the 'Me Too Movement' in 2017, the two seemed to be on good terms; Alyssa saying they talked "almost daily" on social media in a Reddit AMA in 2014.
Rose herself admitted in her autobiography that her own mental health was at an all-time low due to PTSD from her sexual assault, long shooting hours and frequent clashes with the execs (recalling one incident where producers threatened to destroy her career if she were caught smoking pot on the set). She also detailed an altercation she had with a new director who literally started screaming at her minutes into the first shooting day and, although she appealed to the execs to have him fired, he apparently returned two months later.
Shannen Doherty is still best known as Prue Halliwell, or else Brenda Walsh on 90210 depending on how old the fan is. Most of her work after she left Charmed was below the radar and she is usually touted as "Charmed star Shannen Doherty". The rising cult popularity of Heathers (possibly thanks to the musical in the 2010s) has led to her being remembered as Heather Duke too.
Holly Marie Combs initially fell into this too, but rebounded thanks to her role in Pretty Little Liars. Given Charmed's enduring popularity, it seems she's circled back to this.
Brian Krause's most famous role is Leo. Nothing else he's done has ever come close to topping that.
Drew Fuller is likewise best remembered as Chris, with his only other notable role being in the Lifetime series Army Wives.
Irony as She Is Cast: The mermaid storyline in Season 5? Alyssa Milano is terrified of water. She says she skimmed through the script and okayed it without realising she would have to get in the water. Ironically, she later listed it as her favourite episode of the show.
Killed by Request: According to Holly Marie Combs, Shannen Doherty was ready to leave the show by the third season due to creative burnout and frustration from how the network was treating them. Although she was pushing for Prue's death midway through the season, she wasn't let out of her contract until after it was over.
Life Imitates Art: Just as Prue and Phoebe mended their rift on the show, Shannen Doherty and Alyssa Milano did so in real life.
Missing Episode: On the first DVD of Season 6 the episode titled "Love's a Witch" was listed on the DVD menu but not actually present in the DVD collection of videos, a recall was issued shortly afterward in which you could trade in your 'bad' copy and get a 'real' copy.
Holly Marie Combs nearly left the show at the same time as Shannen Doherty, but stayed on once she was granted a pay raise to $60,000 per episode.
Rose McGowan (Paige) was always eager to point out that she just liked having a steady paycheck. But she later said that most of her issues stemmed from the long shooting hours and how little personal time she got as a result. She did say she'd be open to a reunion, so it seems she has some affection for the show. Since her history with Harvey Weinstein became public, she's been far more open that a lot of her misery on the set stemmed from still trying to cope with being a sexual assault survivor, that the grueling schedule caused her even more strain on top of coping with PTSD, and that she largely did Charmed because Weinstein had been blacklisting her from theatrical films and she needed the work. In her autobiography in the wake of Weinstein's exposure, she also added that she took the role completely seriously and she was still grateful to people that liked and related to Paige even if it represented one of the darkest parts of her life.
Never Work with Children or Animals: A real panther was used for "Wicca Envy", and the three lead actresses couldn't appear with it on camera (using special effects for the shot of Piper freezing it in mid-air).
No Stunt Double: Kaley Cuoco tried to do as many of her own stunts as possible.
Victor Bennett was played by Tony Denison for his first appearance, and James Read in all subsequent ones. They also played him rather differently - Denison's Victor was more confident, while Read tended to play Victor as someone in over his head in magical matters. Word of God is that the recast happened because Tony Denison was seen as too young, and the network felt he looked more like a slightly older love interest than a father.
The Source was played by Michael Bailey Smith in "All Hell Breaks Loose", Ben Guillory in the first few episodes of Season 4 and Peter Woodward in "Charmed and Dangerous" (and later "Desperate Housewitches").
The Other Marty: The unaired pilot - which was more of a proof of concept to entice the networks - had Chris Boyd as Andy Trudeau, who would be played by TW King in the main series. More glaringly, Phoebe was played by Lori Rom. According to Holly Marie Combs however, Alyssa Milano was actually who Aaron Spelling wanted for the role of Phoebe, but the network were fighting him for casting her as Piper and told him he could only have two of his preferred three choices. After the show was picked up, Lori Rom decided she didn't want to do it (rumours say not wanting to play a witch because of her religious beliefs), and they were able to bring Alyssa Milano on board.
There's no definitive answer for why T.W. King left after Season 1. There were rumors of tension between him and Shannen Doherty, with reports of the latter being "very pleased" when he left. Other sources say he left to star in a soap opera instead. And others say he asked for more screen time, but they couldn't find ways to use him.
