Blue Bloods Cast Rioted Against One Meal in Those Dinner Scenes
Actors are paid handsomely for appearing as someone else, taking on their character and personality traits, and even being the complete opposite of who they are in real life… But apparently, there's a limit to what an actor can bear.
Blue Bloods ' family dinners are a staple of the show: for many fans, these Sunday night scenes are their favorite part of the series.
There, all the Reagans can bond, discuss the past week's events, and feel that they belong together.
Unlike in some other shows, in Blue Bloods, all the food on the table during the family dinner scenes is real: after all, there are just too many shots of actors actually eating to try and pull off a fake food trick.
This is where reality meets the show: when the characters eat, the actors also nourish.
However, this can also cause some issues. Obviously, since the food must be actually cooked and served, each actor's preferences (for instance, allergies) must be considered.
This is a headache for the prop designers in itself since the dinner scenes take multiple hours to shoot and some of the food might need redoing…
But there are also some things that no one likes!
As Donnie Wahlberg explained on a 92nd St. Y panel, the entire cast rioted against having broccoli on the table during the Reagans' dinners.
Rarely is there someone who enjoys broccoli, but for the actors, it was causing even more problems: after a few hours of shooting, the smell of broccoli was becoming so nauseating that the cast was simply refusing to come close to the table.
Luckily, the actors' demands were quickly satisfied, and now you'll never see broccoli on the Reagans' table — and will see smiling and laughing family members, instead.
After having spent a few hours in a room with degraded broccoli and then having it permanently removed, one's quality of life (and air) becomes better for good, so we can completely understand that.