Hollywood Icon Tim Allen is Drawing a Hard Line in the Sand, Defying Industry Expectations by Refusing to Let His New ‘Shifting Gears’ Character Touch the Third Rail of Modern Politics

Tim Allen Addresses Why His ‘Shifting Gears’ Character Avoids Politics

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What To Know

Tim Allen intentionally keeps his Shifting Gears character, Matt Parker, politically ambiguous to focus on his personal story and complexity rather than political views.
Allen chose the role because the character’s experiences with grief and personal growth closely mirror his own life.
While Allen’s character avoids on-screen politics, Allen himself remains outspoken on political issues.

Tim Allen plays a grieving widow and auto restoration shop owner on ABC’s sitcom Shifting Gears, but his character is a blank slate when it comes to his political views, and that is by design.

Speaking to Us Weekly in a recent interview, Allen revealed that it was intentional to keep his character’s (Matt Parker) political leanings under wraps, so as not to distract from the other elements of Matt’s life and personality.

“You don’t know how smart this guy is. You don’t know who Matt Parker is,” Allen told the outlet. “He’s a little hard to pin down about what he really thinks [specifically politically].”

“I like to skirt all that,” the Home Improvement alum added, referring to on-screen politics. “This guy has to deal with a car shop and always wanted to be a designer and artist. He’s not what you think. He knows about ballet and art. We’ll find out all that. I’ve always wanted to play an artist that’s also a fundamental fixer.”

Allen is a sitcom veteran, having played Tim “The Toolman” Taylor on ABC’s Home Improvement throughout the 1990s and Mike Baxter, a sporting goods store owner, on the ABC/Fox sitcom Last Man Standing from 2011 to 2021.

The comedian noted that a character like Mike Baxter was much easier to pin down politically. “Mike Baxter did his vlogs and it showed his fix-it mentality,” he recalled. “If you were just a fix it person, how would you fix things? It’s whatever political system fixes things. I’m for it. Now you don’t know with Matt Parker.”

Shifting Gears, which premiered in January 2025, also stars Kat Dennings as Matt’s daughter Riley Parker, Seann William Scott as Gabriel, Daryl “Chill” Mitchell as Stitch, Maxwell Simkins as Carter, and Barrett Margolis as Georgia.

Allen told Us that a big reason he decided to accept the role and take on his third broadcast sitcom was that the character is “much closer” to who he is in real life.

“I’ve been through grief in my life with losing my father,” he explained. “I’ve been blessed to be a comedian, and so that’s who this [character] is. If I did it again, I wanted to get as much closer to the [man] that I am.”

Allen’s father died in 1964 when a drunk driver struck his car. The Toy Star star was only 11 years old at the time and over the last six decades has struggled to come to terms with what happened. However, in September, following Erika Kirk’s powerful eulogy for her husband, Charlie Kirk, in which she forgave his killer, Allen revealed the speech inspired him to forgive the man who killed his father.

Despite his Shifting Gears character’s lack of political opinions, Allen, who once described himself as “fiscally conservative and emotionally liberal,” isn’t afraid to speak publicly about politics. He recently spoke about his issues with DEI in a conversation with Bill Maher, and, in 2021, criticized Donald Trump and rioters involved in the United States Capitol attack.

Shifting Gears, Season 2, Wednesdays, 8/7c, ABC, streaming next day on Hulu