Watching Bones

(At least temporarily, that is…)

Well, we’re not completely over the shocker that Zack is not going to be magically back next season, but we’re having to come to terms with it quickly, because the casting for the rotations of grad students has begun! Meet Michael Badalucco, whom you might remember from The Practice - he played Jimmy. (Although since I don’t watch that show, I remember him best as “Baby Faced Nelson” from Oh Brother Where Art Thou. Kind of a weird person to be playing on Bones, if you ask me… but hey, whatever works - and let’s hope he does!)

It seems like the news is being met with varying degrees of outrage and acceptance. For those die-hard Zack fans who can’t seem to let go, this is just another hit for the show. Some people are wondering what’s happening to the writers and if the show has hope of pulling out of the downward spiral that it seems to have taken. Others are more accepting of the change and are willing to move past the sorrow of Zack’s removal from the show. Either way, the die has been cast, so I guess we can only wait and see how the new “rotation of grad students” goes and hope for the best.

Thus far, the show has been great, with the exception of the complete loss of weeks of episodes due to the strike - which I think played a big part in the absolute shocker of Zack’s turn to the dark side. So I can only hope that the next season will pull through with the same great writing as we’ve become accustomed to. Only a little over two months!

Just wanted to share this article with you - it’s an interview with Eric Millegan in the Lansing State Journal. He talks with them about the night he got the news that his character was being written off the show and how a good night went from bad to worse. It’s a neat insight into the fateful day for one of our favorite squints and how the news was broken to him.

I am a little confused about the “Gormogon logic” they talked about very briefly in the article - something about killing a few to help the many. Maybe I just need to rewatch some of the older episodes when the Gormogon storyline began… That’s something I’m hoping they pick back up on next season as they hopefully bring Millegan back for a few guest spots - the whole “how” he was convinced to join the Gormogon and what brought him to that point. Guess we can only hope!

Millegan reflects on ‘Bones’

U-M, Interlochen alum went from Broadway to TV

Eric Millegan was getting ready for a fine evening.

The “Bones” co-star and University of Michigan theater grad was courtside with his favorite basketball team, the Portland Trail Blazers. Then:

• He learned he would soon be unemployed.

• He learned he’d been helping a serial killer.

• And the Trail Blazers lost.

“That went from one of my best days to one of my worst,” Millegan said.

He’s had time to get used to it now, but viewers may need a while. The season finale aired Monday, packing a surprise.

There was Zack Addy (Millegan), former child prodigy and current sweet-faced scientist. He had been secretly helping Gormogon, the serial killer.

“When I first found out, I was like, ‘That’s ridiculous!’ ” said Millegan, 33.

Then he agreed it’s possible: Zack takes pride in being ruled by logic; he fell for the Gormogon notion of killing a few people to help the many.

By the end of the hour, Gormogon was dead and Zack was being shipped to a mental institution. He might return, Millegan said, but not as a regular.

So Millegan is back to job-searching. He has more turf to search than most, all the way from Hollywood to Broadway.

Before any of this, he was a sweet-voiced teen who grew up in Oregon, but has some of his best memories from Michigan.

He spent three summers at the Interlochen Arts Camp - “the most amazing time in my life” - and won a scholarship to the University of Michigan’s elite musical-theater program.

Those were good years, he said, especially after he became open about his homosexuality. And after graduating, he became busy in musicals.

On Broadway, he was a disciple in the “Jesus Christ Superstar” revival. Elsewhere, he starred with Estelle Parsons in “Harold and Maude” and starred in the early workshops of “Spring Awakening.”

Then came “Bones” and Millegan was considered a fresh face. “I’d been in the business for 10 years,” he said.

Zack was the assistant to “Bones” Brennan (Emily Deschanel), who had an almost maternal fondness for him. Derided as “squints” by the FBI guys, they were better at lab work than at human contact.

“It’s been such a journey,” Millegan said. “I don’t think any character has changed as much, except for Brennan.”

He savored the three years of steady employment. Shortly after the writers’ strike was settled, before actors were called back to work, he went to that Trail Blazers game.

Then he got a call, asking if he could come in the next day for a meeting.

“I’m like, ‘Hmmm. I’m paranoid and this does not sound good.’ ”

So Millegan insisted on the news then. He learned that his character was leaving.

Some good came, he said, including the quiet moment between Zack and Brennan. “It’s a great scene; the whole episode was really good.”

