Over the course of 20 seasons, Grey’s Anatomy has seen it all.
On the latest episode of the Call It What It Is podcast, hosted by Grey’s stars Jessica Capshaw and Camilla Luddington, the guest was Skylar Astin, who marveled at the fact there had once been a “sex bear” on the ABC medical drama.
To explain for the uninitiated, the Pitch Perfect actor played Todd Eames on four episodes of the medical drama in 2022. The brother of a patient at Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital, Todd pursued a relationship with Luddington’s Dr. Jo Wilson. After a romantic night together at the end of the 18th season, he infamously showed up at her workplace with an oversize stuffed animal that he actually called a “thank-you-for-the-excellent-sex bear.”
Reminiscing on the podcast, the three actors had a laugh about the moment, and then Astin praised the show’s crack writing staff for making such a bonkers plotline work.
“Listen,” he said, “those Grey’s Anatomy writers are so amazing, they can write anything. They could reverse it. Be like, ‘What I meant by ‘sex bear’ was that we were bare when we were having sex…”
Perhaps because of that awkward gift, his character’s spark with Luddington’s doctor quickly burned out.
That was too bad for Luddington, who said she’d attempted to keep Astin on the show because she hit it off with him immediately.
“It was instant love for me,” the actress recalled. “We just clicked instantly, and in fact, to be honest, I did try and beg the writers to just keep you. I’d be like, ‘No, this is the guy for Jo.'”
While Luddington remains on Grey’s and Capshaw recently reprised her role as Dr. Arizona Robbins, Astin has moved on. He just wrapped up his work as another Todd, the title character on the CBS legal dramedy So Help Me Todd, which was canceled after its second season.
