Shortly after returning to the role, Confess, Fletch star Kyle MacLachlan recalls noticing parallels with his How I Met Your Mother character. MacLachlan, also well-known for his role as FBI Agent Dale Cooper in David Lynch's Twin Peaks, starred in the long-running sitcom as George van Smoot, the boat-obsessed husband to Zoey who unnerves most of the group, despite his generous nature. The Golden Globe winner stared in seven episodes of How I Met Your Mother before returning for two episodes of the Hulu sequel show, How I Met Your Father.
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MacLachlan stars in Confess, Fletch as Horan, a Boston art dealer who Jon Hamm's titular character turns to in his investigation to find the missing paintings of his girlfriend's father. Alongside Hamm and MacLachlan, the cast for the mystery comedy reboot includes Ayden Mayeri, Lorenza Izzo, Annie Mumolo, John Behlmann, John Slattery, Lucy Punch and Marcia Gay Harden. Confess, Fletch has scored generally positive reviews from critics and audiences alike, and one star is sharing why they enjoyed playing their character.
While speaking exclusively with Screen Rant to discuss the mystery comedy, Confess, Fletch star Kyle MacLachlan reflected on his character's How I Met Your Mother parallels. The actor noted how one of his costars in the film reminded him of The Captain moreso than himself, but that he had fun finding the parallels and recalled trying to include an Easter egg for the sitcom. See what MacLachlan shared below:
The character of the Commodore, and I forgot the name of the actor who played him, who comes up with a drink in his hand, and he gets shot at the end. I don't want to give it away, but you know, he gets shot at the end accidentally, he survives. He was kind of [slurring] talking like this, you know, I said," Oh, that's very close to The Captain." But it was kind of fun to revisit that, to be on the boat and have like that, like, "Oh, yeah, a little bit of a Captain reference." I was trying to think of a way that I could lay in a little Easter egg somewhere as the character, but nothing really occurred to me, so I was like, "Well, alright." But there is something that happens when you're on a boat, and you play that particular kind of character, you almost become like Cary Grant, you want to be like, "Hello, it's my boat here. Yes. Take a look and see." You sort of get into this odd, upper crust, almost English, sort of throwback East Coast guy, so that that crept into the character for sure.
How Confess, Fletch Subtly References HIMYM's Captain
Even before the film released, some audiences had begun noting parallels between MacLachlan's Confess, Fletch and How I Met Your Mother characters, Horan and The Captain. The brief glimpse included of the former in Confess, Fletch trailers hinted at Horan's interest in boats with a model situated near his office desk, which given The Captain's love for sailing marked an interesting little Easter egg for fans of the long-running sitcom. Even if MacLachlan wasn't able to properly include a How I Met Your Mother Easter egg, like he had hoped to do, his confirmed noticing of the parallels between the projects is sure to be a sweet enough nod.
With is fate initially being left in the air in How I Met Your Mother, The Captain became an interesting key character to How I Met Your Father and Sophie's backstory in the final two episodes on season 1. As Hulu has already picked up the latter show for season 2, audiences may continue being a central figure, or at least a recurring player, in How I Met Your Father's story going forward. In the meantime, audiences can look forward to catching Confess, Fletch on Showtime on October 28.