And some bad came, including a return to unemployment. Also, the Trail Blazers finished with a .500 record and missed the playoffs; sometimes, things just don’t work out.

Eric Millegan seems like such a classy guy. The fact that he was gracious enough and cared enough and took the time to send out an email to explain a little bit to his fans this past Monday’s episode, well, that just supports the theory. He’s even shared some of his potential future plans with us, so we’ll know where to look for him in the future. Best of luck to you Eric - we’ll miss you greatly and hope to see you back on the show as a guest star soon and often!

Okay. If you’ve seen the season finale, you’ve found out what I found out two months ago. I will no longer be a series regular on “Bones.” Creatively, they decided to carry out this storyline in which my character, Zack, was the apprentice to the Gormogon serial killer. The storyline landed Zack in a psychiatric facility and so he is no longer working at the Jeffersonian. This wasn’t my choice, but I embraced the challenge as an actor.

Over the last two months, I have been auditioning for some very interesting projects and I will keep you informed as to how it all goes. I’m also planning on bringing my cabaret show to NYC before the year is over. Once the date is set, I will let you know. I want to apologize to all of you for the times, over the last two months, in which I’ve had to be vague about still working on the show. I know that I told TV Guide that no one was leaving the show and well, you never know, my character is alive and there’s always the chance that he could return. Maybe they’ll have to visit Zack to help solve a case! I couldn’t tell you the whole truth because I was sworn to secrecy by the producers to tell no one about my leaving the show until now. I hated not being able to tell you (it really really s ucked) but well, unfortunately, it was my job to keep the secret.

There you go. I will really miss being on the show and I will really miss working with my friends David, Emily, Michaela, TJ, John, Tamara, Patricia and company. I loved working with Hart Hanson, Stephen Nathan, Barry Josephson and all the other producers, writers, and directors. I enjoyed working with the crew and it was an honor to be a member of the FOX family for 3 years. Finally, thank you for your continued support.

Still not over the shock of Monday’s bombshell? Yep, me neither. As excited as I was that they were going to be bringing in a new grad student(s), I certainly didn’t want to see it happen at the expense of one of our own. Zach turning out to be the Gormogon’s apprentice really sucks, although the episode was played excellently by the cast.

Apparently, Eric Millegan wasn’t terribly excited about being written off the show, although he doesn’t seem actually upset about it either. He talks about how it was an exciting way to go. One would wonder if they wrote him off because he wanted to pursue other projects, but he assures us that that wasn’t the case. Below is an interview Millegan did with TVGuide. It gives us a better look into how long they’ve known and what they thought about the way his character was ending his time on the show.

TVGuide.com: OK, so I have to say this out loud. Zack is the Gormogon apprentice.
Millegan: Yup.

TVGuide.com: I’m still cringing. How far in advance did you know about it?
Millegan: Two months ago. They met with me and told me and I was like, “What? Zack eats people?” And they told me that I don’t eat people, I kill them — I never reached the eating stage. And I was like, “Oh, My god.” But I was kind of excited because I knew it was going to be an exciting send-off.

TVGuide.com: So you’re leaving the show?
Millegan: Yeah. But they said, “You know, you’re not going to get killed, so we’ll still have the option of bringing you back.” It was shocking, and I just had to follow it and know that this is what’s happening. Zack ends up carted away to a psychiatric facility, but there is the possibility that the others may come visit me.

TVGuide.com: So we might see you next season then?
Millegan: Well, I’m not a series regular anymore, but it’s possible that I’ll be back from time to time. I can’t say much more than that, unfortunately.

TVGuide.com: Was this all written for you because you wanted to leave the show, or are you simply following the fate of your character?
Millegan: Oh, I’m following the fate of my character. It wasn’t my choice — it was a creative decision to shake things up and make a good season finale.

TVGuide.com: So you only found out you were the apprentice after the strike?
Millegan: That’s right. About a couple weeks before we resumed shooting.

TVGuide.com: Were there more Zack storylines that would have been pursued, had there not been a strike?
Millegan: Yes. As you know, at the end of Season 2, I went off to Iraq. They wanted to address it all in Season 3, but because of the strike they never got to it.

TVGuide.com: I was wondering when the show was going to address Zack’s post-traumatic stress. I kept waiting to see how he was going to deal with it.
Millegan: Yeah, I’m sad that we never got to go there.

