David Boreanaz

LOS ANGELES (Zap2it.com) After playing the same tortured vampire with a soul for three seasons of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and five seasons of "Angel" on The WB Network, David Boreanaz is eager to carve a new niche.

Of course, that doesn’t mean he’s escaped being surrounded by the dead.

In "Bones," premiering Tuesday, Sept. 13, on Fox, Boreanaz plays FBI Agent Seeley Booth, a no-nonsense investigator reluctantly paired with forensic anthropologist and mystery-book author Temperance Brennan (Emily Deschanel), whose skill at analyzing skeletal remains yields clues to crime. Brennan takes her name from the fictional alter ego of the real scientist/novelist who inspired her, Kathy Reichs. Rounding out the cast are Eric Millegan, T.J. Thyne, Michaela Conlin and Jonathan Adams.

While he respects Brennan’s skills in the laboratory, Booth derides scientists as "squints" and believes they have no place poking around crime scenes. Brennan would rather be out in the field, making sure her bones are collected properly and seeing firsthand where the victims were found.

Together, Booth and Brennan are an effective if inharmonious team fond of needling each other about their different approaches. There’s even a little sexual tension and comedy, which is an unusual mix in a crime procedural.

"That’s the challenge," series creator Hart Hanson says. "We will either do terrifically well at it, or we will fail horribly. But we would like a little bit of the ’Moonlighting’ thing. We would like a little bit of the ’Thin Man’ thing."

Hart and producing partner Barry Josephson had a hard time finding Deschanel.

"We always said we needed three things from our lead actress on this show," Hanson says. "We needed her to be smart; we needed her to be sexy; we needed her to be funny. Those three legs of the stool are very rare."

Even a greater challenge was convincing Boreanaz that the role was for him. After a shaky first meeting, Hanson had to get on the phone and explain to the actor just why he was the perfect Booth.

"I told him that he had the presence of those old-time male movie stars," Hanson says. "I get in trouble saying it but today, there are so many waifs and boys. I didn’t care about that for this. Booth’s a sniper; he’s an FBI agent. He’s lived the life. I want a man with some heft, and David has that."

"And David’s not pretty. David’s handsome. If you’re going somewhere dangerous, you want David."

And as a bonus, both in life and on the screen, Boreanaz can be very funny.

"Very dry humor," Hanson says. "He can do things with a flick of his eyeballs. I think of him as one of those old-time movie stars, Gary Cooper, Steve McQueen. He’s got shoulders a yard wide. He’s a force in the room."

"Booth’s very black and white," Boreanaz says. "He believes that all men are created equal. He’s a public-school guy, doesn’t believe in private school. He doesn’t think people should be catered to. He goes with his gut. His instincts are 100 percent correct, or so he may think."

All of this is fine with Boreanaz. "I love classic cars," he says. "I love old watches. Things today are fast, there’s maybe too much at our fingertips, and it’s just getting worse. Sometimes, if it ain’t broken, don’t fix it."