Sitcom stars and birthday-sharers Tim Allen and Kat Dennings are at the moment teamed up for the most recent ABC comedy on the 2025 TV schedule, Shifting Gears, with fellow small-screen vets Seann William Scott and Daryl “Chill” Mitchell serving to fill out the solid. However it’s maybe not the human solid members that attraction most to the viewership demographic tuning in to see the House Enchancment alum again in car-restoration mode in primetime. [Grunts similarly to a car’s engine revving up.]
Allen’s Matt Parker owns his personal automotive restoration store in Shifting Gears — the place a poster for the present hangs within the background — and the sequence premiere doesn’t maintain again in exhibiting off a number of the autos being labored on, in addition to the A+ trip (save for all of the gunk on it) that Dennings’ Riley pulls up in. When Tim Allen talked to CinemaBlend about his large return to ABC, I requested if any of the vehicles that seem on the present are his personal, and his reply didn’t disappoint. As he put it:
Sounds grasping, however all of them. We have been gonna lease vehicles anyway and fill the store up, and so the road producer got here to my store and he mentioned, ‘Can we use any of those?’ I mentioned, ‘You need to use any ones you need. I imply, you bought to lease them someplace, may as effectively lease ’em ones round them from me. The query is, it is a course of. You may’t have a present of all restored vehicles. So we now have to do that reverse-restoration factor that we’re studying do. We’re taking a few of my sensible. 100-point restorations and making them look previous so we will take the previous off slowly and make it look new.
How cool is that? A minimum of in concept. Not solely does Tim Allen get to point out off his huge assortment of restored classics, however he will get to make just a little more money by renting them off. A complete win-win for him, I would think about, even when it feels like a hectic scenario to see these initiatives being dismanted, dirtied, and extra for the sake of TV magic.
As an illustration, the automotive that Riley and her children drove up in seemed fairly tough certainly, however was truly in pristine form earlier than its on-screen debut. As Allen defined:
We did it to my ’71 GTO 455, which could be very uncommon, and it is excellent. And it was actual bizarre. It seems like a bit of crap within the opening scene when she drives in, and I am going, ‘Does that stuff come off?’ As a result of I like that GTO. That took a very long time to get it the place it’s, and that’ll be her restoration of our relationship.
What higher method for a Tim Allen character to re-forge a bond along with his daughter than with a automotive restoration serving as a metaphor? Which feels like a joke, however I legitimately cannot consider one, except we’re speaking about Buzz Lightyear, and I doubt we’ll be getting any secret daughter reveals the place Toy Story 5‘s storyline is anxious.
I actually cannot blame him for sounding sincerely apprehensive after seeing the roughed-up verson of his GTO. And I guess it did not take practically as lengthy to mess it up because it did to get it trying excellent to start with.
Tim Allen talked a few completely completely different form of basic trip we’ll see on the present, and the way all of the work he put into was for naught as soon as it was confirmed to look on Shifting Gears.
Then we simply did one other Volvo ’67 122S which has at all times been one in all my venture vehicles in my head, as a result of it is form of a bizarre little automotive. There’s solely a lot you are able to do with Swedish efficiency vehicles; that is simply the way in which it’s, you understand. It is just a little 4 cylinder. Nonetheless, I at all times thought it was duck ugly, however there’s some form of cool factor to it. So I’ve dropped it just a little bit, put mini lights on it, and it is nice, after which we needed to take all of it off after which make it look rusty and every part. And I am nonetheless going, ‘Does all that come off of there?’
Regardless of what number of occasions he will get reassured that every part will prove okay, Allen little doubt nonetheless makes positive every time that no person makes the error of inflicting any everlasting injury to his prized rides. I’m wondering if it is intimidating in any respect for the individuals accountable for faux-damaging the vehicles.
Tim Allen completed up his vehicular rundown by addressing a venture that followers have seen him selling in the actual world, involving the conversion of a 1934 Ford Victoria. In his phrases:
Then we have an electrical scorching rod I name The Vic, which we’re midway by means of in actuality, and that’ll be within the background. That is going to be a kickass automotive when he will get it. At all times puzzled what it seems like, a scorching rod with electrical motor. I really feel like I am crossing swords, and all people’s gonna hate me for this, however I did it.
Hopefully if the brand new present is large enough to hit a 3rd season, the present can have Matt tackling some pop culture-friendly automotive restorations, such because the ’60s Batmobile or Thomas Magnum’s convertible.
Whereas critics weren’t precisely glowing with Shifting Gears reward, that’s par for the course for Allen, whose TV reveals and flicks are inclined to succeed no matter vital opinions. Let’s not neglect he is one in all comparatively few celebrities who had the largest film (The Santa Clause), the largest TV present (House Enchancment), and the largest e book (Do not Stand Too Near a Bare Man) all throughout the identical week.
It’s nonetheless too early to inform how effectively the sitcom will do on ABC’s Wednesday night time schedule, however the easiest way to maintain it on the air is to observe new episodes every week both stay or with a Hulu subscription.