“I didn’t know what was going on, and I was really frustrated.”
Stephen Amell has suggested that he was “c**k-blocked” out of a role in NCIS: Origins.
The Arrow actor opened up about auditioning for the upcoming NCIS prequel series the same week as his successful audition for Suits spin-off Suits: LA.
“My actual focus that week was on an audition that I had on Wednesday – it was for the prequel they were doing to NCIS,” he revealed on the Inside of You with Michael Rosenbaum podcast. “It was playing the younger version [of Leroy Jethro Gibbs].”
The star said he was “excited by the prospect” of doing a network show, and felt that the audition went “extraordinarily well”.
“I got great feedback,” he continued. “I hadn’t looked at the sides for Suits: LA yet, and then I found out on Thursday afternoon – after getting not just good feedback, but, like, good intel, like, ‘We think this is actually gonna move forward’ – all of a sudden, it was dead.
“And I felt like someone, somewhere along the line, had, like, c**k-blocked me… So I didn’t know what was going on, and I was really frustrated.”
The role of young Gibbs eventually went to Catch-22’s Austin Stowell.
Amell opened up further about his subsequent reading for Suits: LA, revealing he had a “breakdown” on the way to the audition due to a number of factors.
“I called my wife on the way to the audition… and I got a shitty phone call about a personal business thing… combine that with being solo with both kids all week [and] my perceived NCIS slight, and I had a full f**king breakdown in the car, emotional, screaming,” he said.
“I walked into that audition just with, really, kind of no fear. Went in, read the audition, tried to be a lot looser and more spontaneous than I think probably a lot of other people were, because this guy’s a lawyer. This guy’s supposed to be the smartest guy in the room. But, concurrently, I just figured everyone was going to be stone-cold serious, so let’s just have a little bit of fun.”
Speaking about getting the role, the star later added: “Retrospectively, I got the job that I was supposed to get, and everything does work out for a reason.”