David Boreanaz Reveals Betty White’s NSFW Reaction When They First Met: ‘Holy S—, I Want to F— You’

David Boreanaz is remembering his Bones guest star Betty White — and her sassy way with words.

While speaking with fellow cast members during the Bones: 20th Anniversary Retrospective panel at the inaugural Televerse Festival on Saturday, Aug. 16, Boreanaz, 56, revealed that White made an unexpected, and quite direct, comment toward him on set. And he apparently took it in stride.

White’s first of two appearances as Dr. Beth Mayer came in the series’ 11th-season episode “The Carpals in the Coy-Wolves,” which aired in 2015. After actor T. J. Thyne admitted she was “a little troublemaker” on set, Boreanaz — who played protagonist Seeley Booth in the long-running drama — shared during the Bones panel that White’s trouble also extended to one NSFW comment.

“She showed up in the diner. They drive her in and put her — Ms. White — [they] usher her in. And she says hello to everybody,” he said of their first interaction. “And Emily [Deschanel] and I are waiting for her. And she’s like, ‘Good to see you. Oh, good to see you. You’re so nice. You’re so pretty.’ She goes up to Emily — ‘Oh, you’re so pretty.’ ”

“She looks at me, she goes, ‘Holy s—, I want to f— you. I want to f— you!’ I just started laughing,” Boreanaz recalled.

Deschanel, 48, then clarified during the reunion talk — moderated by PEOPLE’s Sean Mandell and also featuring insight from Thyne, Hart Hanson, Tamara Taylor, Michaela Conlin and Eric Millegan — that she didn’t remember the exchange herself.

“I’m not saying it didn’t happen, I’m saying I didn’t hear that, but that’s amazing,” she said, as Taylor called White a “legendary potty mouth.”

White’s second appearance on Bones came during the show’s 12th season in 2017, in the episode “The Radioactive Panthers in the Party.” The series was just one in which the Golden Girls star would make the occasional guest appearance before her December 2021 death. She also made cameos in Ugly Betty, 30 Rock and SpongeBob SquarePants.

Bones ran for 12 seasons from 2005 through 2017. The series earned two Primetime Emmy nominations, in 2009 and 2012. Since then, Deschanel and Bones costar Carla Gallo launched their rewatch podcast, Boneheads, in 2024.

Speaking with PEOPLE at Televerse, Deschanel said that looking back at the series for her podcast has been “fun,” especially after not seeing some of the episodes in two decades.

“It’s been really interesting to see the show because all of them I hadn’t watched for 20 years basically. And then there’s a couple so far that I hadn’t seen yet, I don’t think. And then definitely as we go along, there’ll be ones I never have seen,” she said. “So it’s interesting to look back and see like, ‘What did we do?’ And I guess one takeaway is, hey, it was pretty solid. The show is pretty solid.”

Yamillah Hurtado contributed reporting to this story.