‘9-1-1’s Callum Blue on Brad Torrence, ‘Hotshots’ and His Love for the ABC Series: “It Really Made Me Fall in Love with Acting Again”
About seven years ago, actor Callum Blue took a look at his life and decided he needed a break from the entertainment industry. After starring in hit TV shows and movies like Dead Like Me, Smallville and The Princess Diaries 2, Blue hit the road, unsure if he’d ever return to Hollywood. Then a guest role on Season 8 of ABC’s hit series 9-1-1 came along and changed everything.
“I had just taken a seven-year sabbatical from acting. I was doing a TV show and a movie at the same time, and I looked at my life and myself and decided that I wasn’t very happy, even though I had success and money around me. I told my agents I was going to travel and I was never going to come back,” Blue told Decider over Zoom. “I had gotten a few offers over the years that were just straight offers. But 9-1-1 was my first job after that sabbatical… and it really made me fall in love with acting again.”
Blue made his 9-1-1 debut in the Season 8 premiere as actor Brad Torrence, star of Hotshots, a show about firefighters that Peter Krause’s Bobby currently serves as a technical advisor on. While most of Blue’s scenes in the first four episodes were filmed on the Hotshots set, he also had a front-row seat to the conclusion of the Season 8 premiere’s big emergency scene in Episode 3. Episode 4 ended with Bobby returning to 118 and Brian Thompson’s Captain Gerrard taking his place on set, but Blue assures us that fans haven’t seen the end of his character or Hotshots storyline yet. For more fun facts about 9-1-1 Season 8, heartwarming on-set experiences, and behind-the-scenes insights, read our full interview with Blue below.
CALLUM BLUE: I actually just took a six or seven-year sabbatical from acting. About seven years ago, I was doing a TV show and a movie at the same time, and I looked back at my life and I looked at myself and I decided that I wasn’t really happy, even though I had success and money around me. So I told my agents that I was going to travel and I never came back. [Laughs] I’ve had bits and pieces here and there over the years that were just straight offers. But this was my first job after that sabbatical, so I didn’t even have an agent or a manager. A friend of mine from 20 years ago who produced one of my first movies became a manager and she said, “Don’t you want to go back to the business?” I said, “Honestly, I’m not sure. I really like sitting on a mountain in Palm Springs and meditating.” And she said, “I’ll send auditions your way.” And I was like, “Okay, let’s see what happens.” And then this audition came up and it really made me fall in love with acting again.
Yeah. I’m having a great time and being back on set after all these years. And being around these high-vibration people and actors — it’s really a dream come true. Yeah, it was just an audition. She sent me a couple of auditions, and I recorded them, and then all of a sudden I was on set.
Hotshots is so funny. I love how it’s so supernatural and yet it gives you the opportunity to do layered acting like Brad Torrence and Captain Race Banner. The fans love it, it seems like you’re having a great time, and I know Peter Krause is a big fan of Hotshots. What was it like working closely with him?
It was awesome. I mean, I’ve been a fan of his since Six Feet Under. It’s funny, I was telling him the other day that I was doing a show called Dead Like Me on Showtime at the same time he was doing Six Feet Under on HBO, and I would be doing press conferences for Dead Like Me. And because it was all about death, they would ask me about the comparisons. I would spend more time talking about Six Feet Under than my show, and the Showtime people would be like, “Come on, you have to talk about our show more.” I’ve always been a fan, so working with him was great. His excitement about that aspect of the storyline was contagious. He was so dedicated, there was so much energy there, and we just had fun with it.
