Emily Deschanel faced an internal battle while shooting “Bones.” Deschanel played Dr. Temperance “Bones” Brennan, and with this role came a massive amount of pressure. Her character was known for having long, complicated dialogue that, at first, Deschanel struggled to master. On David Duchovny’s “Fail Better” podcast, she opened up about her ADHD and dyslexia and how they affected her time on the Fox series.
After a 14-16-hour day of shooting, Deschanel stayed up late trying to memorize her lines for the next shoot. Sleep-deprived and overwhelmed, she found that her lines escaped her by the time she got in front of the camera the next day. In these stressful moments, with the knowledge that her memory lapses could annoy the entire crew, Deschanel explained how “the room would start to close” around her. “I didn’t know I was having panic attacks, but I was basically having panic attacks at the time,” she said.
How was Emily Deschanel able to overcome her panic attacks?
Emily Deschanel continued to struggle until Hart Hanson, the creator of “Bones,” talked with her. “You know, the studio … has concerns about your work,” Deschanel recalled Hanson telling her. This conversation came after Deschanel arrived late to the set due to traffic. Coupled with Deschanel’s consistently forgotten lines, it wasn’t a good look.
“I took it so hard,” Deschanel recalled to David Duchovny. “I was such a fragile person at the time. I got hardened up doing that show for so long.” Fortunately, Hanson was willing to work with the series’ lead. “He gave me support. That’s how I got someone to help me run the lines.” As the show got picked up for more seasons, Deschanel fell into the swing of things. “They realized that they could write more scenes for other people,” she said. “They did a lot of things to help me not be a nervous wreck.”