It's a rumor that Charisma Carpenter auditioned for the role of Paige. However many others have said that Rose McGowan was always the first choice for the role, and Holly Marie Combs said she didn't audition and was offered it straight away.
In 2013 Shannen Doherty claims that she was asked to appear in the finale but turned it down - not liking what they wanted to do with Prue. This is in spite of others claiming she wasn't even asked beforehand. Others have countered that it was the Season 7 finale she was approached for, as they were uncertain if they would be coming back (see below).
Post-Script Season: The show was on the bubble throughout its seventh season. Brad Kern has said that production was game for an eighth season, but they had no idea whether or not they'd be renewed. (They actually didn't get renewed until a week before the season finale aired—meaning, unlike prior seasons, production completed on an air of uncertainty.) So, the writers tried to provide an episode that would allow for closure (the title mirroring the first episode, references to Prue and other departed characters and concepts, Daryl's conflict of loyalties reaching a head, and the destruction of the Nexus), but also leave the door open for continuing (the Charmed Ones being thought dead by everyone and changing their faces). Of course, the eventual eighth season was heavily panned for recycled ideas, a hated new character, budget cuts (which led to Leo having a minimized role and Daryl being outright dropped), and a lack of direction, but its last episode ended up being widely praised.
Produced By Castmember: Holly Marie Combs and Alyssa Milano both became producers around season five. Rose McGowan was offered the role too but declined, saying that the only thing that would have changed is "my name appearing twice in the credits".
Shannen Doherty and Holly Marie Combs were good friends for years, which is echoed in Prue and Piper being closer to each other than to Phoebe. Piper is also clearly the most distraught after Prue's death, which echoes Combs's desire to want to leave the show after Doherty left.
The tension between Prue and Cole in Season 3's "The Good, the Bad & the Cursed" makes a lot of sense when you realise their actors were dating at the time.
Phoebe standing up for Piper's right to breast feed in public is taken from Alyssa Milano's own views on the matter.
Billie's introduction as someone to help the sisters with demon slaying reflects that the character came in to give the three lead actresses less stunt work to do.
Real-Life Relative: Brad Kern's son cameos in the finale as the Magic School student who orbs a book.
Real Song Theme Tune: The Smiths' "How Soon Is Now?" As covered by Love Spit Love, the same recording that was used in the movie The Craft.
Piper has bangs in Season 1 for the only time in the series because Holly Marie Combs had just done the TV movie Sins of Silence, where her character cuts her hair like that to hide a bruise on her forehead. She was ready to grow them out by "Wicca Envy" but was told to keep them by Aaron Spelling, who felt that was her character's defining trait. She was allowed to grow them out when they were on hiatus.
Danielle Harris in "The Fourth Sister" was told to dye her hair red because she resembled the three lead actresses too much. As she was shooting a film at the same time (doing the film during her days and Charmed on her nights), she couldn't change her hair for continuity. The slicked back style was a compromise.
Paige's red hair in Season 5 was part Writer Revolt from Rose McGowan, who rebelled against the studio's orders that none of the actresses could change theirs without permission. When the furious execs demanded to know how this would be explained, she sarcastically suggested that a potion blew up and turned Paige's hair red. And that was exactly the explanation the show used.
Alyssa Milano likewise decided to chop off all her hair into a pixie cut for her 30th birthday. This was right before Season 6 started production so, rather than making her wear a wig, they threw in a couple of lines referencing Phoebe cutting her hair.
Paige goes from blonde to brown in Season 6's "The Courtship of Wyatt's Father" because Rose appeared on Regis & Kelly and let her fans vote on what colour she looked best as. Brown won out.
As Shannen Doherty would be directing the episodes "Be Careful What You Witch For", "The Good, the Bad & the Cursed" and "All Hell Breaks Loose", the episodes preceding those ones would find a way to write Prue out or minimise her screen time to allow her time to prepare. In "Apocalypse Not", she's trapped in a vortex. In "Bride & Gloom", she's in an enchanted sleep. And in "Look Who's Barking", she's transformed into a dog.
Leo's having to be Put on a Bus in the middle of Season 8 was due to budget cuts, requiring for him to be written out for ten episodes.
Phoebe being de-powered in Season 6 was because the special effects were too costly. As such she regains her premonitions (and it's implied empathy too) in Season 7, but never levitation.
Chris's storyline was heavily written around Holly Marie Combs's pregnancy in Season 6.
Magic School was created because the budget kept lowering, and producers cut cost by building one set that they could continually shoot on - as opposed to constantly going out on location.
