‘9-1-1’s Brian Hallisay Dishes On Doug’s Unexpected Return, Working With IRL Wife Jennifer Love Hewitt, And More

In 9-1-1‘s highly-anticipated Season 7 wedding special, fans of the hit procedural drama finally got to see Maddie and Chimney say I Do-ug?!

That’s right. In a chilling twist, 9-1-1 Season 7, Episode 6 — which premiered May 2 on ABC — brought Maddie’s (Jennifer Love Hewitt) abusive ex-husband Doug Kendall (Brian Hallisay) back from the dead…again. Before the magical Madney wedding, Chimney (Kenneth Choi) battled a mysterious medical emergency that caused amnesia and hallucinations. That’s how he found himself face-to-face with the show’s Season 2 villain, played by Hewitt’s real-life husband.

“When [showrunner Tim Minear] pitched the idea and the fact that I was going to be showing up in Chimney’s world as opposed to Maddie’s, I thought it was a super creative way to bring that character back,” Hallisay told Decider via Zoom ahead of Doug’s unexpected return. “I love Kenny. I love working with him. And we’ve obviously gotten to be close over the years. So we had a ton of fun.”

After chatting with Hewitt, who was “super psyched” for her IRL and on-screen husbands to reunite, Decider spoke with Hallisay about crashing Madney’s wedding episode, his Season 2 memories, his family’s deep love for the show, a “full circle” journey with Tim Minear, and more.

DECIDER: Before we dive into 9-1-1 I have to say I loved you on Revenge, another iconic show.

BRIAN HALLISAY: Oh thank you. That was quite a while ago. Just to age that, my son is now eight and he was born a month after I wrapped that show. That was a good group of people. I really enjoyed that. It was a good show.

Between that and 9-1-1, you’re really good at playing guys who get stabbed to death.

Oh my gosh. Yes. That’s right. I hadn’t thought about that in a while. And oh my gosh [I was stabbed by] Courtney Love, which was an amazing and a very cool story to tell.

We’re obviously here to talk about Doug, who crashed the Madney wedding episode. What were your thoughts when you learned he would be returning again for this major milestone?

Oh my gosh. So the idea of it, Tim reached out or mentioned to Love that he was cooking something up in his head, and they wanted to bring me back. I think there were a couple of different iterations of how it was going to happen. Not all of them passed muster. I think there were maybe some gorier versions or some other different things that didn’t end up happening. I may or may not be at liberty to say that. But ultimately, when he pitched the idea and the fact that I was going to be showing up in Chimney’s world as opposed to Maddie’s, I thought it was a super creative way to bring that character back. And I love Kenny. I love working with him, and we’ve obviously gotten to be close over the years. We had a ton of fun. So I was super excited. It frees you up, too. Because it’s a character who’s dead. So anything that you’re doing, you’re not really constrained to reality. I knew it was gonna be a lot of fun to play around with.

I remember Tim Minear saying in an interview that he gave you your first network TV gig maybe 10 years before you were cast on 9-1-1.

100%. He gave me my first job as an actor ever. My first TV job. The first time I ever got paid to be an actor. It was this show that he did on Fox a long time ago called The Inside, and what I’ll always remember is the show unfortunately got canceled and pulled from the air before my episode aired. And I’ll never forget Tim reached out to me, he emailed me — because he knew it was my first job — and he said, ‘You were great. I’m really sorry that you’re not going to be able to see it. But I would really love for you to have this tape to start a reel.’ And he met me in Santa Monica and gave me a DVD of my scenes.

Oh my god. And then a decade later he hired you again.

Yeah, that was — I don’t even know — that was maybe 2005. Something like that. But I’ll never forget that and the fact that it’s sort of came around full circle with this. He’s a great guy.

What are your standout memories of joining the show back in Season 2?

Well, it was interesting. I don’t know if Tim knew all along what he was going to do. Obviously Love joined the show Season 2 and when he initially pitched her the show, her character was running from something in a relationship and [had] this complicated backstory. Early on in Season 2 there’s a scene where she got a threatening phone call and [Tim] said, ‘Hey, do you think Brian wants to come in and do the voice just for fun?’ This is before we knew anything about what he had in mind and what this was actually going to turn into. And then slowly he started sharing his ideas and it was a lot of fun. What culminated in that Big Bear episode was really something, and we were really proud of it. We thought it turned out great. And we had two young kids at a time. I think our kids were three and four. And we just drove out to Big Bear and figured it out and fought it out in the snow. It was a great experience and we still talk about it to this day. In fact, in our backyard, I don’t know if you’ve ever been to Big Bear, but they have these wooden bears on the side of the road that they carve out of tree stumps, so we still have we still have a bear in our backyard from Big Bear.

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What an amazing memory. I had the pleasure of chatting with Jennifer yesterday and she mentioned that your kids love that you got to return to the show again in Season 7 and love watching you “be scary.” Was it mildly terrifying showing them you as Doug?

