You’ve likely seen Kyle Bornheimer on any one of a number of shows — Breaking Bad, Casual, Will & Grace, to name a few — or in The Lovebirds or Marriage Story on Netflix.
And most recently, he stars on the HBO space comedy series Avenue 5 as Doug, one half of a bickering couple, which will return for a second season. Plus, he recurs on the NBC police comedy Brooklyn Nine-Nine as Amy’s (Melissa Fumero) ex-boyfriend, Teddy, who proposes every time he sees her.
“I do have an affinity for innocent lugs,” he admits to TV Insider. “People who are positive but not always the brightest light in the room. … Obliviousness is just a very fun note to play in acting.”
Here, Bornheimer offer his take on the past and hopeful futures of Doug and Teddy.
Last we saw Teddy on Brooklyn Nine-Nine, he was married and his wife was pregnant … and he still proposed to Amy again. I imagine his wife in labor and Teddy calling Amy to propose.
Yeah, he’s probably got some sort of prenup. There’s one out, if she says yes.
What is it about Amy that brings that out in him?
It’s probably more about Teddy than her. Anyone can see the wonderful person that she is. When we first meet them, the way they approach their work and their attention to detail and their nerdy love for what to do is what brings them together. But Amy’s on her own journey on that show in terms of the opposites attract thing she has with Jake, who she eventually marries.
But in terms of Teddy, that’s what the writers started with, the simple thing of, how funny would it be if her boyfriend was almost exactly like her? His pining for her and his love for her obviously grows when he knows he can’t have her, and that’s heartbreaking for him.
What I love [is] there’s an obliviousness to him, where he has a lack of self-awareness that’s really funny in a different way, not that he’s necessarily an oaf, but there’s this smiling basic-ness that he has, that he’s not really aware of how wonderfully, gloriously basic he is, and I mean that as a compliment. Not only that, but then his obliviousness that she has moved on from him, and in his mind, they are still this perfect couple, played in this really light, comedic way. The writers always hit the right note with that, the perfect amount of time to spend with Teddy and on Teddy with that. If you were to break it down anymore, it would be quite disturbing how much he’s in love with her.
We’ve also seen Teddy audit the precinct and be the commander of the bomb squad. What else would you like to see him do when he shows up next?
What’s been fun the last few times is now the writers are having a real fun time being surprising with how Teddy shows up. The fact that he’s in the bomb squad and actually in that particular case, holds sway over the circumstances and can almost bend the circumstances his way to compel Amy to either spend more time with him or appreciate him more, I like the way they flirted with the idea of him manipulating a really dire circumstance for his own pining for Amy. The last episode, there’s a great, clever surprise how he’s revealed as well.
It’s going to be fun to see whenever the writers want Teddy to come back. That’s going to be a fun challenge they give themselves, how can we make this the most surprising or unwelcome appearance by Teddy?