WHEN CAMERON MONA-
ghan departed Shameless
in 2018 after more than
eight seasons and 100 epi-
sodes, he had no intention
of returning, saying he felt
comfortable with the “logi-
cal conclusion” for his
character, Ian Gallagher. The
actor made a brief appear-
ance in the season 9 finale
to help send off Emmy Ros-
sum’s Fiona, but he says
showrunner John Wells had
to do a “decent amount of
convincing” to get him back
full-time for season 10
(premiering Nov. 3 at 9 p.m.
on Showtime). Still,
Monaghan, 26, was only
interested on one condition:
The show needed to further
explore Ian’s “almost Shake-
spearean” relationship with
his boyfriend—and now
cellmate—Mickey Milkovich
(Noel Fisher). “There’s
still a lot of story to tell,” he
says. “We’ve never really
had these characters just
together in a somewhatstable environment for
very long, so that’s been
fun to explore.”
In classic Shameless
fashion, “a somewhat sta-
ble environment” means
prison...and the honeymoon
period is over. “It turns out
that living in cramped
quarters without much
break from one another is
not necessarily all that
conducive to a healthy rela-
tionship,” shares Fisher, 35,
who will be a series regular
for the first time since
season 5. “It’s basically
living together in the worst
studio apartment you can
possibly imagine.” Adds
Monaghan: “They’re in a
challenging place and trying
to work through their
issues. Now, the way that
people work through their
issues on Shameless tends
to be pretty volatile. I won’t
exactly say how they work
on solving them, but I will
say it involves shivs
and stabbings. [Laughs]”Noel Fisher&
Cameron
Monaghan
Shameless