Alyssa Milano is looking back on her time starring in Charmed alongside Shannen Doherty, Rose McGowan and Holly Marie Combs in her new collection of personal essays, Sorry Not Sorry. The actress, now 48, opened up to Entertainment Tonight about how the late ’90s and ’00s culture affected her relationships with her co-stars and where she is today with Doherty after their on-set tension.ย
“When I think about the ’90s…you watch reruns of Charmed, and I’m running around in like a bra and underwear for 80 percent of every episode,” Milano recalled. “We had to be scantily clad in order for that show to be a hit.” Despite being proud of the iconic television show, Milano and Doherty often struggled together in their time on set playing sisters, but the two are now “cordial,” the actress revealed.
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“I would say we are cordial,” she shared. “You know, I could take responsibility for a lot of our tension that we had. I think a lot of our struggle came from feeling that I was in competition rather than it being that sisterhood that the show was so much about. And I have some guilt about my part in that.” Despite the guilt she feels for her part in their years not getting along, Milano did reach out to the Beverly Hills, 90210 alum when she was first diagnosed with breast cancer in 2015.
“When I heard about her diagnosis, I reached out to her,” Milano said. “And I will send her DMs every couple of months to just check in. …I have respect for her. Great actress, loves her family so much, and I just wish I could’ve felt strong enough in who I was to recognize that back then.”
Milano has also struggled in recent years with McGowan, getting into a feud on Twitter last year that quickly turned into McGowan accusing Milano of creating a “toxic” environment on the set of Charmed and co-opting the #MeToo movement. Milano said that at the time she became an advocate for the movement, started by Tarana Burke, she had “not dealt with any of [her] trauma” from her own sexual assault. “I went from being a victim to a survivor, that transition is not easy at all. It really sucks, but it was necessary,” she explained.ย
