Jeffrey Dean Morgan still can’t quite believe he’s stepping into the role of host for NBC’s new competition series Destination X. The actor, best known for his role on The Walking Dead, admits the offer caught him completely off guard, and revealed who really convinced him for it.
“[NBC] called… and I said, ‘I think you have the wrong person,’” Morgan told PEOPLE exclusively. “I live on a farm, and I kill zombies, and I’m a dad, and I’m kind of a pain in the a*s.”
Despite a decades-long acting career, the 59-year-old never saw himself hosting a TV show.
“I’m still not actually completely sure how the hell this happened,” he joked. “I am not like a typical host. I’m not Ryan Seacrest — who I love, and I think he’s excellent at his job — but that’s not me. I’m a bit on the crass side and I’ve got a very sarcastic sense of humor, and I didn’t picture it.”
But producers of Destination X were determined. The show, inspired by a Belgian series, follows contestants traveling across Europe on a blacked-out bus.
Each week, they must guess their location through a series of challenges. The player with the farthest-off guess is eliminated. It’s a mix of adventure and strategy — described as The Amazing Race meets Traitors meets Big Brother.
Morgan was hesitant, especially after seeing the original version’s host.
“The host was this very slick, kind of James Bond-y guy,” he said. “I kept saying, ‘That’s not me either.’ And [producers] just kept coming back and coming back.”
At the time, Morgan was also dealing with a lot personally. He was filming the Walking Dead spinoff Dead City, while also navigating the emotional toll of his father’s declining health.
“There was a bunch of stuff going on in my life. My dad was passing away in the middle of shooting, and I was a bit of a mess,” Morgan shared. “I wasn’t sure how I was negotiating doing anything well at the time.”
His wife, Hilarie Burton Morgan, helped shift his perspective.
“It was my wife who said, ‘You know what?’ She came from this world. She came from the world of hosting,” he said, referencing her early 2000s stint on MTV’s Total Request Live.
“She said — in a very nice way, but much more diplomatic than I’m going to make it seem now — ‘You’re not getting any younger. You’ve got this thing about you that it would be fun for you to be able to share that with the world, and you may have an opportunity to do that [by] hosting a show like this.’”
She also added that, unlike his usual roles, he “probably” wouldn’t get hurt on Destination X.
Before making his final decision, Morgan spoke with his father about the opportunity. “Well, you know, son, I’m not really a reality show guy,” his father replied.
“And I’m like, ‘Well, I’m not either, which might make it all that much more interesting and cool,’” Morgan said.
Producers ultimately assured him that they just wanted him to be himself.
“‘Look, we just want you to be you. A little bit edgy, but a guy that maybe people want to have a beer with, and the gals think is kind of entertaining,’” Morgan recalled. “So I was like, ‘All right, let’s try it.’”
