Perfect casting doesn’t happen overnight, and The King of Queens is a great example of that. For instance, Jerry Stiller originally turned down the role of Arthur Spooner, and the showrunners hired early TV comedian Jack Carter to play the part instead. After filming the pilot with Carter, they learned they could get Stiller and had to make a difficult phone call to Carter to tell him the bad news. This, of course, required them to reshoot all of Carter’s scenes with Stiller in his place.
And although Kevin James and Leah Remini hit it off immediately when they met, finding someone to play Carrie was not easy. Megan Mullally actually auditioned for the part and was rejected just before landing a role on Will & Grace. They had such a tough time casting the role that they still hadn’t hired anybody by the time they held their first table read.
Remini happened to be there that day, but had just been on an unsuccessful sitcom called Fired Up, which got canceled after two seasons.
The Strange Way Tony Danza Helped Leah Remini Land ‘The King of Queens’
Remini wasn’t looking for more sitcom work at the time and was apparently just hanging around with another big-name actor who was serving as Carrie’s stand-in until they found the right actress for the job. As James explained during a 2021 cast reunion, for that initial reading of the pilot’s script, they enlisted the help of Who’s the Boss? star Tony Danza to do Carrie’s lines.
Danza had given Remini one of her first acting jobs on Who’s the Boss? almost a decade earlier. Despite her initial lack of interest in doing another sitcom, James said he was “literally in love” when they met and managed to convince her to read for the part.
“I’m sorry, were you busy collecting unemployment? I’m sorry, did we interrupt all that to offer you a job?” Remini remembered James asking her that day. The lighthearted jabs ultimately won her over, and she decided to go for it without having even read the script. Remini still had her doubts about the show due to past failures, but that instant connection with James was all the convincing she needed.
The King of Queens obviously went on to be a big hit, running for nine seasons and later becoming one of the top-rated shows in syndication—and to think it all started with Tony Danza telling Kevin James that he wasn’t pregnant.