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Fans of The Walking Dead and actor Jeffrey Dean Morgan may have spotted the tattoo on his character, Negan’s arm in recent episodes. Although Negan is a murderous barbed-wire-bat-wielding psychopath in the series, in real life, he’s got a huge heart and a soft spot for dogs!
Famous for his roles in Grey’s Anatomy, The Good Wife, Extant and, most recently, as the charming (yet totally horrifying) Negan on The Walking Dead, Jeffrey Dean Morgan recently revealed that the tattoo on his forearm is actually in tribute to a dog he rescued and loved wholeheartedly for 12 years until she passed.
In the late nineties, Morgan was walking along the boardwalk in Venice Beach, California when he came upon a group of kids selling puppies out of a cardboard box.
Recognizing that the pups were only days old, the dog-loving actor asked how much they cost. The kids said $300. Morgan spotted a tiny pup in the bottom of the box, her eyes not even opened yet, and said “I’ve got $20, give me the one that won’t make it through the day.”
He took the tiny pup to a veterinarian who offered little hope that she’d survive. Miraculously, the little dog in the bottom of the box pulled through and ‘Bisou’ became Morgan’s faithful sidekick.
In 2009 Morgan described the life changing moment, with the dog he rescued by his side, on The Bonnie Hunt Show.
“I bottle fed her for a month, and she used to kiss her way around, which is how she got her name Bisou — it means ‘kiss’ in French.”
Months after they appeared together in the interview, Bisou sadly passed.
But, always in Morgan’s heart, in 2015, he memorialized her with a tattoo in her honor.
Today, Jeffrey Dean Morgan shares his heart and home with several other animals, including his rescue dogs, Bandit and Honey.
You see, Negan isn’t so bad after all.
Ron Dobson
Jun 22, 2018 at 6:57 pm
Almost enough to make me like him on TWD…
Carol
Dec 2, 2017 at 11:57 pm
Love this. Jeffrey is fond of animals you can tell from his SM. Also I thought Bisou died in 2015 but I guess he got the tattoo after he died. He must have missed him very much
Michelle
May 1, 2017 at 12:32 pm
LOVE hearing a story like this! I KNOW he's just acting, but JDM is SO good at being Negan, that it's nice to know that he's just as charming as he seems to be when Negan's being nice!