InStepWith

DAVID BOREANAZ by James Brady

Parade Magazine 13th May 2007

[transcribed © Boreanaz.net ]

When David Boreanaz, who stars as FBI agent Seeley Booth on the hit Fox series Bones, was a kid, he wangled a family connection into a job as bal boy for the NFL's Pitssburgh Steelers. And ever since, he's used sports analogies in trying to explain acting to a civilian.

Asked why he and Bones co-star Emily Deschanel work an 80-hour week but still see acting coach Ivana Chubbuck, David said "You've gotta work the muscle."

Then, when I asked how it was working opposite Anne Heche in a new movie, he said, "She gives a very interesting reading to her character. I'm expecting a fastball, but I love to be fooled when she throws a slider."

A big, strapping, good-looking guy, David didn't manifest the slightest interes in acting until after college. Someone saw something in the boy, and one of his first acting jobs was a guest spot on Married...With Children. But another guest role-on Buffy the Vampire Slayer-was his breakthrough moment. He drew so much attention, he became a regular and then starred in his own WB spin-off series, Angel. And now, Bones.

What does he do on hiatus? " I try to do little bits and pieces or find a small role in a nice film," he told me. Which is why he'll be in New York later this month for a one-week stage reading of Spalding Gray monologues. His latest film, Suffering Man's Charity, will be coming out later this year. It stars Alan Cumming-who also directs-and Ms. Heche.
"Alan plays a composer who things he's a great genius but isn't. It's a wild ride, right out of Sunset Boulevard-a dark, cult kind of film that I think will live beyond its time."

How does he feel going into Bones' thrid season? "our show is what a romantic comedy really should be," David said. "I'm reminded of Moonlighting and what Bruce and Cybill achieved.
"I bumped into Bruce Willis , one of my icons," he went one. "He said good things, and I told him, 'Look, man, I'm just walking in your footsteps.'"

Brady's Bits

David Boreanaz's name is pronounced with the accent on its third syllable(an).
'I'm forever being told it's Greek," he told me, "but it's Italian." His father is an ABC weatherman, and I knew that his mom had been a singer.
How good was she?"
"Good enough that she was recruited by the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra and offered a job. But it meant going out on the road with the band, and she didn't want to do that."
These days, David, his wife-actress Jaime Bergman-and their 5-year old son, Jaden, live in a home in the Hollywood Hills. "When I bought it, it was just a cottage, like a place on Cape Cod," he said. "But I saw a lot of potential. So I got a contractor. It's pretty messy and muddy right now, but we're getting there.
We're just back from a vacation in Hawaïi, and it's such a joy to see our son on the beach, to see his smile."