TVGuide.com: When you first heard about the Gormogon storyline, who did you think the culprit might end up being?
Millegan: You know, I didn’t think about it. People on the board started saying they thought it was Sweets, the psychiatrist. But that didn’t even dawn on me. And it never dawned on me that it might be one of us, either.

TVGuide.com: When did the rest of the cast know that it was going to be you?
Millegan: Not until I knew. After they told me, they told everyone else.

TVGuide.com: Was it hard to keep it a secret form the rest of the world?
Millegan: Yes. But it’s my job to keep it a secret. And one thing that was hard was that Mike Ausiello did an interview with me at TV Guide’s Sexiest Stars party, and he asked if I was leaving the show. I said no, and I didn’t say I was leaving because I wasn’t allowed to. But then everybody on the message boards ran with that, saying, “Nobody’s leaving the show!” And I just thought, “Oh no, people are going to be mad at me when they find out.”

TVGuide.com: The actor who plays the master Gormogon, we haven’t seen him on the show before, right?
Millegan: No.

TVGuide.com: So was it strange playing Zack as a bad guy?
Millegan: He’s not so much a bad guy. He’s more a victim of brainwashing. It’s Zack’s intelligence that got in the way, because Gormogon rationalized [his cause] with him.

TVGuide.com: Do you think by the end of the episode, Zack really understood how he’d been used by the Gormogon master?
Millegan: Yeah, I think it really hit him hard. And actually, there was a moment that was cut out of the episode of Zack saying he’s sorry right after he explains how to catch Gormogon. Just an “I’m sorry.” I saw the cut, and realized they’d cut that out and was like, “No! Zack has to say he’s sorry!”

TVGuide.com: What have you’ve enjoyed most about working on this show?
Millegan: Working with the people. David [Boreanaz], Emily [Deschanel], T.J.[Thyne], Michaela[Conlin] and Tamara [Taylor] have been just wonderful to work with, and we really bonded very closely. Emily and I are even going to be singing “I Got You Babe” together at an AIDS benefit in August. So I’m still going to be bonded to them.

TVGuide.com: I think fans are going to feel like there’s an important chunk of the family missing.
Millegan: I hope so. I hope people miss me.

I can’t believe this. I never saw it coming. Don’t know how really, the signs were there, but somehow it’s a complete shock that Zack Addy, the baby-faced, innocent, genius squint on Bones’s team is in fact the Gorgomon’s apprentice. I’m shocked. I’m disappointed. I’m a little bit in denial.

This is a sad, sad, day for us.

Like I said, there were signs. I’d heard the rumors that Eric Millegan may not be coming back next season - even after he said he wasn’t leaving the show. And there had been speculation, although the same discussion boards also offered Hodgins and Sweets as possible Gorgomon suspects. I didn’t take any of those seriously. How could it be Zack? I feel like we’ve missed a big part of his story - due in large part to that stupid strike that took away so much time from us! Is this in some how related to what he went through in Iraq?

The people in charge of the show have pointed out that since Zack wasn’t killed, they still have the option of bringing him back as a guest star - but short of having the staff of the Jeffersonian visit him in the looney bin, I can’t see them giving him a day-pass to help out on a case. Even as silly as having his ex-co-workers visit him may be, I suppose it would be better than not finding out the why’s and wherefore’s behind what happened. How in the world was someone as brilliant as Zack conned in to becoming the apprentice to someone so obviously sick? Bones said on the show last night that his intelligence got in the way. Well, I’d still like a better explanation than that.

How about you - did any of you see this coming? I have to say that even my husband who’s usually annoyingly good at figuring out the plotline before it’s revealed on the show didn’t see this one coming.

I can’t even begin to imagine how these people get their hands on the info they do - I crawl the web as often as my 15-month-old will let me for new scoops, but apparently I’m not looking in the right places (or I don’t have the right connections.)

