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With Shifting Gears, Tim Allen opted in on playing a sitcom widower for the first time in his career, and that distinction has of course led to his character Matt Parker entering the dating pool for the first time in years. His most obvious chemistry has been with Jenna Elfman’s Eve, with the Season 2 finale leaving the door open for a bigger romance in Season 3. (Despite Elfman’s other series-leading role.) Their age gap has been addressed on the show, but how does Allen feel?
As it turns out, the actor is of two minds about it. On the one hand, it’s something he’s dealt with in part due to the 14-year difference between him and his wife Jane Hajduk, to whom he’s been married since 2006. But on the other hand, he gets that it’s the kind of thing that can come off as…less-than-wonderful, particularly when it comes to how he and Elfman look together. Speaking with US Weekly, he shared:
It depends on the pictures. It gets creepy for me at a certain age [and] we’re right at that border. If Jenna didn’t look so damn nice, then our age gap is not that much. I just let my hair go natural and she just looks — especially on camera — quite young.
So if you show the Home Improvement vet a pic of him looking more grayed and haggard than normal, where Elfman looks fresh as a daisy, he might have souring feelings about the age gap. But when faced with pics where they're both looking spiffy, it's less of an issue.
Which, at least to me, is an almost surprisingly candid take on it. He didn't just brush the idea aside as if it wasn't a thing, knowing full well age gaps in Hollywood (both on-screen and off) are an oft-discussed topic. And he also didn't give a jokey answer that would also serve as a distraction.
Not that he avoided joking about it entirely. When addressing his scenes with Eve, the 73-year-old actor cracked that he looks "probably 68" under great light. He admitted he doesn't want the pairing to come across as "creepy," and isn't all that delighted when the characters draw attention to the age difference, even if he understands. As he put it:
It hasn’t really come out — except when they joke about, ‘Well, a guy your age.’ When they have her making jokes about it, it’s not my preference. But I said, ‘It’s admitting what is there.’ There’s times — and I’ll give it to them — that they're lit right and in the right clothing, so it doesn’t look creepy.
It also helps that Allen's character Matt Parker is a proud father and grandfather who owns his own business, and isn't a drug-addled hermit who can braid his eyebrows together, because that might tip the scales into creepy territory when Eve is looking at her best.
The Shifting Gears creative team does seem set on keeping Matt within a certain age range with his dating life, seeing as how they brought in The Office vet Angela Kinsey,, who's the same age as Jenna Elfman, to date Matt. So long as he doesn't start wolf-whistling at any of Riley's friends, I think we're all good here.
While waiting for Shifting Gears to hit ABC’s midseason schedule after being absent from its fall lineup, both current seasons can be streamed via Disney+ subscription
