Ray Romano Opened Up About The Real Life Struggles Of The ‘Everybody Loves Raymond’ Characters On An Interview With Larry King

Certain characters and storylines from Everybody Loves Raymond are based on real-life experiences.

The television show Everybody Loves Raymond featured a comical take on real-life struggles, and it turns out that most of the struggles were real. Everybody Loves Raymond ran from 1996 until its end in 2005. The show was massively popular and starred actor Ray Romano as the leading role. Other cast members included Patricia Heaton, Brad Garrett, Monica Horan, and many others. Many went on to be very successful in the entertainment industry.

As the show was being aired and since then, the creators of the show have revealed some interesting details about how certain characters and storylines came to be. Some characters, specifically Ray’s brother Robert in the show, were directly inspired by real life people. Other scenarios actually happened to the writers and executive producers. Here’s what Ray Romano and other creators had to say about the inspiration behind the beloved show Everybody Loves Raymond.

Is Everybody Loves Raymond Based On Real People?

Everybody Loves Raymond was one of the biggest sitcoms in the late 1990s and early 2000s. The show first aired in 1996 and sadly came to a close in 2005. The show tells the story of family dynamics and struggle through a comedic lense, and it spoke to many viewers. Actor Ray Romano was at the center of the series.

A year after the show came to its end, executive producer Phil Rosenthal opened up to CBS News about some of the inspiration behind certain characters and scenarios.

The interview was also a promotion for his memoir You’re Lucky You’re Funny: How Life Becomes a Sitcom. The memoir details a lot of behind-the-scenes details about Everybody Loves Raymond, which die-hard fans of the sitcom absolutely loved.

“I guess, I had these terrible things happen to me and I thought, ‘You could either be depressed or make something out of it,'” he said of his initial inspiration for the show.

Rosenthal estimated that 90 percent of what viewers saw on Everybody Loves Raymond was somehow based on real life, whether it be from his own life, Ray Romano’s, or other writers for the sitcom.

One specific Everybody Loves Raymond moment that was directly inspired by Phil Rosenthal’s life was the “Fruit of the Month” reference in the pilot episode. Rosenthal had given his parents a “Fruit of the Month” membership in real life, and his mother’s reaction inspired the scene in Everybody Loves Raymond.

In fact, much of Marie’s character was directly inspired by Rosenthal’s own mother.

Rosenthal’s real life wife, Monica Horan, was actually cast in the series to play Amy, Robert’s wife. Though their dynamic was not the same as Rosenthal and Horan, the marital issues between Ray and Debra were inspired by obstacles Horan and Rosenthal had faced in real life.

“That was kind of the homework! We would go home early, we were home for dinner every night. All the writers. And the assignment was, ‘Go home, get in a fight with your wife so we have a show for tomorrow!”

Ray Romano Says Everybody Loves Raymond Is A Documentary

Though not technically true, when viewers found out how much was based off of star Ray Romano’s real life, it makes sense to say that the hit series Everybody Loves Raymond is somewhat of a documentary. In fact, most of Romano’s friends and family, whom he borrowed from when creating the show, believe that it is a documentary.

A great deal of the show is entirely based on Romano’s real life and family, which he confirmed in an interview with Larry King in 2002.

“Well, that was where we started with, based on all the characters in my life and kind of a situation I was living.”

“But it’s a combination,” Romano clarified during the interview. “Phill Rosenthal our executive producer, it’s his parents also. And every writer in — we have ten great writers, and every one of them brings something from their life.”

One character in particular in the show Everybody Loves Raymond gave Romano’s family reason to call it a documentary: Robert Barone, played by Brad Garrett.

The inspiration behind Robert was Romano’s real life brother Richard Romano. Essentially everything about the character is based on Richard, but the actor Garrett gave the character a bit of a spin.

“Well, my brother [Richard] was — he is a retired cop now, but at the time he would take a lot of stuff from the other cops.”

“They think it’s a documentary.”

Though at the end of the day everyone in Romano’s family was thrilled with the show, his mother was initially annoyed by the portrayal of Richard Romano in Everybody Loves Raymond. Thankfully the show was a success and the Romano family found joy in watching their struggles in a comedic manner.

Where Did The Name Everybody Loves Raymond Come From?

Since so much of the sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond is directly inspired by actor Ray Romano’s life, it makes sense that the title also came from his real life.

In the previously mentioned interview with Larry King, Romano revealed where the saying “everybody loves Raymond” actually came from.

Turns out, the line and eventual title of the show was also taken from the actor’s brother Richard Romano.

“It came from a sarcastic comment my brother made, who is a police officer,” Romano said during the interview. “And he said ‘look what I do for a living, and look at Raymond — yeah, everybody loves Raymond.'”

“So we used it as a working title. And it just grew on CBS, and we couldn’t get rid of it.”

Fans could not imagine the hit sitcom being named anything else, and the origin story of the title just makes it better.