Blue Bloods is a CBS mainstay. It has aired for thirteen seasons and has become a career highlight for practically everyone involved.
Given how successful the show has been and how much momentum it currently has heading into season 14, it’s tough to envision the cast members refusing to participate.
And yet, when Blue Bloods was being shopped about, that’s exactly what happened. An actress passed down a chance to be on the show, and it wasn’t until one of the other cast members persuaded her to alter her mind. As they say, the rest is history.
Do Bridget Moynahan and Donnie Wahlberg have a friendship?
The actress in question is Erin Reagan herself, Bridget Moynahan, and the actor who persuaded her was her onscreen brother, Donnie Wahlberg. During a 2020 interview with Entertainment Tonight, the latter recounted the casting process.
Moynahan and Wahlberg had both featured in the 2009 TV movie Bunker Hill, so they were acquainted by the time Blue Bloods premiered. “I called Bridget Moynahan, and she said, ‘I already turned it down, and I’m not going to do it,'” Wahlberg explained. “I pleaded and begged, and I made her an offer she couldn’t refuse.”
The actor was so certain that Blue Bloods would be a success that he offered Moynahan a proposition if she reconsidered. “I said I’d give her all of my paychecks if we couldn’t shoot in New York,” Wahlberg explained. “So, thank God, we shot in New York.”
The plan worked, and Moynahan consented to play the Reagan family’s only daughter. It’s an amusing twist of fate, given that Wahlberg was also hesitant to join Blue Bloods.
The decision proved to be sound. Erin Reagan has become Moynahan’s defining character, and she even co-wrote a Blue Bloods-themed cookbook in 2015, The Blue Bloods Cookbook: 120 Recipes That Will Bring Your Family to the Table. She’s also come to see the rest of the ensemble, including Wahlberg, as her family.
“From the second [the cast] all met [on] the first day of shooting, [we shot] a] family dinner [scene], it was ‘Nice to meet you,’ ‘Get in your seats,’ and we instantly became family,” Moynahan told The 92nd Street Y. We can’t picture anyone else playing Erin, therefore we’d say everyone came out on top in this casting process.
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