Gerald McRaney Promoted to Series Regular on ‘NCIS: Los Angeles’
NCIS: Los Angeles has promoted recurring guest star Gerald McRaney to series regular ahead of the 13th season.
McRaney has appeared on the CBS procedural drama since 2014, playing retired U.S. Navy Admiral Hollis Kilbride, a longtime friend of Henrietta “Hetty” Lange (Linda Hunt), the current Operations Manager for the Office of Special Projects branch of NCIS in Los Angeles. Kilbride often offers his advice and counsel to the NCIS crew during their undercover operations.
“When you have an actor of Gerald McRaney’s caliber, you do everything you can to make sure you get him as often as possible,” executive producer R. Scott Gemmill told Deadline. “Admiral Kilbride has been an esteemed part of our universe for seven years now and we look forward to viewers seeing him come in and shake up our NCIS: LA world.”
McRaney’s promotion comes after longtime series regulars Barrett Foa and Renée Felice Smith recently exited the show. Foa and Smith’s respective characters, Tech Operator Eric Beale and Intelligence Analyst Nell Jones, left the U.S. behind to begin a new life in Tokyo, Japan, at the end of Season 12.
In May, Gemmill highly praised McRaney’s work during an interview with TVLine. “I have been a huge fan of his forever,” he stated. “I mean, I grew up watching him and I was really happy when we had him on the show the first time, a few years ago. He’s such a pro and so cool, he raises everybody’s game. He’s so great because he can do comedy, and he can do drama, and he likes to be out running around with guns, because he’s a big hunter in real life. We hope to see a lot more of him.”
McRaney has been acting since the late 1960s, appearing in numerous films and television series throughout his career. He is perhaps best known for his role in the 1980s mystery series Simon & Simon and his turn as antagonist George Hearst in the final season of HBO’s Deadwood. More recently, he played Dr. Nathan Katowski in the NBC series This Is Us, a role which won him an Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series.
NCIS: Los Angeles, Season 13, Fall 2021, CBS
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O
While I think he’s a really good actor, I fear that this means less and less of Hetty. I’ll give him a chance but nobody will ever replace the one and only Linda Hunt.
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T
She'll be back next Season in a larger capacity, it was confirmed last month.
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G
He has been a great friend to Hetty in the past and I think he will be good for ncis I will be interested to see who replaces Nell and Eric. It took awhile for me to warm up to Nell but ended up liking her character. Sad to see those two go. Interested fior next season to see how this gets handled. One of my fav shows.
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T
Great, so once again, Hetty's going to have a grumpy partner who questions her and her team's every move. Sounds faintly familiar.
This is really unneeded.
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P
I thought McRaney's character was shot and appeared in an episode a year or so ago. Don't remember it being discussed in any of the episodes.
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C
Love, love this! Gerald is great.
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G
Booo. Is it not bad enough that we're losing two regulars, did you have to add a one-trick grumpy pony that adds nothing to the show but annoyance?
This character has literally not had a single line this entire past season that wasn't insulting to someone on the team. Not one. We can hope the final shot of him on the final ep of the season, where he's putting Hetty's stuff back where it belongs, and her standing over him being very specific about where he's to place things, will be a sign of better things with him assuming she does return in a more normal capacity as is claimed.
But even then, his character is really not wanted.
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