Jaleel White Opens Up About HisFamily MattersCostars Believing He Was 'Difficult' to Work with: 'I Digress'

Mar. 15, 2025

The cast of ‘Family Matters’ in 1991.Photo:Craig Sjodin/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty

Craig Sjodin/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty

The actor, who played nerdy neighbor Steve Urkel on the series, joinedAndy Cohenon his SiriusXM showAndy Cohen Livethis week to discuss hisjust published memoir,Growing Up Urkel. The host asked White about his off-screen relationship with hisFamily Matterscostars, specificallyJo Marie PaytonandReginald VelJohnson, whom Cohen noted have spoken publicly about the challenges of working with White back in the ’90s.

“They, at one point, said publicly that you were not that easy to work with,” Cohen said. “Did that surprise you to hear?”

“They’re also over 70, and I’ve been told not to argue with my elders from the time I was 12 years old,” White, 47, responded. “So you know, with Jo Marie, it’s always like, what day did I catch her on or what day did the interviewer catch her? I talk about it in the book.”

Jaleel White, Reginald VelJohnson and Jo Marie Payton in ‘Family Matters’ in 1995.ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty

ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty

“So, when you say ‘difficult,’ I’ll be self-aware enough to say, okay,” White continued. “You know, as a 13-year-old kid, anytime I was called to set, I always brought my basketball. I dribbled my basketball everywhere, and I can hear the script supervisor to this day, Joyce Webb, going, ‘Oh, here he comes with that basketball.’ It wastap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tapconstantly.”

“It annoyed everybody,” Cohen interjected.

“Yeah,” White said. “If that is the extent to which I was called ‘difficult,’ then okay. I digress.”

In a 2022 interview withEntertainment Tonight, Payton acknowledged that White was “just a kid” whenFamily Matterswas on the air, and blamed “some of those adults” on set for allowing the young actor to “run wild and do whatever he wanted to do, thinking he can say what he wants to say, you know, and hurt people’s feelings and all that.”

Jaleel White in ‘Family Matters’ in 1990.ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty

VelJohnson, 72, noted that White joined the series midway through its first season. “He had a lot to deal with, because we were already established as a family, but he had to get into the group and introduce himself,” he said. “We love him. We’re sorry he’s not here, but he’s a special person.”

On Cohen’s show, White also explained why he thought moving the show from ABC to CBS for a ninth and final season was ultimately a mistake.

“It was really time for the show to be canceled to be quite honest,” he said. “We had jumped the shark in about the seventh season, but you know, people were making more money than they had made for the first three or four seasons.”

“I’ve retained the ability to look at the show objectively as a viewer and also as somebody who was a performer inside of the show,” he added, “and we should have been canceled after the seventh season.”

Jaleel White in October 2024.Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty

Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty

White also reiterated hisresistance to ever doing aFamily Mattersreboot, comparing the series to another TGIF show,Full House, and Netflix’s recentFuller Houserevival.

“I embrace the TGIF legacy, but I’m also careful to acknowledge that TGIF was a sinking ship, and you cannot make shows like that right now,” he explained. “Fuller House, I feel like they got away with it because they have a schmaltzy, kind of vanilla thing that they do that’s very Hallmark-ish to be quite honest, and it benefitsCandace [Cameron Bure]and that’s wonderful. But I just didn’t feel like we could get away with that same brand of humor.”

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According to White, discussions of a potential reboot got far enough that he was offered a contract that was not to his liking. “I was not offered a direct reboot,” he told Cohen. “I was offered a blind contract with no script and half the pay that I made leaving the show, right? So, I’m like, ‘Wait, wait, what do you mean?’ I don’t get to meet any producers. I don’t get to see a script. ‘We’ll pay you this,’ ” he said he was told, “And it’s like, you know, if it’s just a cash grab and, you know, I just, I’m not interested in that.”

“If I touch anything that’s associated withFamily Matters,” he added, “I want to advance the legacy and I want to help the kids' careers.”

source: people.com