David Boreanaz: His Personal Journey From ‘Buffy’ and ‘Bones’ to ‘The Rockford Files’ Reboot (Exclusive)
TV historian Ed Robertson reveals why David Boreanaz, 56, is the 'Holy Grail' casting for Jim Rockford
Key Takeaways
- David Boreanaz has been cast as Jim Rockford in NBC's new version of 'The Rockford Files.'
- The actor began as a cult favorite portraying vampire Angel in 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer.'
- Boreanaz is one of the few actors to be a series lead for nearly 30 years.
When NBC announced that David Boreanaz would star as Jim Rockford in the pilot for a reboot of James Garner’s The Rockford Files, the reaction wasn’t the kind of surprise that usually greets a piece of casting news. It felt more like recognition given the fact that over three decades, Boreanaz has built his career by moving steadily from cult favorite to household name to veteran series anchor, becoming the kind of presence viewers grow accustomed to—and then rely on. And now that Rockford is officially part of the network’s Fall TV schedule, that is certainly going to continue.
From his breakout years on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, through a 12-season run on Bones, and then into seven seasons of the physically demanding world of SEAL Team, Boreanaz has spent most of his adult life carrying television series on his shoulders. Stepping into a role once made iconic by James Garner doesn’t feel like a stunt designed to capitalize on nostalgia, but more like a natural next chapter for an actor whose career has been shaped by endurance, trust and a quiet understanding of what audiences want to bring into their living rooms week after week.
Television historian Ed Robertson, host of the podcast TV Confidential and author of 45 Years of The Rockford Files, notes, “To me, doing a remake or recasting or reimagining—whatever you want to call it—of The Rockford Files is like the elusive search for the Holy Grail. It’s been talked about countless times in the last 25, 30 years. There’s been a lot of big names attached to it and, other than the aborted pilot they made about 15 years ago, it’s never really gotten off the ground.”
One point he makes about this new version, and why Boreanaz could be the right choice to resurrect Jim Rockford, is the fact that the character, as originally conceived, was a middle-aged man with some baggage. “He was a little heavy around the middle, as most people in their 40s and 50s are,” he says, “but he was still in good enough shape that he could handle himself in a fight if he had to. So, I like that they cast a middle-aged man. I like that they didn’t ask him to slim down so that he looks like Superman. The fact that David Boreanaz looks like a 55-year-old guy, that works for me. That’s one reason I think it’s a good casting choice. He also has a built-in audience, depending on whether they’re targeting younger viewers, older viewers or viewers of David Boreanaz. The guy’s been working consistently in television for 30 years, and whether he’s carried the show or been part of an ensemble, all of his shows have had legs. If they’re factoring that into the decision, that’s smart.”
The Philadelphia foundation
Boreanaz’s sense of steadiness didn’t come out of nowhere. Born in Buffalo and raised around Philadelphia, he grew up in a household where television was part of daily life. His father, longtime Philadelphia weather presenter Dave Roberts, was a familiar face to local viewers, someone people invited into their homes every night without thinking twice about it.
That early exposure shaped how Boreanaz would later navigate fame. He never presented himself as untouchable or larger than life. Even as his star rose, he carried himself with a grounded, blue-collar sensibility that felt closer to local television than Hollywood excess. A lifelong sports fan, particularly devoted to the Eagles and Flyers, he has always seemed more comfortable talking about teams and seasons than about celebrity. That background gave him an instinctive understanding of what it means to be part of people’s routines—and how easily that trust can be lost if it’s taken for granted. All of which is kind of ironic when you consider how he fell into acting in the first place.
Before being cast in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, he was someone making a living parking cars, painting houses and handing out towels at a sports club. He was famously discovered by an agent while he was walking his dog. There were some guest spots, TV movies and films, but it’s the role of Angel that initially brought him to people’s attention.
“I wanted to be everything. I wanted to be the fire guy, I wanted to be the police guy, I wanted to be the cowboy, the Indian. I guess I didn’t say I wanted to grow up and study the Shakespearean art of acting. I’m not good at that kind of stuff,” he related in the pages of Slayers & Vampires, the Buffy and Angel oral history book. “I love people. I love experiences. I love going out. I love traveling. I love adventure, I love learning, and I love involving myself in things where I’m going to learn more about people and seeing people. I’m extremely voyeuristic; I like to look at things. I can go to parks and watch people and their personalities. I didn’t study at the Royal Shakespearean Academy or whatever. I have a high respect for those people, but my method is trying to get down and dirty with it. I understand the level it takes in order to achieve the impossible dream, and for me, the dream is, ‘Be very simple.’ And that’s very hard to do. It’s very difficult. It takes a lot of work, a lot of effort. I just want to work hard and do what I’m doing.”
