Frankie Muniz has shared the memory of meeting his Malcolm in the middle On-screen father Bryan Cranston for the first time, and it was a skin-colored Speedo.
talking to PEOPLE Ahead of the show’s revival, Muniz, 40, recalled that Cranston was the last cast member to be confirmed, and his role as father Hal only ended the morning of their first filming together.
“The first scene we filmed is from the pilot where Jane [Kaczmarek]”, or Lois, is shaving Hal’s back,” Muniz said.
“And he walked in in a nude Speedo and said, ‘Hey, guys, I’m going to be your dad.'” He paused before adding, “Obviously quite uncomfortable.”
Muñiz was only 13 years old at the time and was already excited by the excitement of landing the lead role.
Meeting the rest of the cast had been exciting enough, but Cranston’s entrance was something else entirely. What no one could have predicted at the time was how central Hal’s character would be to the show.
“Hal was originally supposed to be such a small character…kind of an afterthought,” Muniz said. “But I think Bryan is an incredible actor and he created the show.”
Behind the scenes, the cast quickly settled into something that genuinely felt like a family, banter included.
They stuck clothespins in each other’s backs, played the circle game hard enough to leave bruises, and fought over a foosball table until the production team replaced it with a ping-pong table.
“It was a bad idea, we couldn’t get out of there to film,” Muniz recalled. “We probably could have turned pro.”
Saying goodbye to this seven years and 151 episodes later was harder than Muniz had anticipated.
The cast was given about a month’s notice of the show’s end, which he says helped. But nothing fully prepared him for the final day.
“It had no effect on me like I thought it would have until literally the last injection on the last day,” he said. While the cameras were rolling the last scene, two or three hundred crew members who had worked on the show over the years had gathered on the set.
“I remember starting [to cry] when they started shooting, and it wasn’t for the scene, but it worked very well for the moment. “It was very difficult to say goodbye.”
The farewell party brought its own quiet emotions. Muniz and Jane Kaczmarek were the last two people to leave the stage that night.
“You realize in that moment that, wait, everything I’ve known for most of my life… is ending,” he said.
Malcolm in the Middle: Life is still unfair now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney+.
