In addition to hosting Project Runway All Stars, appearing in Aug. 4 series Wet Hot American Summer: Ten Years Later, toplining the upcoming Netflix dark comedy Insatiable, and fighting to hold President Donald Trump accountable for his alleged “collusion” with Russia, Alyssa Milano is also—if the tabloids are to be believed—circling a reboot of the beloved former WB show Charmed.
Just last week, inTouch ran an “exclusive” claiming that Milano and Shannen Doherty are “in talks for a reboot” of the show, and Holly Marie Combs is interested in reprising her role as well. Combs subsequently took to social media to throw cold water on the report of dubious provenance, writing, “I’m sorry to say that all the reboot rumors are just that… rumors.”
Created by Constance M. Burge and produced by Aaron Spelling, Charmed followed a coven of sister-witches played by Milano, Combs, and Doherty (Rose McGowan replaced her following Doherty’s character’s Season 3 finale death), who protected the innocent from demons and various other evil spirits. The popular fantasy series (1998-2006) ran for eight seasons and 178 episodes, accumulating a rabid fan base along the way. It earned the distinction as the second-most binge-watched TV series on Netflix soon after dropping on the streaming service in 2012.
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And as Milano tells it, the tabloid reports are mostly baloney.
“I’ll tell you everything I know: the last few years, CBS Studios—not the network, the studio—has been trying to reboot Charmed without any of the old cast members. They just want to use the franchise,” she says. “Because we have the best fans ever, they were up in arms over this and said you can’t do Charmed without the original cast members. I think CBS Studios understands the importance of getting it right, so they came up with the idea last year that they were going to do a prequel to our story but the script didn’t come in the way they wanted, and so it went back into redevelopment.”
The actress does maintain, however, that the cast is game for a reunion of some sort. “The other thing that I know is that Shannen, Holly, Rose and I have all said out loud that we are open to some sort of reboot, reunion or something,” Milano tells The Daily Beast. “The next thing I heard was that Netflix was doing it, but I heard that strictly from the media and not from my deal with CBS Studios or Netflix, where I have two shows right now.”
If the Charmed reboot were actually being set up at Netflix, Milano says, “I would think I would have heard what’s going on from my CBS Studios or Netflix contacts, but I haven’t heard anything. I’m as open as humanly possible to what the scenario is, but I don’t know the scenario, honestly.”
Well, there you have it.