The breakthrough: ‘Buffy’ and ‘Angel’
Boreanaz’s career changed in 1997 with a role that was never meant to define him. Cast as the vampire Angel on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, he was initially intended as a recurring presence rather than a central figure. But the character’s mix of restraint, danger, and emotional weight struck a chord almost immediately. Angel wasn’t just another supernatural love interest; he was conflicted, haunted and morally complicated in a way that felt unusually serious for the genre at the time.
His chemistry with Sarah Michelle Gellar played a significant role in that response. Their scenes carried an intensity that elevated the material while grounding the supernatural elements in something recognizably human. What began as a supporting role quickly became essential to the show’s emotional design.
That audience connection led directly to the spinoff Angel, a gamble that could easily have failed. Spinning off a secondary character—particularly one tied so closely to a central romance—is a risk, and early expectations were far from guaranteed. But Angel found its footing by leaning into darker themes, moral ambiguity and long-form storytelling, allowing Boreanaz to evolve from romantic figure to full-fledged series lead.
To get a sense of what was required of the actor, on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel begins as a mysterious, brooding ally whose curse restores his soul, forcing him to live with the crushing guilt of centuries spent as the sadistic Angelus. His love for Buffy brings out his capacity for humanity, but it also exposes the central tragedy of his existence: true happiness costs him that very same soul. By the time he leaves Sunnydale, Angel understands that redemption isn’t something granted through love alone, but something that must be actively pursued. That realization becomes the foundation of Angel, where the character evolves from romantic figure to reluctant champion, founding a detective agency to help the helpless while wrestling with moral ambiguity, leadership and the acceptance that his redemption may never be complete. Across both series, Angel’s journey shifts from tortured lover to existential hero—one who chooses to fight, not for absolution, but because the fight itself is what gives his existence meaning.
“In the beginning,” Boreanaz explained, “Angel was an analogy to everyday living. I think when you wake up in the morning and look at yourself in the mirror, you see yourself, but in there are these fears and these demons that somehow are sleeping or hidden in your past. When you walk out that door and face people, you don’t really know how people are. They’re touch-and-go and those demons and fears will come out. So the idea was that I would be fighting those demons and it would be a fight for humanity; how many souls can I save in order to save my own? And Angel as a character is very complex, because he does have the opportunity to delve into dangerous personalities at times, but he knows how to keep that at bay, because he has a soul.”
Across the spinoff’s five seasons, he carried a show that required emotional stamina, leadership and the ability to sustain a character arc that shifted repeatedly without losing coherence. More importantly, it demonstrated that audiences weren’t just responding to the concept—they were responding to him.
“Early on, people kept talking about the pressure of headlining the show,” he offered as a glimpse into his personal philosophy. “Pressure is something that everybody can understand. I think that pressure is something that you bring upon yourself, and I was fortunate enough to have two great parents who instilled a lot of confidence in myself and also a lot of humility. So at the same time, I learned just to take things for what they are, work hard and be loose with it. And with those ingredients, along with great cast members and a great support team, and being part of the whole rather than being part of the given, then I think it works out.”
And when Angel came to an end after five seasons, he was okay with it—a feeling he’s had each time one of his shows has concluded. “I always subscribe to the idea that when every season is over, I consider the series over until it gets reordered and then I move on from there. So when I learned about the show not being picked up from Joss Whedon, I didn’t really have much of a reaction. For me, you take the show for as long as you can, you learn from it, you work on a character for ‘X’ number of years and you build with it and take it as part of your resume. For me, it was almost like a relief of pressure, so to speak. It wasn’t like I was rejoicing, but at the same time it felt right.”
Becoming a household name: ‘Bones’
In 2005, Boreanaz made a transition that many actors struggle to pull off. Moving from genre television into a mainstream network procedural often requires shedding part of what made an actor distinctive in the first place. Instead, Bones allowed him to recalibrate without starting over.
As FBI Special Agent Seeley Booth on Bones, Boreanaz became the emotional anchor of a series built on contrast—between faith and science, instinct and evidence, gut reactions and forensic certainty. Booth’s instincts, humor, and deeply rooted moral code balanced the analytical rigor of forensic anthropologist Dr. Temperance Brennan, played by Emily Deschanel, whose worldview was shaped by data, logic and measurable proof. Each episode’s procedural framework—solving murders through skeletal remains—was grounded by Booth’s humanity and empathy for victims, while Brennan’s brilliance pushed investigations forward in ways Booth alone never could. Their dynamic wasn’t about romance, but about trust, mutual respect and the slow, believable construction of a partnership in which two very different people learned to rely on one another—professionally and personally—giving viewers a reason to return week after week beyond the mystery of the crime itself.
