Zach Braff, Donald Faison get candid on 'Scrubs,' doing 'half-hour comedy sex' - USA Today
NEW YORK – Relative to the last time he was on camera with Rachel Bilson, "Scrubs" star Zach Braff says their latest scenes were a bit easier.
In the opening shot of the Season 2 premiere for the medical sitcom (new episodes Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET/PT, streaming next day on Hulu), Braff and Bilson are in bed together.
"We're old friends and buddies," the actor, 51, says alongside costar and real-life best friend Donald Faison. "It's like rolling around with a very beautiful buddy."
Rachel plays Charlie, J.D.'s (Braff) love interest. The two actors previous worked on the 2006 film "The Last Kiss."
"We actually did R-rated movie fake sex back in the day," Braff notes of the film. "So to come and do ABC half-hour comedy sex is easier."
For the season premiere, Braff pulled double duty, directing the episode as well. And as Faison points out, Bilson isn't the only person that Braff has known for a while.
"It's got to make it easier that everybody in the immediate cast, you've known pretty much half your life," Faison, 52, notes, mentioning Sarah Chalke, Judy Reyes, John C. McGinley and Neil Flynn, who were also on the original run of "Scrubs" from 2001 to 2010.
"The biggest challenge of directing 'Scrubs' is we shoot it in five days," Braff replies, noting that directing the cast is "easy." "It's a real challenge to get everything that we do in five days."
Braff says filming the jokes, drama and surreal fantasies with a cast of 15 and 50 extras is a "marathon" for that short of a period. Both he and Faison serve as executive producers for the revival, with Braff overseeing production in Vancouver, where the show films.
"I don't miss a single scene," Braff says. "I cared so much about getting this right that if I'm not in the scene and it's at 6 a.m. and I wrapped at 1 in the morning, I'll be there."
"Scrubs" took an atypical route to get from its first run to its second. ABC Studios originally produced the series, yet ABC declined it for its network. The show ended up running for eight seasons on NBC before a 9th on ABC in 2010. Like other shows during the COVID-19 pandemic, "Scrubs" received renewed attention, thanks in part to a rewatch podcast that Braff and Faison started.
Then in 2023, the duo starred in Super Bowl commercials for cellular network T-Mobile. They would eventually return for multiple ads, however the first one (which also featured John Travolta) ranked in the top 10 of USA TODAY's Ad Meter. ABC then picked up a revival of "Scrubs," which premiered in February 2026.
"To be honest, those ads helped alley-oop, if you will, this experience happening," Braff says, using a basketball analogy. "The ads being so successful as they were kind of helped bring the show back, so we're very grateful for those."
Faison, a diehard New York Knicks fan, agrees. And he loves the sports analogy: the actor is still riding high off the Knicks' NBA championship win in June.
"Listen, I waited 52 years for this," the actor says. "I was born the year after [the Knicks won in 1973]. I think my parents might have had conceived me through celebration of the Knicks winning the year before."
But despite Faison's fandom and his sitcom airing on the network that showed the NBA Finals, the actor didn't try and pull a favor for tickets to the games. He even turned down an invitation from Braff to go to Madison Square Garden because he didn't want to sit in a suite "with a bunch of people who were not Knicks fans and hear them say to me, 'It's all right, maybe next game Donald.'"
"I guess you're talking about me because I'm not walking around with a Knicks hat yelling 'Knicks in 5!' at every doorman that I meet," Braff responds.
"Maybe I am!" Faison quickly retorts, as both men start laughing.
The "Scrubs" revival reunites best friends J.D. and Turk, who are now at Sacred Heart Hospital as the chief of medicine and chief of surgery, respectively. J.D. is trying to date post-divorce, as is his ex-wife, Dr. Elliot Reid (Chalke). She reunites with her ex-boyfriend Sean (Scott Foley).
And Faison says that his character Turk is still trying to find his way.
"Even though J.D. is back in the hospital and Turk seemed to be on the mend from his depression, it doesn't really work like that," Faison says. "Turk still has issues about where he works and how he works. And he's grateful that his best friend's back but he's still burnt out."
"I think the fans are going to like the season even more because we learned a lot last year," Braff says, referencing the first season of the revival. "It's a little more lived in this season. I think we found our footing."
Both actors are thinking about plans for "Scrubs" past Season 2, but neither know what will ultimately happen. The only prediction Faison will offer is on the Knicks upcoming season.
"I've waited 52 years and it's happened, and there's a possibility it might be another 52 years," he says of the Knicks' championship chances. "Even though I think we win it again this year. Knicks in 5."
