Still one proud mama! Home Improvement star Patricia Richardson, who played beloved mom Jill Taylor on the hit ’90s family sitcom, gave fans an update on her former costars — namely, teen heartthrobs Jonathan Taylor Thomas and Zachery Ty Bryan — via a Reddit AMA on Thursday, February 25.
“I do stay in touch with Zach and Jonathan who in fact have written a really wonderful pilot that is sort of R rated and are shopping it around town,” the 65-year-old actress wrote in response to one inquisitive viewer. “Jonathan also directs Last Man Standing [which stars her Home Improvement husband, Tim Allen] and I got to see him there.”
Lest fans spread rumors of a reunion show, however, Richardson quickly shut down the possibility, noting that “usually those things don’t work out very well.”
“Of course we’re missing Earl [Hindman, who played mysterious neighbor Wilson] and that would make us all sad,” she continued. (The actor died in 2003 from lung cancer.) “It would be hard to imagine someone writing us a good script. It was always funny and crazy.”
The actress, who starred in Lifetime’s Strong Medicine for three seasons and had a recurring role on The West Wing, added that she’s proud of what her onscreen sons have done since the show’s conclusion in 1999. (The ABC series ran for eight seasons.)
“I think that it was very fortunate that Jonathan is so smart and well balanced,” she wrote. “Jonathan knew that pitfalls of the situation that he was in. When he left the show he ended up going back to school and got a really good education and thought a lot about what he wanted to do with his life. When he was on the show at one point he said to me he was interested in being a politician.”
Though Taylor did not go into politics, the actor, now 34, went on to have a great career in TV, guest-starring on shows such as Smallville, 8 Simple Rules and Veronica Mars.
