His real first name was Willy...Willy Gilligan? Any truth to that? Or is it just a rumor?

Since Gilligan's first name was never used in the show (or in any of the reunion movies) we may never know for sure. But I did read somewhere (it may have been in Bob's book "Gilligan, Maynard, and Me") that he and Sherwood Schwartz had discussed this topic and they decided that if they ever needed to give Gilligan a first name that name would be "Willy". So technically Gilligan never had a first name but if Gilligan would have had a first name it would have been Willy. That's about as close as we can get to answering this question.

Since Gilligan's first name was never used in the show (or in any of the reunion movies) we may never know for sure. But I did read somewhere (it may have been in Bob's book "Gilligan, Maynard, and Me") that he and Sherwood Schwartz had discussed this topic and they decided that if they ever needed to give Gilligan a first name that name would be "Willy". So technically Gilligan never had a first name but if Gilligan would have had a first name it would have been Willy. That's about as close as we can get to answering this question.


:cool: Excellent thanks for the response Marv!

Yes Sherwood on Gilligan's Island exposed said it was Willy Gilligan.
But ofcourse it was never said on the show except for skippers and proffessors real names used on the pilot:)

For some reason, I always thought that Gilligan was his first name.

It's mentioned in the musical that his name is Willy Gilligan. And the musical was written by Sherwood and his son Lloyd, so I'd consider that pretty official.

His real first name was Willy...Willy Gilligan? Any truth to that? Or is it just a rumor?

Ross Shaefer, on his show, had a Gilligans island reunion back inb the late 1080s, and he asked Sherwood Shwartz what Gilligans first name was, and Sherwood said and I quote him, We were never going to use it but if we had, it would have been Willy Gilligan. So the others above are correct.