James Lafferty responds to former One Tree Hill costar Sophia Bush’s suggestion he should join Grey’s Anatomy
“Who gives you more McDreamy vibes than James Lafferty?”
Could Nathan Scott be scrubbing in at Grey Sloan Memorial?
While chatting with Entertainment Weekly about the season 22 finale of Grey’s Anatomy earlier this month, Sophia Bush nominated James Lafferty as the next One Tree Hill alum to appear on the long-running medical drama.
“So many of us girls have been on the show. Honestly, who gives you more McDreamy vibes than James Lafferty? Nobody!” Bush tells EW. “He would be so good in that world. He would crush it — and so would Stephen [Colletti]. Those two, just the most tender humans, the best guys, the best friends from 10 years of all growing up together. It’s really special.”
Bush and Lafferty starred as Brooke Davis and Nathan Scott, respectively, on all nine seasons of One Tree Hill, which aired from 2003 to 2012. Their costars Bethany Joy Lenz (Haley James Scott) and Hilarie Burton Morgan (Peyton Sawyer) have both recurred on Grey’s Anatomy in the past. Bush notes that she recently spent time with Lafferty and Colletti in North Carolina, where they filmed OTH. (Colletti joined the CW show during Season 4.)
“We were all in Wilmington together a few months ago, and it was before, obviously, they’d announced the next season of their show [Everyone Is Doing Great], but I had this sort of out-of-body experience as we all were huddled up talking about our families and talking about our lives and talking about production, the things that we’re developing,” Bush says. “I sort of zoomed out and I was like, ‘Oh my God guys, do you remember when we were all 22 and going to bars and look at us now?’ It’s crazy to have just had that experience specifically with those two guys and then to be thinking about this, I’m like, ‘Yeah, put them on Grey’s!’ They’d crush.”
The same day EW spoke to Bush, we caught up with Lafferty and Colletti — and got a reaction to her kind words.
“Oh, wow. I mean, dude, I don’t have that hair!” Lafferty says with a laugh.
Colletti disagrees, saying, “It’s in there, grow it out!”
“That wave? That [Patrick] Dempsey wave, that’s iconic. I can’t fill those shoes,” Lafferty replies. “Also I can’t memorize more than three sentences in a row, so there’s no way I’m playing a doctor.”
For now, fans can watch Seasons 1 and 2 of Lafferty and Colletti’s meta comedy Everyone Is Doing Great on Netflix — and potentially expect Bush to return to Grey’s for Season 23 as her character, Cass, ended up in bed with Caterina Scorsone’s Amelia in the Season 22 finale.
“You immediately get that question of like, ‘What happened? This is insane,’” Bush told EW of the plot twist. “Also, I was just giggling to myself because from the moment that Cass showed up at Grace Sloan, the whole gay internet has been asking for this. And I was like, ‘Oh, okay. Writers’ room, I see you!’”