Them seeing it is actually just a very new thing. They never saw any of that before, and it’s been interesting. This move to ABC I think has been amazing for the show. There’s a lot of great energy behind it and they’ve certainly done an amazing job. [The show is] doing great. It’s sort of been reinvigorated. And when [our kids] heard I was going back they started asking about that Big Bear episode, because they vaguely remember being there and they’ve seen some pictures with bloody faces and stuff. But they only recently watched that for the first time. It was it was pretty cool, and they actually have gone back with a couple of their friends and they’ve been watching from Season 1. They’ve literally been binging the show, so all these big Hulu numbers, I think my kids and their friends are at least partially responsible for tracking those numbers. [Laughs] It’s been fun. They’re very invested. It’s very cute.

Well I’m excited for them to see the new episode.

Yeah, I didn’t see it yet. But I hope that the Santa hat at least made it.

Oh the Santa hat is definitely there. When Christmastime rolls around in the real world do you put that on and do a Doug impression?

[Laughs] No, but my kids will now call me Doug if I’m getting upset with them. It’s really, really funny. “Daddy, don’t be Doug!” [Laughs]

Oh I love them. Doug is obviously a very dark character and people to this day are shocked to learn that you and Jennifer are married when they watch the show. Can you talk a bit more about working with her, and are you ever recognized as Doug?

Every once in a while. She will come across people more. There was actually somebody recently who she was working with that said something referencing those episodes and “what a creep that guy was” and “how dark and scary he was” and she had to say, “yeah, well that’s actually really my husband.” She’s talked about [working together] over the years in different interviews, but it’s a very, very vulnerable position to be in. Certainly those types of stories are sadly real. They’re very dark and they do happen. We wanted to take good care of that type of storytelling so she felt safer to be in that scene. Obviously we got we got physical, and the fact that we do have the relationship that we have enabled us to really go for it.

We’ve seen Doug return in archival footage since his death but in Season 6, you got to shoot some news scenes for Buck’s coma dream and your daughter briefly appeared in the episode as well. What was that experience like for your family?

Yeah. That was really sweet. It was really fun and another example of how creative that show can be. They really played on this idea of It’s a Wonderful Life. There were the Christmas themes with going back, even in this current episode that I just did. In [the Season 6 episode], it was Buck’s alternative reality — imagining if Maddie had ended up with Doug, and our daughter Autumn came in and played our daughter in this imaginary world. It was really fun. It was it really cute, and she was super nervous but I think she nailed it. She did a great job, and she was super proud of herself. Our son was there also at the time, so it was a really fun day. Everyone was super sweet to her. She had a great time. And honestly, it’s actually crazy how much it looks like my wife when she was younger.

I asked Jennifer if she thought we’d seen the last of Doug now that he visited Chimney and she said he’ll never be gone because he represents very real trauma for these characters. Are you open to returning down the line if the story calls for it?

Oh man. 100%. If Tim comes up with something or they cook something up, I trust that it would be good, that it would serve the story of these character arcs that they’ve been developing over these last several seasons. I know one thing Tim said was that he just wishes that — since we do have this relationship that goes back a long time — he wishes that he didn’t kill me off so soon and that we could have played around with it a bit more. But I felt really grateful to come back and I was happy with the work that we did and would certainly love to come back if they want me to. I’ve gotten to know that cast and crew pretty well over the years and it’s a great group. They work really hard and I think the show and the results speak for themselves.

Since Doug was killed off have you become a fan who watches the show yourself?

Honestly, I’m going back now and watching the show with my kids truly for the first time. Right now I don’t know what season it is, but they’re all wearing masks, so it was obviously during COVID, which I think was the season Love was filming when she was pregnant with Aidan. But honestly the show is really great. We’ve never watched it. We’ve never really been big watching ourselves in shows and stuff, but going back and watching it with the kids, I’m actually getting to see it’s great. It’s really so different than any other procedural out there. Everyone is so, so good in it, and I think they really elevate this idea of first responder/cop show. They match the drama with the comedy and the whimsy.

Before we wrap, is there any particular storyline you’d like to explore if Doug were to return again down the line?

Hmm, that’s interesting. We’ve actually talked about the idea of — I don’t know how far you could go back, because I already look much older than I did in Season 2 [laughs] — but the idea of Maddie’s story, like a “Maddie Begins,” and what [Maddie and Doug’s] relationship was like in the beginning, why was he damaged, why did he become the person that he became, and why did she stay with him for all those years. I think those are interesting stories to explore [that would] fill in the gaps. I don’t know if there is going to be an opportunity to do something like that, but I think exploring that a little bit more is interesting.

This interview was edited for length and clarity.

Want more 9-1-1? Be sure to read Decider’s full interview with Jennifer Love Hewitt here and check out the rest of our show coverage.

New episodes of 9-1-1 premiere Thursdays at 8:00 p.m. ET on ABC with next-day streaming on Hulu.