The tears became all too “real” for Kat Dennings and Tim Allen on Shifting Gears.

While appearing on the Not Gonna Lie podcast, the actress, 38, looked back on filming an emotional moment with her costar on the hit ABC comedy.

“We were both dreading it,” she said of her and Allen. “We were like, ‘Oh God, we have to cry. What is this?’ It’s like, I looked at him and I started crying, he looked at me and he started crying. It was real.” 

“In the first episode, we both got emotional and it was real,” she added.

The 2 Broke Girls alum admitted that filming the show is “a really interesting experience because we are dealing with grief and real issues.”

“It feels kind of crazy to be raw and emotional in front of an audience like that,” she explained. “And it’s this incredible combination of theater and burlesque or something like that. But as soon as I look into Tim Allen’s little face, I’m in there.”

“I forget about everything else because … he’s a very present actor, and he’s really feeling these things,” she continued. “I mean, I really haven’t experienced that a huge amount because, like me, people are thinking about their next line or whatever they’re doing.” 

“He’s so in the moment, and he’s such an amazing actor, and he will just be there with you.”

The sitcom centers around Matt (Allen), a “stubborn, widowed owner of a classic car restoration shop,” who is struggling to adjust to his estranged daughter Riley (Dennings) and her two kids moving back into his home.

Dennings said that working with Allen and the children has been “incredible,” adding, “Everybody is really amazing that just makes the funny parts even funnier and such a relief to do. It’s just been a very good, organic-feeling show to me, which is new, it’s a new experience for me.”

That new experience also includes playing a mother for the first time.

“I didn’t really know what to do career-wise,” she shared on the podcast. “I’m 38. I’m in this area where I could play mom, but me? I’m 12, how could I play a mother? That’s crazy. Obviously, the math maths. I was excited about the idea of doing something that I’ve never done before and playing this side of my life.” 

“I’m a stepmother, I have two step children. I’m a godmother and I have nieces and nephews that are like my own children,” she continued. “So I have this big side of me where there are a lot of children involved in my life so I was really excited to do that. I’ve never gotten to do that before.”

Dennings was also excited about the opportunity to work with Allen, saying, “This is Tim Allen’s next sitcom. He’s an icon of television, so I was like I can’t really pass up this opportunity, this would be really fun. And it is.”

In January, Dennings also praised Allen in an interview with PEOPLE.

“Tim Allen, I will say, is my favorite TV dad of all time. It’s been a real joy doing this show,” she gushed, noting that the actor’s crew has been with him since his days on Home Improvement, which ran from 1991 to 1999, and Last Man Standing, which lasted from 2011 to 2021. “They followed him through all of his projects, which I think is a real testament to him as a person.”

“We have a very funny banter. We really enjoy these scenes where we’re arguing. It’s really fun,” she added of their on-camera rapport.

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Shifting Gears airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET on ABC and streams the next day on Hulu.