Patty is conspicuously absent from many episodes in Seasons 5 and 6 that would otherwise make sense to include her for - especially Wyatt's Wiccaning ceremony. This is because of Finola Hughes's schedule for General Hospital. She finished up on there right before Season 7, allowing her to reappear for "Cheaper By the Coven". Patty also doesn't reappear until the finale, because Finola Hughes became a presenter of the show How Do I Look? She also alluded to possibly being able to make more appearances, but she had to move to New York to film All My Children. The episode "Witchstock" was supposedly intended to revolve around Patty, but was changed to Penny when she was unavailable. One can see remnants of this in how Paige reacts to meeting Penny's past self with admiration; she had only met Patty once briefly at this stage, meaning it would make more sense for her (as she had spent "Happily Ever After" getting to know Penny).
Phoebe and Paige spending most of the finale dead is because Alyssa Milano needed time off to visit family during filming, while Rose McGowan was also filming Planet Terror. "Forever Charmed" was filmed before "Kill Billie Vol. 2" due to them having to Trash the Set at the end.
While on-screen, Leo and Piper were together as were Cole and Phoebe. Off-screen, Alyssa Milano was dating Brian Krause while Shannen Doherty and Julian McMahon were a couple. Holly Marie Combs also ended up marrying one of the key grips.
Alyssa Milano had dated Eric Dane, who played Jason, for a while. As such, she channeled her real life emotions during their break-up scene (they had split up long before this).
Screwed by the Lawyers: Shortly before the release of the season 8 DVD production lost the rights to Love Spit Love's cover of "How Soon is Now" forcing them to replace the theme song with a rock instrumental used briefly as background music in "The Devil's Music". For a long time the replacement theme tune was the only one available for streaming, even on episodes produced before they lost the rights. Thankfully the situation was resolved in time for the HD remaster which debuted in late 2018 where "How Soon Is Now" was finally restored.
Jennifer Rhodes and Shannen Doherty definitely look like they could be grandmother and granddaughter respectively. Likewise the resemblance between Doherty and Emmalee Thompson (who plays Prue as a young child) is uncanny. There is also a big resemblance between Finola Hughes and Alyssa Milano (mother and youngest daughter respectively). This is especially notable in season 4 when the two have similar hairstyles. And rounding off the SABC, James Read as Victor has a resemblance to his middle daughter Holly Marie Combs.
Outside the Halliwell family, Kayley Cuoco has a distinctive resemblance to Barbara Niven who guest starred as Billie's mother in a couple of episodes. Barbara Niven also looks quite like Marnette Patterson, who plays Christy.
Ellen Geer was cast as the elderly Piper because her hair gave her a distinct resemblance to Holly Marie Combs. They also gave her contact lenses and shaped her eyebrows to resemble Holly's.
Sequel in Another Medium: In 2010 they continued with Season 9 and 10 in Comic book form, which has been very successful.
Sleeper Hit: Constance M Burge describes the networks originally having very little faith in the show, and they didn't think the witchcraft concept would sell until she made the characters sisters. Likewise, Shannen Doherty and Alyssa Milano were reasonably known to the public, but hardly huge stars. Holly Marie Combs was known from Picket Fences and TW King and Dorian Gregory were unknowns. The last of the ten episodes ordered was shot as a Series Fauxnale - but the show ended up snagging ten million viewers per episode. It was renewed for a full twenty-two episodes after only the second had aired. Eight seasons later and the show is still remembered.
Soundtrack Dissonance: "How Soon Is Now?" as the show's theme. While it has a somewhat mystical sound, the song has nothing to do with magic. It's actually about a man feeling lonely because he suffers from crippling shyness. The opening lyrics are used probably because they sound like, "I am the sun and the air," except they're, "I am the son and the heir."
Spiritual Successor: Can be seen as one to The Craft. Word of God is that the 1996 film inspired Charmed and it borrows a number of elements from the film, such as the girl-power themes, witches as the main characters and the magic system. Charmed's theme song, Love Spit Love's cover of "How Soon Is Now", was actually originally recorded for The Craft.
Star-Derailing Role: Shannen Doherty's departure at the end of the third season was what marked a decline in her status. The news that she had left a second hit TV show over tension with her cast members (the reason she had been fired from Beverly Hills, 90210 as well) saw her gradually disappearing from the spotlight. After a few failed reality TV show outings, she ended up doing Lifetime movies before fading into obscurity.
Stunt Casting: the last couple of seasons were hit particularly hard with this. As a character, Phoebe got the short end of the stick, as the most blatant and pointless were given to her as satellite love interests, further flanderizing her into a Serial Romeo.
