NCIS stars Brian Dietzen and Diona Reasonover are dropping their first episodes of a brand new podcast, NCIS Partners & Probies, on Tuesday March 3 – but episode two will feature a very special appearance.
The second episode will see their co-star Wilmer Valderrama join them to discuss his decade in the NCIS-verse and behind the scenes moments, but Brian tells HELLO! that there was one moment that left him floored – when Wilmer slipped into the voice of Fez from That 70s Show.
“Wilmer’s is a wonderful, wonderful interview,” he said. “It’s so cool how you can interview someone you’ve worked with for over a decade and you’re still surprised, or your eyes go up by their answers. Let’s be honest, when you’re sitting around in your workplace environment, you don’t sit there and go deep on someone’s daily experience or history, and so he managed to surprise me – and he threw in a little bit of Fez from That 70’s Show!
“I’ve known him for like 12 years or something, and I’ve never heard him once do that voice because he’s said, ‘I’m done with the character. I don’t want to be known as the rest of my life.’ So the fact that he pulled that out, I was like, ‘Whoa!'”
© Robert Voets/CBSWilmer is best known for playing the role of Fez in the sitcom That ’70s Show between 1998 and 2006.
Fez was the foreign exchange student from an unknown country, and his real name was deemed unpronounceable by his friends, so they called him “Fez,” which stood for Foreign Exchange Student. Fez’s country of origin was one of the show’s longest-running gags, and it was never confirmed.
Wilmer created a unique accent for Fez, because he was given creative license due to the lack of details around his origins. “I felt like that accent was another great aesthetic to create a character that was still multi-dimensional that I hadn’t seen on television,” he once said of the decision.
© CBSBrian, who has been with NCIS since it began in 2003, tells HELLO! that he and Diona hope that the podcast is a “fun time talking and letting people have insight into our lives and our friends’ lives who make the show,” and that they have recorded around 18 episodes so far.
He does, however, have a few dream guests: “I want Michael [Weatherly] and Cote [de Pablo] to come on next time they’re in town, but I would also really love to interview some actors who had their one week on NCIS and moved on to very, very big things – Glen Powell or Zac Efron or Jesse Plemons or Skye P Marshall.
“I’d love to know how NCIS was an important stepping stone on their career and, and how that served them as a working actor, if it helped them get this next job, or what they learned from working with Mark Harmon or Michael or Paulie [Paurette].”
Brian also revealed that he is keen to get the cast and crew of NCIS: Sydney o the show – and not just because it means he would get to visit Australia.
“Hear me out, yes I’d get to visit, but it’s a fun family they’ve developed there, and Diona and I could both interview the whole cast, some producers, and we could be on the show, so two birds, one stone!”
The NCIS-verse is vast – shows past and present include Hawaii, LA, NCIS, Origins, and Sydney – but Brian shares that the one show he wishes he could have appeared on as Jimmy was the 2025 Paramount+ spin-off Tony and Ziva, which was canceled after one season.
“I thought the world of that show, and Michael and Cote are close friends whom I just love dearly,” he said. “They told a beautiful 10-episode story within that one season, and I really had designs on going and helping in any way I could, appearing in the second season were it ordered, and unfortunately it was not but I would have loved it.”
Read the full article here
