Debra Messing recalls former NBC exec saying she needed to have 'big boobs' on Will & Grace

Will & Grace's Grace Adler almost looked, uh, different.

During a panel celebrating the show's 25th anniversary at the Paley Center for Media on Monday, Debra Messing, who played Grace on the beloved sitcom, revealed that the then-president of NBC wanted her to "have big boobs" while on the show.

"The very first fitting, they had the chicken cutlets to make me bigger," Messing said, per a PEOPLE report. "I just wasn't a fan of like the whole idea of it. I was like, 'You know what? I don't need that.' And they're like, 'Well, it's the president of the network [saying this].' And I said, 'If he wants it, then he needs to come here and tell me to my face.'"

Though Messing ultimately won that particular battle, fans may recall ironically that in one episode of the series, her character wears a water bra to increase the size of her chest, but it malfunctions and leaks water everywhere.

Will & Grace, which also starred Eric McCormack, Megan Mullally, and Sean Hayes, initially ran on NBC from 1998 to 2006, before its revival from 2017 to 2020.

During a conversation with EW commemorating the 20th anniversary of filming the comedy's pilot episode, Messing revealed that she wasn't initially sure at that time how the show would land with audiences.

"The thing that is so vivid in my memory is that, as soon as it finished, Eric and I were seated in the little two-seater couch in the nook with the TV, and he just turned to me like a Buddha and just very calmly looked at me and said, 'I think we're going to be sitting on this couch for quite a while,'" Messing recalled. "And I turned to him and I was like, 'What?!' Because all I was thinking was, Please let this pilot get picked up, just give us a chance! And he was like, 'Yep, yeah, that's what I believe.'"

It wasn't until season 2 rolled around that Messing realized her costar was right about his initial impression.

"It was a provocative show, and sort of the core of what it is, it pushes boundaries, and we didn't know if people would go on that ride with us 20 years ago," Messing said. "So second season, it became clear that everybody was really responding to our brand of comedy, and then I felt like, okay, we belong here."

Will & Grace can currently be streamed on Prime Video and Hulu.

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