Jared Padalecki is looking back on a touching moment he shared with his Gilmore Girls co-star Edward Herrmann, recalling the day he realized the late actor had what felt like an “eidetic memory.”
During an interview for People’s Sexiest Man Alive issue, Padalecki, 43, sat down with former co-star Matt Czuchry and opened up about one of his favorite memories from filming the season 2 episode “The Bracebridge Dinner.” It was a long day on set, and an unexpected conversation with Herrmann made the moment unforgettable.
“It was before the Lord of the Rings movies came out, and I was reading one of the books, and Ed Herrmann, rest in peace, an amazing man, came up and he said, ‘Have you read them before?’ I was like, ‘No, it’s my first time,’” Padalecki said. “He’s like, ‘Where are you right now?’ When I told him, he just rattled off quotes from the scene.”
Padalecki explained that Herrmann, who had already built a distinguished acting career by the time he joined Gilmore Girls, seemed to have an “eidetic memory.” As Simply Psychology defines it, eidetic memory refers to “the ability to vividly recall images from memory after only a few instances of exposure, with high accuracy for a short time after exposure, without using a memory aid.”
“I remember I turned it back a page, and I was like, ‘That’s exactly what happened,’” Padalecki shared. “He said, ‘You’ll enjoy it very well.’ I was like, ‘Oh my God. This is a brilliant man.’”
Looking back on his early days on the show, the Supernatural actor joked that he was just “little Jared Padalecki from San Antonio,” but Herrmann always treated him with respect and warmth.
“He just treated me like an equal,” Padalecki said of Herrmann, who passed away in 2014 after battling brain cancer. “I was like, ‘Maybe I can do this.’”
Czuchry, 48, added his own reflections on the behind-the-scenes bonds that shape an actor’s experience. “Those are the moments you remember as an actor — being on set and the connection with the cast, the connection with the crew, being at craft service and all those things,” he said. “That connection is what’s so beautiful about the behind-the-scenes aspects.”
Padalecki starred in the early seasons of Gilmore Girls as Dean Forester, Rory Gilmore’s first boyfriend. Czuchry later joined in season 5 as her third serious boyfriend, Logan Huntzberger. Herrmann appeared throughout all seven seasons as Rory’s beloved grandfather, Richard Gilmore.
Even though Czuchry was “the new kid on the block” when he arrived, he said the cast and crew made him feel immediately at home.
“It just felt so welcoming to be a part of that experience and for them to say, ‘Hey, no, no, you’re a part of this. You’re making this happen,’” he recalled. “I remember that episode fondly because of the emotional way that it connected to me and how important it was for me to feel like I belonged.”