The Bones Spoilers on LiveJournal have a slew of spoilers posted (hence the name), but on that they’ve got is just too good not to share. So, here goes:

Looks like some of the lines from the upcoming The Finger in the Nest has been leaked, and these guys were kind enough to share. One of the lines for TJ Thyne’s character Hodgins is: “First, my best friend who used to work here, with me, he got into some big trouble and… he’s locked up now and I miss him…”

Okay, we can assume he’s talking about Zach since we already know that Bones is getting a new grad student. But what’s he locked up for? Some of the speculation on the boards is that he’s Gormagon, but I don’t buy it. I’m going to guess it has something to do with the time he spent in Iraq - we never did get the full story on why he came home like he did. I don’t think he was a deserter or anything, and I don’t expect it to be anything huge, but who knows, I could be seriously surprised. And with awesome writers like the show has, I’m sure the way it pans out will be great.

Also, later he also says: And Angela - you know Angela, she and I used to - we were engaged to be married, and well, that went south, too.

I don’t know what to think about this one. If you believe Ausiello, we’ve been promised more kissing - but not necessarily from Bones/Booth, so I assumed it was the Angela/Hodgins deal. Maybe not? But really, can you see the writers breaking up our only satisfying relationship on the show? Oh well, guess we’ll have to wait and see! What agony!

Check out this video showcasing some of the Season 2 bloopers from Bones. There’s plenty of profanity, blowing of raspberries, funny faces, forgotten lines, and general goofiness to enjoy! One of my favorite is David Boreanaz as Booth giving us a close-up on his beautiful smile - as in through a magnifying glass close-up!

There’s a funny bedroom scene with Emily Deschanel (Bones) and Eddie McClintock (Sulley) under the covers, and Boreanaz does a little dance step more than once. We see a silly side of Eric Millegan’s character Zach, and what appears to be a fly-by air attack. There’s an unscripted Booth/Bones kiss, and loads of uncontrollable giggles.

Squeaky nose jokes, more cussing, and what blooper reel would be complete without the all-time favorite, the fart joke. Anyway, don’t just take my word for it, check it out! (They make having and doing their jobs look like so much fun.)

Sometimes you look at an actor in the different roles they play and the interviews they give and they just come across as a nice person. I realize as well as the next person that an actor can have many faces and there’s no way to tell which the real one is, but sometimes a genuinely nice person does stand out beneath the scrutiny of the Hollywood lights.

TJ Thyne and Eric Millegan both appear to be such people. (The rest of the cast doesn’t shape up too badly either - but this isn’t about them!) Lee Hawthorne has a little blog that showcases different autographs from celebrities that have been received over the past year or so. As you may have guessed, both TJ and Eric have provided autographs and they are posted on the sight along with only nine other names. Apparently, TJ Thyne sent an autographed photo as well as a letter, and if you read the inscription on the photo, he mentions Lee’s note and it’s obvious that he actually took the time to read it himself. Eric Millegan sent Lee not one but two autographed photos. (You’ll have to check out his blog to see them both - I only posted the one where the autograph was more clearly legible.) I have to say, I’m impressed. Considering how much fan mail stars must get, to take the time to send something out to a fan - well, that says something about your character.

(more…)

We all knew Eric Millegan could sing - why else would he have gotten a part in Pirates of Penzance? But here is his singing the National Anthem at the Trailblazer’s game. Yes, I realize that this is an old game, but I hadn’t had the opportunity to hear Eric yet, and I just had to share it with you guys.

You’ll have to give the video a second or two, at first it seems to be just a fuzzy shot of the backs of the players and some guy in a suit for the first little bit, although you can hear Eric singing. After a bit, it finally zooms in on the overhead screen and you can see Eric (with beard it seems) belting out a beautiful Star Spangled Banner.

Oh, and he’s good - he’s really good! Don’t believe me? Just listen for yourself!

GotNews.TV has posted the following interview with Bones creator and writer Hart Hanson on the writers strike. Hart, along with Emily Deschanel, Micheala Conlin, and Eric Millegan address the strike and says that fans can help get things rolling again by writing letters, sending emails and by sending pencils. Yes, pencils. If you check out pencils2mediamoguls, you can send a box of pencils to the studios show your support for the writers. The hope is that they will come back to the table for more talks with a better outcome than we’ve had previously. The site says that the point of all of this is “we want the media moguls to start negotiating in good faith. We want the strike to end with a fair deal for both sides.”

Nikki Finke says, “Now is the time to save ALL our shows. Mail pencils to the AMPTP and to any studios whose shows you enjoy… Maybe we can help the studios see just how much support the WGA has. And maybe, just maybe, we can give them a graceful way out (not because they’re buckling under the writer’s demands, but because they care so much about their audience. Us. And isn’t that supposed to be their job?”

