{"id":894700,"date":"2026-10-26T00:44:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-26T00:44:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/894700\/"},"modified":"2026-10-26T00:44:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-26T00:44:09","slug":"before-ncis-sean-murray-appeared-on-the-show-that-launched-the-franchise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/894700\/","title":{"rendered":"Before NCIS, Sean Murray Appeared On The Show That Launched The Franchise"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>            &#13;<br \/>\n    &#13;<br \/>\n    &#13;<br \/>\n    &#13;<\/p>\n<p>&#13;<br \/>\n    &#13;<\/p>\n<p>                                             &#13;<br \/>\n                                                    &#13;<br \/>\n                            &#13;<br \/>\n                        <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"gallery-image \" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/intro-1792970647.jpg\" data-slide-url=\"https:\/\/www.tvline.com\/2291733\/ncis-sean-murray-recurring-role-jag\/\" data-post-id=\"2291733\" data-slide-num=\"0\" data-slide-title=\"Before NCIS, Sean Murray Appeared On The Show That Launched The Franchise: \" width=\"780\" height=\"438\" alt=\"Seam Murray posing for a photo in front of a CBS logo backdrop.\"\/>&#13;<\/p>\n<p>                    Frazer Harrison\/Getty Images<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Special Agent Timothy McGee certainly earned his stripes on &#8220;NCIS&#8221; over the years. But Sean Murray&#8217;s TV cadet training actually stretches back to two different roles on the parent series, &#8220;JAG.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Murray&#8217;s first appearance in &#8220;JAG&#8221; was in 1998, guest starring in Season 4, Episode 3 as a character named Ensign Terry Guitry. The episode, titled &#8220;Innocence,&#8221; centers on a rape case involving a U.S. Naval officer and a Japanese girl.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Murray then had a recurring role on Season 6 of &#8220;JAG,&#8221; playing Danny Walden \u2014 the troubled young son of Dr. Sidney Walden.\u00a0Murray appeared as Danny in five episodes from 2000 to 2001, including &#8220;Florida Straits&#8221; (Episode 3), &#8220;Flight Risk&#8221; (Episode 4), &#8220;JAG TV&#8221; (Episode 5), &#8220;The Princess and the Petty Officer&#8221; (Episode 6), and &#8220;Past Tense&#8221; (Episode 21).<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Despite <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tvline.com\/2155810\/why-navy-tried-stop-jag-oliver-north\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">&#8220;JAG&#8221; getting some initial pushback from the actual Navy<\/a>, the military courtroom drama had a strong run, with two Season 8 episodes (&#8220;Ice Queen&#8221; and &#8220;Meltdown&#8221;) serving as a backdoor pilot for &#8220;NCIS&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<p>                Murray kept it in the family<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Though Murray&#8217;s tenured status on &#8220;NCIS&#8221; has granted him the designation of longest-serving cast member in series history (regardless of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.tvline.com\/2032196\/ncis-sean-murray-leaving-mcgee-interview\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">rumors of his departure<\/a>), his connections with both shows extend beyond the screen.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">His father, Craig Harland Murray, served over 30 years in the U.S. Navy. Growing up with a naval officer \u2014 in-addition to living on a number of military bases until the age of 15 \u2014 no doubt gave Murray a unique way into the character. In a <a href=\"https:\/\/people.com\/tv\/sean-murray-ncis-veterans-day\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">2017 interview with People<\/a>, Murray talks about including a picture of his real father on the &#8220;NCIS&#8221; set early in the series.\u00a0&#8220;So there&#8217;s a picture of me and my real father together in McGhee&#8217;s apartment set, which is kind of cool and sort of inspired the rest of the character&#8217;s story,&#8221; he recalls.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">After his parents&#8217; divorce in the early &#8217;90s, Murray&#8217;s mother Vivienne married Donald P. Bellisario, who created &#8220;JAG&#8221; and &#8220;NCIS.&#8221;\u00a0Murray&#8217;s brother Chad W. Murray and his stepsiblings Michael Bellisario and Troian Bellisario have all worked on both shows.<\/p>\n<p>&#13;<br \/>\n    &#13;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"&#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; &#13; Frazer Harrison\/Getty Images Special Agent Timothy McGee certainly&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":894701,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[88,92],"class_list":["post-894700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-entertainment","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/894700","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=894700"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/894700\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/894701"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=894700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=894700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=894700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}