Austin Stowell on How He Used Personal Tragedy to Get Inside Gibbs’ Head on ‘NCIS: Origins’

NCIS: Origins premieres tonight taking us back to 1991 to tell the story of how Leroy Jethro Gibbs ( Austin Stowell ) became the crack special agent he developed into from its inception. The episode opens only four months after the shooting deaths of his beloved wife Shannon and daughter Kelly when Gibbs returns from serving in Operation Desert Storm, leaves the Marines and becomes an NIS agent at the behest of Mike Franks ( Kyle Schmid ), the NIS special agent who investigated his wife and daughter’s deaths.

As a result, the tone of the series is bit more somber as Gibbs tries to sort out his life and new career, and it goes without saying that the Gibbs that we’re going to meet in NCIS: Origins is not the one that audiences have known for 19 seasons.

“From page one, I could tell this was a character that I knew,” Stowell tells Parade. “I just kept turning the pages and saying to myself, ‘I know this guy.’ I had to deal with the passing of my father two years ago. He committed suicide. That was obviously not the way that I wished to have that story end, so I tap into that quite a bit.”

With his family’s death so fresh in his mind, Gibbs isn’t really up to social activities of any sort, but he is determined to succeed at his new job because it keeps him busy and keeps the demons at bay for periods of time.

Related: NCIS: Origins Releases a First-Look Trailer as Leroy Jethro Gibbs Becomes a Special Agent

That makes Mike Franks the most important relationship that Gibbs has at this point.

“He's appreciative and he's thankful to Franks for bringing him into the fold and trying to help him out, but in terms of Franks being his best bud, we're not there yet,” Stowell says. “He’s my boss. In the pilot, he gets ticked off at Franks a few times. The scene where I'm trying to step up for a Marine that I served with, and he said, ‘This is different. You do your job,’ and I address him as sir instead of boss, it’s a bit of a dig back. ‘OK, I guess this is just like it was when I was a gunny.’”

Mark Harmon , who created the role of Gibbs on NCIS, is an executive producer on the prequel—as well as a narrator—and was part of the casting process that resulted in Stowell landing the role. But when it comes to offering advice on playing the character, he’s pretty much hands off.

“He’s said over and over and over again, ‘Trust yourself. You got it. It’s in you. Know it,’” Stowell says. “He's been wonderful about giving advice not on acting, not with the character, but life advice. He truly will wave me off [when it comes to acting advice], but when it comes to handling the life shift that I'm probably about to go on, he’s been so influential. He’s done it. He’s someone who’s lived it for decades now and not just with NCIS , but also with projects that he did beforehand, during and after—movie franchises, other TV shows. He’s been a star for a long time and that is not easy life.”

Related: Mark Harmon on Why Austin Stowell Is the Perfect Young Leroy Jethro Gibbs for NCIS: Origins

During our chat, Stowell also talked about his concerns on signing up for the series and the iconic role, how important it is to him and the producers to honor the cannon, and the Easter eggs that will appear in the episodes.

What was your trepidation going into this? Mark Harmon is hugely popular for creating this role, not just here in the U.S. but internationally.

I loved the character right from the start. My agent sent this and said, “I really think you're going to find a lot to sink your teeth into,” and he was right. I wanted to pursue this right away. In terms of trepidation about taking on the character, the show and what it means in terms of NCIS, I have the utmost respect for what’s been created but that's just the bar that has been raised. That doesn’t make me nervous, it makes me excited.

Honestly, I liked the idea of doing a movie or miniseries or a limited series because it allowed me to explore another character. It kept it fresh all the time. My mind has changed over the years. I love TV. I love characters that I get to watch for season after season because they get to change, too, and it just took me some time to realize that. I guess that's what maturity is and so, that was my largest trepidation about the show and about the job in general.

Related: Mark Harmon on Leaving Gibbs Behind on NCIS and His Return for Origins

We know that Gibbs kills Pedro Hernandez, the man who killed his family. How much will we be seeing Gibbs plot his revenge this season?

NCIS fans know that Gibbs has already killed Pedro Hernandez. That’s happened. That’s in the canon of the mothership, super fans will get that already. It is a potential because as you’ve seen, we are doing flashbacks. Keep watching.

We’re definitely going to see a young Vera Strickland (Diany Rodriguez) . Any chance we might see a young Hetty Lange or Dwayne Pride?

I think all options are on the table. You're going to meet characters along the way that you may not even realize you know yet.

There were some little touches like the beginning of the Gibbs gut, where Mike tells him if you have a gut feeling tell the team, and then he started drinking bourbon. Anything other Easter eggs to come?

You saw his first taste of bourbon. There are going to be Easter eggs galore, things that NCIS fans will recognize and enjoy. Most of them will be the origin story of that behavior. I don't want to ruin anything but there are the origins of several Gibb-isms.

Related: First Look Photos of 3 New NCIS: Origins Cast Regulars

One change from the mothership is that his father is present. In the original series, they didn't talk for more than a decade after his father showed up at his wife's funeral with a date. Can you talk a little bit about the relationship we're going to see with his father?

Absolutely. I don't think we'll break canon and I'm going to tell you why. It's because when people deal with grief, when they deal with a part of life that they would rather not think about, don’t we sometimes tell ourselves stories that aren't really true?

So, maybe when he says we didn't talk for that long, it just shuts down the potential of anyone going too deep into it. So, who knows how much time they actually spent apart?

Honestly, I don’t know either. I'm 10 episodes in. It’s not like I have all the answers at this point. I've thought about that because the last thing I would want to do is participate in a storyline that breaks from canon and doesn’t pay homage to the writers of the story that came before us.

We're really cognizant of the 1,000+ episodes. I think Gibbs appeared in 435 episodes. I think I have that correctly. We’re trying our best to make that as real as possible, that it exists inside the character that I’m playing as much as possible.

I think it's in cases like that where you can come up with reasons why he might have said the things he said at the time. You get your story wrong. That's why federal agents question witnesses right away because your memory starts to change even half an hour after an event.

I'm just giving a reason why, but we're absolutely going to explore that relationship a bit more. The struggles between fathers and sons are nothing new. What's so unique about this situation is that we basically get to tell the real version now.

I’m playing it a little tight to the vest because I really appreciate so much of the time that I’ve gotten to have with Robert Taylor (Jackson Gibbs). And who knows how much of this lives inside Gibbs’ head? That it’s actually a dream. You understand that this is just a journal retelling at this point, right? So, this is Gibbs’ version of his memories.

NCIS; Origins premieres tonight at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CBS and streams next day on Paramount+.

Next, Who's in the Season 1 Cast of NCIS: Origins