The “Awkward” actress said that the “Frasier” star told her mother, “It might be better for you to not have my last name.”

Kelsey Grammer’s daughter reveals ‘meanest thing’ he said after they reconnected following 12-year estrangement

The "Awkward" actress said that the "Frasier" star told her mother, "It might be better for you to not have my last name."

By Wesley Stenzel

Wesley Stenzel is a news writer at **. He began writing for EW in 2022.

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December 29, 2025 10:30 a.m. ET

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Kelsey Grammer and Greer Grammer in Los Angeles in 2017. Credit:

Barry King/Getty

- Greer Grammer said that her father, Kelsey Grammer, told her that he once wondered if "It might be better for you to not have my last name."

- The *Awkward* actress said that at the time, she "started sobbing," because "that was like the meanest thing you could ever say to somebody."

- The actress suggested that she later thought, "He's not wrong."

What's in a name?

Kelsey Grammer's daughter, Greer Grammer, shared an emotional memory of a conversation that she had with the *Cheers* star after they reconnected following a 12-year estrangement that spanned most of her childhood. The *Awkward* actress told the *Pretty Basic* podcast* *that her father and her mother, makeup artist Barrie Buckner, debated whether or not she should bear the actor's last name.

"He told me this later, but he was like, 'I told your mom — I asked her, or I said "It might be better for you to not have my last name,"'" Greer remembered.

Kelsey Grammer in Toronto in September 2024.

Mathew Tsang/Getty

The actress said that her dad speculated that dropping his last name "might be easier for you growing up," as the actor was not a significant presence in Grammer's life from ages four to 16.

Grammer said that she had an emotional reaction to learning about that conversation between her parents.

"I think I was 19 when he told me that, and I just started sobbing, because to me, that was like the meanest thing you could ever say to somebody," she recalled. "Like, 'I knew I wasn't going to be in your life, so I told your mom it would probably be easier for you to not have my last name.'"

The actress also indicated that she later realized that her father had a point. "He's not wrong," she said later in the podcast.

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Grammer ultimately maintained the *Frasier* actor's surname.

"That was always the last name that I had," she said. "And obviously, it was still from the times that I was younger. My birth was in a press announcement."

The actress said that the *X-Men: The Last Stand* actor paid mandatory child support to her mother, and also bankrolled her private school education, including USC.

"He did pay for college, which was amazing, for tuition," she said. "Anything extra, I had to pay for on my own. So housing, books, sorority, like all that stuff. So thank God I was on *Awkward*."

Greer Grammer in Los Angeles on July 22, 2025.

Monica Schipper/GA/The Hollywood Reporter via Getty

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Grammer eventually reconnected with her father as a teenager.

"When I was 16, I ran into him at a Christmas tree lot, and he came up to me, and he said, 'Are you Greer?'" she remembered on the podcast. "I said, 'Yes, I am. Then he went, 'I am—' I was like, 'I know who you are, duh.'”

Listen to Grammer's full episode of *Pretty Basic* above.

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