That '70s Guy

by Eve Troeh

Tommy Magazine
November 19, 1998

Topher Grace's everyday-guy charm vaulted the former USC freshman from the classroom to a co-starring role on a new prime-time television series.

Topher Grace was studying for midterms in his dorm room last March when he got "the call."

Before he knew it, he found himself wearing paisley and polyester in a dank basement with mustard-colored walls and cheap wood paneling. There was eerie, pre-recorded laughter all around him and hot, bright lights. Heaven? Well, not quite, but a change almost as big. Topher was starring as muddled teenager Eric Foreman in the pilot episode of Fox's "That 70's Show."

For an actor who had only been in three plays before his break into TV land, the switch from student to star was completely unexpected. "It's weird. You're in school and you think you're going to be there four years and then you're yanked."

The people who pulled Topher from the life of papers and frat parties were Bonnie and Terry Turner, the writing/producing couple behind "That 70's Show," "Third Rock From the Sun" and "The Brady Bunch Movie." They chose Topher, hardly a Hollywood veteran, to make the central character of Eric as true to life as possible.

"Eric doesn't always quite know what he's doing," Topher says, "but that's good because I don't either." Topher had never been on camera before the initial readings for "That 70's Show" last spring and says he is the least experienced of the cast "by far."

Inexperience isn't necessarily bad for this project, though. "If I was too into being a big star, Eric wouldn't be real," Topher said. They're both just normal guys who seem to find themselves at the center of odd situations."

In one episode, Eric found himself onstage with Gerald Ford, naked, with his dad in the audience. Senior year in high school Topher found himself onstage, in a toga, with the Turners in the audience. Their son went to the same boarding school as Topher and they admired his performance as the lead in "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum." It was almost a year later, though, that they called Topher to read for "That 70's Show."

Never having expectations of a career in acting, Topher said at first he wasn't sure the phone call was serious. His high school plays were just for fun. "I didn't play any sports, and, well, there were girls in the plays." His unusual name isn't an attempt to project more star quality, either. "I wanted to be called Christopher," he said. "When people would just call me Chris I'd say 'topher' to finish it." By the time he got to high school, the first part had been dropped altogether.

Topher came to USC last fall not with hopes of Hollywood but just trying to get into the USC Cinema School, he says, "like just about everyone else."

As a college freshman, Topher bonded with new friends over beer and pizza, went to football games, stayed up all night doing nothing - all part of the "normal life" he now has to schedule around the rigorous demands of the show. Every Monday he still gets together with the guys for a poker night. Sunday nights Topher gets far away from the TV; he never watches his show. "I don't really want to get into the whole young Hollywood thing," he said. Topher adopted the mantra "don't change" from the start of his TV adventure, he said, because his brush with fame came around suddenly and could be over just as quickly.

Because "That 70's Show" has been deemed a breakthrough success by many critics and was picked up for the rest of the season, Topher's return to normal life isn't likely to come anytime soon. He does plan to finish school at USC, but when the time is right. "At first I thought I could be Superman and do both," he said, but when the show's pilot was taped during finals week, he realized it was more than he could handle. "I was so tired all the time. Maybe I just don't have the muscles for it."

"That 70's Show" has definitely provided another kind of education for Topher. With the young cast's dressing rooms set close together and long days spent gabbing on the set, "it almost feels like a dorm." The "professors" are the fleet of seasoned professionals brought in from behind the scenes of other television hits such as "South Park," "Murphy Brown" and "The Wonder Years." Extracurricular activities include publicity stunts and running lines. A typical day goes from nine in the morning to nine at night, adding another lesson in STRESS!

Topher is also learning the business side of television. "That 70's Show" was supposed to be called "Teenage Wasteland" after the Who song "Baba O'Riley," but lead singer Pete Townshend nixed it, along with the next suggestion incorporating some of his lyrics, "The Kids Are Alright." Two weeks before air the show still didn't have a name, so the creative team took a cue from screening audiences who kept referring to it as "That 70's Show."

Controversey didn't stop with the name, though. Television watchdogs,including church groups and network executives, pounced on the first episode, specifically a scene where Eric and his friends smoke marijuana in his basement. No tokes were actually shown, but the funniest bits in the show were the dazed expressions and dialogue of the experimental young "rebels." The writers and producers stood by the original material, arguing that a show about the 70s would be hypocritical if they didn't address the issue of drugs. Fox network executives eventually gave the scenes the OK, and Topher said the green light has led writers to push the limits even further in upcoming episodes, including the streak scene in front of Gerald Ford.

But Topher says "That 70's Show" is about more than just drugs, bad clothes and retro references. He thinks the show has a good chance of sticking around, largely thanks to the timeless characters. "Everyone has a girl next door, and everyone has awkward moments growing up," he said. The issues teenage guys face growing up haven't changed over the decades, so there will always be something new, but familiar, happening to Eric Foreman. "I've had a lotof experience being an awkward teenage guy," Topher said, "so I know there's no end to the embarrassing situations that come up."

As for what's going to happen to Topher Grace, he's too busy living in the constructed world of the 70s to plan for the future. After his unexpected success, Topher said there's no way to tell what, if anything, will come next, but he's looking toward all of it with the same goofy grin as his character. "My first performance ever was in second grade as the title role in 'Plymouth Rock' where I sang a song - something like 'Land on Me.' That's kind of where I'm at now. I'm trying to be ready for just about anything."