Season 7 brough us Nick Lachey, then at the height of his reality tv fame thanks to his marriage to Jessica Simpson, as Leslie St. Claire, a ghostwriter for The Bay Mirror who had little characterisation outside of a lukewarm and ultimately pointless romance with Phoebe.
Kerr Smith of Dawson's Creek fame also showed up in Season 7 as a love interest for Paige. Living TV in the UK were particularly enamoured of hyping up his guest appearances in the episode descriptions. Tellingly, he was originally offered the role of Leslie. Given his relevance to the arc, he at least avoided some of the accusations levelled at Phoebe's love interests. His character was merely divisive.
The network didn’t even bother with subtlety when they gave the episode Witchness Protection the promotional title of Charmed, with Charisma, with the stunt casting being made all the more obvious by her character, Kyra the Seer, being a thinly veiled Expy of Cordelia Chase. Luckily, Kyra was well received for being a fun, relatable, likeable character in her own respect, and having amazing chemistry with the whole cast, especially Phoebe.
Another well-received example would be Billy Zane as Drake dè Mon, a larger-than-life former Demon who is about to die for the deal he made to be turned human. As far as Phoebe’s short-term satellite love interests go, he had the best characterisation, funniest lines, coolest powers, and got bonus points for helping fan-favourites Piper and Leo overcome their latest marital crisis.
Season 8 also brought us Jason Lewis of Sex and the City fame as the equally despised Dex Lawson, yet another short-term boyfriend for Phoebe. Despite being even featured in the promotional shots for the season, Dex barely had any character to speak of, was practically interchangeable with last season’s Leslie St. Claire, lasted only a handful of episodes, his romance with Phoebe was forced and even more passionless than Leslies, he contributed absolutely nothing to the plot and didn’t eventake his shirt off. Fans consider him a waste of screen time that could have been devolved to Phoebe regaining her love for magic instead – or if anything, at least for an earlier introduction of the better-received Coop, her final love interest and eventual husband who suffered from a last-minute addition.
Throw It In!: Neil Roberts kept ad-libbing calling people "darling" in Rex's scenes.
Holly Marie Combs talks about the hectic shooting schedule in the first season on her House of Halliwell podcast; as other Aaron Spelling shows filmed each episode in a seven day period, Charmed initially did as well. It soon became clear that all the stunts, special effects and wardrobe changes required meant that continuing on such a tight schedule was impossible - with shooting days sometimes lasting eighteen hours, and the episode "Wicca Envy" requiring an absurd amount of eye lights to hide how tired the actors looked on camera. Eventually they added an extra day to the schedule, meaning an episode would now be filmed in eight days.
The studio was constantly fighting with the network over things like changing producers, changing writers and the network not giving the money required for all the stunts and special effects. The three lead actresses initially bonded through the struggle, but by the third season, Shannen Doherty and Alyssa Milano "started to just go at it" (according to Holly Marie Combs). Shannen Doherty also decided she wanted to leave as early as the middle of Season 3, but was told that she wasn't going anywhere because she was under contract. However, she was fired while they were on hiatus between seasons.
Holly Marie Combs initially was ready to leave with her, but was warned she'd be sued if she tried. A condition for her staying was a pay rise and promotion to And Starring in the credits (Alyssa Milano now taking first billing). She's said this was motivation behind her becoming a producer in Season 5; to prevent similar things from happening again.
Earlier in Season 1 Ted King's departure was rumoured to be because Doherty didn't get along with him either. Other rumors say he left to pursue other projects, or wanted more screen time but producers couldn't think of ways to use him.
Constance M Burge left after Season 2 after protesting the upcoming Cole storyline. She had Creator Backlash about the season-long love triangle between Piper, Dan and Leo - and didn't want another love story. She remained on as Executive Consultant until Season 5.
Rose McGowan signed on to play Paige, not expecting to be around very long. Needless to say, she didn't foresee sticking around for five more years. She's been quoted as saying "every year Charmed would get renewed and each year I would cry." Likewise she was fed up at Paige being Flanderised into Really Gets Around and complained to producers about it. She later revealed that she was told she had signed for two seasons. When the ratings went up, they turned around and told her she had signed for five.
The actresses got fed up with the increasingly Stripperiffic outfits the sisters would be forced to wear (and writer Krista Vernoff even partly left the show over this in Season 6). Alyssa Milano has gone on record to say how much she hated dressing up in them. Before the eighth season, they went to producers and protested. The series' costume designer for six years was fired and replaced. This was also a partial reason for Billie's introduction - as they required a new Ms. Fanservice.
