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Shameless in town filming this week

By Reel Chicago
September 25, 2020

Showtime’s longest-running series, Shameless was seen filming in town today for some pickup shots.

A small crew filmed exterior drone shots of the infamous Gallagher house for VFX plates.

The award-winning series was scheduled to air this summer, but like many other productions, shut down in March due to COVID-19. The cast headed back to work in LA on Sept. 8 for their final season, which is now likely to air sometime in 2021.

Now in its 11th and final season, the series filmed at Warner Bros backlot, uses Chicago exterior locations multiple times per year with vehicles rented from the Essanay fleet, which includes three 10-ton and two 8-ton grip trucks as well as a Mercedes sprinter van package.

Reel Chicago caught a moment at the Shameless location today at the now famous Gallagher house location.

TRIVIA: The Gallagher House location is so well known that Google Maps has actually tagged it.

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Showtime: Meet the fabulously dysfunctional Gallagher family. Dad’s a drunk, Mom split long ago, eldest daughter Fiona tries to hold the family together. Eldest son Philip (Lip) trades his physics tutoring skills for sexual favors from neighborhood girls. Middle son Ian is gay. Youngest daughter Debbie is stealing money from her UNICEF collection. Ten-year-old Carl is a budding sociopath and an arsonist, and toddler Liam might actually be black, but nobody has a clue how.

IndieWire: The series follows Gallagher family patriarch Frank (William H. Macy) and his six children as they struggle to survive on the South Side of Chicago. The feel-good description is that throughout the seasons, each of the Gallagher children — eldest child (and de-facto parental figure) Fiona (Emmy Rossum), super-smart Lip (Jeremy Allen White), responsible Ian (Cameron Monaghan), troublemaker Carl (Ethan Cutkosky), youngest daughter Debbie (Emma Kenney), and the much-younger Liam (Christian Isaiah) — comes into their own as they all take care of each other. The closer-to-reality description is much more debaucherous (there’s a reason this isn’t on basic cable). Frank is an alcoholic, deadbeat, absentee dad who’s only looking out for himself. Life is hard, but the Gallaghers — the rest of them, at least — really do take care of each other (and their friends, like next-door neighbors and best friends Kev and V, played by Steve Howey).

The recurring exterior Chicago locations are: