The '80s Action Rom-Com That Convinced David Boreanaz To Play Booth In Bones
Network crime procedurals are a dime a dozen, so what led to "Bones" taking off the way it did? It helped that Hart Hanson's series had a sense of humor about itself, combining terrifying serial killer storylines with episodes about alleged deaths by chupacabra or FBI agent Seeley Booth (David Boreanaz) and forensics expert Temperance "Bones" Brennan (Emily Deschanel) donning ludicrous wigs to go undercover at a demolition derby. But above all else, "Bones" was more interested in the home lives of the Jeffersonian Institute's employees than their field and lab work.
To be sure, Boreanaz and Deschanel's chemistry kept viewers hooked, even after Booth and Bones finally abandoned their will-they-or-won't-they rumba to get married, settle down, and start a family. Not that the series gradually evolved into a rom-com disguised as a show about solving murder cases — it was always that! Really, if there was ever even a sliver of doubt that "Bones" would eventually make its male and female lead a couple, then Boreanaz himself put it to rest the moment he quipped about Scully and Mulder in the pilot.
Boreanaz, for his money, was well aware of what he was getting into when he signed on for "Bones." As he's mentioned on multiple occasions in the past, the instant he read for Booth, his mind immediately lept to Michael Douglas' cocksure expat Jack T. Colton in "Romancing the Stone." One could even go so far as to argue that Robert Zemeckis' beloved 1984 rom-com adventure established the template for Boreanaz's interactions with Deschanel across all 12 seasons of "Bones."
Romancing the Bones
"I remember reading 'Bones' and being so intrigued by the [Booth] character and by its relevance to 'Romancing the Stone,'" Boreanaz explained to BUILD Series in 2017. Indeed, much like Kathleen Turner's timid romance novelist Joan Wilder gets entangled in a life-or-death situation with the free-spirited Jack in Zemeckis' film, the impersonal, highly logical Bones finds herself at odds with her new partner's spiritual outlook and go-with-your-gut way of doing things. Boreanaz not only cottoned onto this screwball comedy at the heart of the characters' relationship right out of the gate, but he was also determined to let it take its natural course. In his own words:
"I thought of that movie and the connection that those two characters had and the give and the take and the back and forth and the humor that could be created while solving crimes, and then you add the beautiful Miss Deschanel and it's like a perfect lighting in a bottle combination. You can't — that was just the [... ] just very lucky to have that. So that just unfolds, and so instead of chasing certain things like that I just want to kind of lay back and see how it goes."
Fox, it should be pointed out, wanted "Bones" to prioritize its procedural elements over its rom-com shenanigans, but Boreanaz and Deschanel made a conscious effort to explore what their characters were like off-the-clock as much as (if not more than) their daily lives at work. It certainly isn't the first time TV executives have turned their noses up at artists wanting to focus more on characters' relationships and emotional lives, but it is a telling example of why creatives should be trusted to have a better understanding of what makes a compelling story than their corporate bosses.