Trivia / NCIS: New Orleans

• Actor Allusion: Lt. Lin is a therapist with several dangerous patients, any of whom could be his killer it's actually his sister-in-law.
  • Pride's father, played by Stacy Keach, is as bad as his son is good and one of his specialties is "bilking people out of loads of money". Keatch is also the narrator of MSNBC's American Greed, a show about real-life financial fraudsters.
• Actor-Shared Background: LaSalle is from Alabama so that Lucas Black can continue to work with his native, and highly distinctive, accent.
  • An article on Lucas Black mentions that he currently lives in the French Quarter district like his character.
• California Doubling: Averted. Unlike its parent series, this show is actually produced where it's set: New Orleans. This surprised the cast because they expected to be based in California and to only occasionally visit Louisiana for location shooting.
• The Cast Showoff: Scott Bakula plays piano very well. Several episodes show his character playing the piano and singing too.
• Cast the Runner-Up: Scott Bakula was in the running to play Gibbs before Mark Harmon was cast. Many years later, he'd get to lead his own NCIS series.
• Creator Backlash: Diane Neal went on a Twitter tirade against what she considered to be unsafe working conditions on the set. She hasn't been invited back on the show, despite being hugely popular with the fans, since.
• Disabled Character, Disabled Actor: Daryl "Chill" Mitchell, who plays Patton Plame, was paralyzed in a motorcycle accident.
• Dropped After the Pilot: The pilot originally had an African American forensic specialist who plays music in his lab. This character was dropped in favor of Sebastian, a quirkier character with many neuroses and a conspiracy theorist to boot.
• Inspired by…: The show's original concept came about when Gary Glasberg learned that NCIS really does have an office in New Orleans and that it was run by a quirky agent and his partner for several years.
• Like You Would Really Do It: Like they'd really attack a real location— Oh my god they blew up Arnaud's (not in reality (not even with squibs), but still).
• Produced by Cast Member: Scott Bakula is a producer.
  • While he only quite appears a few times in NCIS NOLA ^note  save for 2 NCIS NOLA backdoor pilots in NCIS , Mark Harmon, who played Gibbs in NCIS, also serves as an executive producer.
• Real Life Writes the Plot: Zoe won't appear in Season 3 onwards due to creative differences, especially if Brody felt responsible for compromising an anti-militia operation.
  • In season 7, NCIS NOLA incorporates the COVID-19 Pandemic into their storylines.
• Real Song Theme Tune: "Boom Boom" by Big Head Todd & The Monsters, in a departure from the original series and Los Angeles having dedicated theme music.
• Recycled Script: A Navy lieutenant being killed via radiation poisoning was a plot explored in the parent show's fourth season. Both victims even love running.
  • And speaking of the parent show, both have done an episode where a Big Blackout hampers an investigation.
  • "Viral", in which the team must clear Sebastian of shooting an unarmed man, is very similar to "Probie", in which the team had to do this for McGee.
• Those Two Actors: Dean Stockwell (Bakula's costar on Quantum Leap) appeared in an episode. For added bonus, whereas they had been allies and best friends on the previous show, they were adversaries here (which also applies to Stockwell's guest appearance on Star Trek: Enterprise).
  • Chelsea Field (who stars as Pride's ex-girlfriend) and Scott Bakula are married in real life.
• What Could Have Been: Gary Glasberg originally conceived of NCIS: New Orleans simply as a two-part sweeps episode for the original show. He told his idea to Mark Harmon who immediately realized the concept's potential to be a full-blown series in its own right.
• You Look Familiar: Zoe McLellan previously spent several years as Jennifer Coates on JAG before taking on the role of Meredith Brody on this show. She is just one of several actors from JAG to play a different character on a spin-off, although the first to play two regular roles in the same universe.
  • Gillian Alexy previously appeared on NCIS: Los Angeles as a different character on the still-born NCIS: Red series before playing Savannah on NOLA.
  • Liza Lapira recently guest-starred, despite having been killed off over a decade ago on NCIS as the duplicitous Agent Lee.