“When I read him [the character], I instantly thought of Romancing the Stone,” he explained to Entertainment Weekly. “It was a joy to work with [Bones creator] Hart Hanson, who was a showrunner who was open to creative endeavor, creative possibility, creative outlet. I loved being able to work with somebody who has an open-door policy, allowing the character to thrive in the environment and taking me to places that were fun, dynamic, improvisationally different. I always had a bag full of tricks with Hart and a bag full of metaphors.”
What made Bones endure wasn’t simply its cases or its format, but the sense that these characters belonged together. Over time, the series became ritual viewing for millions of households, the kind of show people lived with. Yet when it was over, Boreanaz was okay with it.
“There’s pressure to [being on] a show for 12 years,” he said. “You get weight off of your shoulders and realize how much it takes to shoot one episode, one day’s work, to create moments. It doesn’t seem possible that it’s been that long, and it goes by so fast. It’s like a tornado, a hurricane. I’ve done three series, it’s 20 years of television work—that’s a lot of hours.”
Behind the scenes, Bones marked a turning point in Boreanaz’s professional identity. As the series matured, so did his involvement, stepping into producing and directing roles that signaled a deeper investment in the show’s long-term health. Directing episodes, including major milestones, reinforced his reputation as someone capable of sustaining a franchise rather than simply starring in one.
His most demanding role: ‘SEAL Team’
After Bones, Boreanaz could have comfortably stayed within the procedural space he had mastered. Instead, he chose a path that demanded something very different. In 2017, he took on the role of Jason Hayes, the battle-worn leader of Bravo Team on SEAL Team, a series committed to exploring the realities of elite military service.
On SEAL Team, Boreanaz’s work as Jason Hayes was rooted firmly in realism rather than swagger or spectacle. The series centered on an elite Navy SEAL unit tasked with high-risk domestic and international missions, but its true focus was the cost of that work—how constant readiness, secrecy and exposure to violence reshape the people who serve. The role demanded physical discipline and emotional restraint, portraying leadership not as command presence alone, but as something earned through experience and loss. Hayes leads by example, carrying the weight of decisions that affect not just missions but the lives of his team members and their families. As the show unfolds, SEAL Team leans heavily into the toll such a life takes—not only on the body, but on marriages, parenthood, loyalty and personal identity.
For Boreanaz, the commitment was real and cumulative. Over time, the physical demands of the role became impossible to ignore, and he spoke openly about the wear it placed on his body after years of intensive training, stunts and long production schedules.
“My body just can’t do it anymore,” he related to PEOPLE. “I take good care of myself, but it gets to a point where your body’s not moving like it used to. I think I’ve had four MRIs in the past four months, for my knees, hips, shoulders. It’s been quite a journey.”
By the time SEAL Team reached its seventh season, the show’s conclusion felt less like an abrupt ending than a natural stopping point, underscoring the idea that longevity in a career sometimes means recognizing limits. That self-awareness has been a recurring theme in his career. Rather than pushing past the point of sustainability, he has consistently made choices that preserve the integrity of the work and the person doing it.
Why Rockford is the perfect fit
The reboot of The Rockford Files centers on a Jim Rockford who is newly paroled after serving time for a crime he didn’t commit, returning to life as a private investigator in Los Angeles and quickly finding himself at odds with both law enforcement and organized crime. It’s a premise built on weariness, resilience and moral stubbornness—qualities Boreanaz has been honing onscreen for years.
Where Garner’s Rockford embodied a reluctant heroism rooted in dry humor and self-preservation, Boreanaz arrives with decades of experience playing men shaped by responsibility. He brings Booth’s empathy, Hayes’s authority and the lived-in confidence of an actor who has carried a series for most of his adult life.
“The challenge with redoing The Rockford Files,” says Robertson, “in my opinion, goes back to the specter of James Garner. Almost all of the stories in the trades had a picture of Garner embedded next to David Boreanaz. Whether that’s conscious or subconscious, that’s something they have to overcome.”
One person expressing enthusiasm for his being cast is Gigi Garner, daughter of the late James Garner, who enthused on X, “So, I recently got a call from David Boreanaz. He was kind enough to share that he was offered the series and thinking about it. He wanted to know how I felt about the reboot, etc. If anybody can do it, he can. I’m 100% on board! It is going to be great!”
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