As much as I would hope that as the fans and viewers of the shows that we could make a difference, it seems that more often than not it comes down to the money. However, if they don’t keep the viewers happy, I guess that will hurt their pocket books in the long run… I hope that our efforts as fans DO have an impact, so definitely take the time to send a box of pencils if you can (it’s only $1) or send a letter or email. The site also has the names and addresses of the six media moguls - the men that run the multi-media conglomerates - and who are in charge and actually have the power to make a difference. They’re the people we need to contact - in a NICE, POLITE way please!

One of the really great things about the pencils2mediamoguls campaign is that any money left over will go to the Union Solidarity Fund, which supports the non-WGA members affected by the strike. I just think this is an awesome thing! Oh, and if you’re concerned about the waste of pencils, the vendor who is supplying them makes them from sustainably harvested wood (they don’t deforest) - Emily would be proud!

Wow! What a way to accessorize! Eric sure makes a statement in those red glasses. And he sure does match the dress of the woman on his arm…

I have to say, red glasses aside, Eric does look pretty spiffy in his tux. It sure is an improvement over the gold pants he wore to the American Idol season 6 finale. I guess that is a different kind of event than the 59th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards though! I do miss the rumpled, longer hair he wore in the first season or so of Bones though. Oh well. I guess now that he’s playing a “Doctor” he has to look the part!

Okay, so this is just a teeny tiny clilp of Eric singing… it’s mostly a quick look at tonight’s Halloween episode, an interview with the cast, and a behind the scenes peek. Emily Deschanel leaks a little spoiler that she may accidentally shoot Booth in the episode!

But there is ia segment with Eric Millegan about his outside interests. He’s a fantastic piano player, and talks about his love for singing. He says that you have to have other outside interests as an actor - especially when you’re not working and can’t find a job! Eric is getting ready to sing the national anthem at a Portland Trailblazer’s game.

Okay, so we probably all saw it coming that Zach was going to come home early from Iraq, so that’s no big surprise. But isn’t anyone else wondering exactly why they sent him home? I know, they said in the season premier that he was sent home because he “failed to assimilate” and was “detrimental to a military team approach,” but what does that really tell us? Zach is different than the typical soldier. Well, duh, we knew that already.

I’m curious if anyone else has heard if we’re ever going to find out, or if that’s all we’re going to get from the writers. If left to my own imagination, I do have a few thoughts on why they sent him packing…

Zach is obviously a thinker. He looks at things logically, and often, without the emotional attachments or hinderances that most of us would. In a social sense, this would be a big drawback. Put in a military situation, that might be a good way to live, until the fighting stopped and you had a chance to let your emotions catch up with you to register what you’d been through, and who you’d lost.

Zach, on the other hand, with his hyper-intellectual thought process, may never get to the point of grief and emotion that the other soldiers would. Can you imagine just coming out of a battle, realizing you had killed men, your friends had been killed or wounded, maybe you had been wounded yourself, only to have someone analyze you or the situation? Not exactly good for morale.

Or, there’s the possibility that Zach ruffled feathers by arguing the other side. Not saying that he would specifically sympathize, but I could see him breaking down the issues of war into black and white facts and not making a lot of friends in the process.

And, there’s the option that he simply was unable to conform to the strict routine and expectations of the life of a soldier. He seems to be a person who does things that have purpose and make sense. If he could argue that it was impractical or could be done better another way, Zach would be one to do it. Yes, I know, he takes orders from Cam and Bones pretty well, but they also think a lot like he does to begin with. Not to mention they all work for the same goal and purpose. As a recuit overseas in a war-time situation, Zach isn’t a soldier, he’s still a scientist through and through.

Anyway, we may never know the truth behind his early dismissal. It seemed to me that he was a little upset at having been sent home, although he seems to have accepted it and returned to his previous life without much trouble. We’ve only seen two episdoes since he’s come home - and he was a minor character in this past episode. Guess we’ll have to wait and see if there’s more to his story.

Happy birthday to Eric Millegan, our oddball but lovable “Zach Addy,” on August 25th. He’s celebrating 33 years young! Wonder how he’ll celebrate this year…?

Ooo-kaayy… not sure I’m digging the pants, but hey, whatever floats his boat. Check out Eric at the American Idol season finale! Wow - I’m still in shock at all that gold…