For the final season, the network slashed the budget in half. Dorian Gregory had to be Put on a Bus and Brian Krause had to be written out for ten episodes. The network also demanded lots of new characters - hence Billie, Christy, Henry, Coop, Dex and Agent Murphy. Additionally Shannen Doherty was not asked to appear in the finale and the budget was so tight, they couldn't even use a picture of her (which would have cost around $8000). Notably the final shot of the series - the manor door closing - is actually the end shot of the Season 4 finale re-used. The budget was that tight.
Years after the show ended, reports came out about sexual harrassment and lewd comments in the writers' room. Brad Kern, who took over from Season 3 onward, was accused of inappropriate behaviour towards female employees too, including making fun of Alyssa Milano when an illness caused her to gain weight, showing off Shannen Doherty's Playboy photoshoot in front of everyone and told writer Krista Vernoff in front of the whole writer's room "I bet you're good in bed" (she left when her contract ran out, preferring "the uncertainty of staffing season", despite the pay rise she was offered). Co-executive producer William Schmidt was fired after only being on the show a few months, and he suspects the reason was confronting Kern about his behaviour towards women.
Alyssa Milano claims that there was no on-set producer from about Season 5 onward, so she and Holly Marie Combs took on that role in addition to acting. She has described the process as "hectic", claiming it would be nearly impossible to get the showrunners on the phone to verify dialogue changes.
Aaron Spelling initially wanted all the episodes to be standalone so that they could air at any time, which is why there were rarely any holiday episodes. It was only when the cast and crew began protesting that a witch show needed a Halloween Episode, they were granted "All Halliwell's Eve", and even that was the only one until Season 8.
Fed up at being given these raunchy scenes every episode that she had to film with guys she had just met, Rose McGowan went to the writers and protested. This resulted in any love interests for Paige being long term, and she was never shown having sex scenes again.
They cast different actors to play the older versions of Piper and Leo rather than using make-up to age Holly Marie Combs and Brian Krause because Holly didn't want to wear prosthetics while pregnant.
Word of Gay: Alyssa Milano responded to a fan asking about Phoebe's Ship Tease with certain female characters such as Kyra the seer, and stated that she felt Phoebe was bisexual.
Write What You Know: Constance M Burge herself had two sisters and created the Halliwells based on them, with Phoebe being her Author Avatar. The lead actresses would often ask her about her sisters to get a sense of their characters.
Writing by the Seat of Your Pants: The series seems to have been an example of this. The most egregious example was probably the whole arc with Chris, a character who came from the future to Set Right What Once Went Wrong. The problem is, he kept changing the story of what went wrong and doing all sorts of morally questionable actions behind the Charmed Ones' backs. Eventually, the writers decided that he was Piper and Leo's Kid from the Future, here to stop his older brother Wyatt from turning evil. The reveal made a lot of these actions seem even weirder in hindsight as a result, though considering the Bad Future Chris came from and that he literally had no real idea what he was looking for, him doing reckless, questionable and borderline stupid things actually does make a degree of sense. Word of God seems to admit that they didn't know what his story was, having only decided on this course of action because Piper's actress, Holly Marie Combs, got pregnant; before that, Chris was going to turn out to be future Wyatt.
Written by Cast Member: Brian Krause, who plays Leo, wrote (parts of) "Sense and Sense Ability" (the one where "Paige is proposing violence against the monkey!"), inspired by a monkey prop he saw on the set.
Rebecca Balding appears as Aunt Jackie in Season 1's "The Fourth Sister", before joining the cast in a recurring basis as Elise Rothman from Season 4 onwards.
Peter Woodward plays the Source in "Charmed & Dangerous" and another demon in "Someone To Witch Over Me", though he wears prosthetic make-up in the former (and uses a different accent).
Brian Thompson plays one of the four horsemen in "Apocalypse Not" and later Cronus in "Oh My Goddess".
Will Kemp plays one of the Seeker demons in "Death Takes a Halliwell", and Demetrius the Titan in "Oh My Goddess".
, accusing Alyssa Milano of making the set "toxic af" - allegedly one day throwing a fit on the set screaming "they aren't paying me enough to do this s***". At the point when Paige was introduced, Alyssa was also acting as an on-set producer (see below), adding to their hectic schedule. Oddly enough, prior to the rise of the 'Me Too Movement' in 2017, the two seemed to be on good terms; Alyssa saying they talked "almost daily" on social media in a Reddit AMA in 2014.