Versatile Wendell Pierce sparks new Michael J. Fox sitcom
NEW YORK – “I’ve always wanted one thing,” says Wendell Pierce. “To have a diverse career, to be a journeyman actor.”
Mission accomplished this fall. With no fewer than four projects in release, Pierce will meet himself coming.
Earlier this month, he made his latest appearance in a recurring role on the USA law drama “Suits.”
He has a film opening, an edgy indie drama titled “Four” wherein he plays a family man who keeps his homosexuality secret while he hooks up harmfully with a teenage boy through an online dating site. In December, he returns as fancy-free jazz trombonist Antoine Batiste on HBO’s glorious New Orleans series “Treme,” airing its final season.
And that’s all on top of Pierce’s dandy new role on “The Michael J. Fox Show,” which premieres on NBC at 9 p.m. today with a special hour-long edition.
“This,” Pierce sums up proudly, “is the diversity I always wanted.”
On the new comedy, Pierce summons his rascally charm to play Harris Green, news director of a New York TV station and longtime pal of former anchor Mike Henry, played by Fox.
Mirroring Fox’s own real-life plight, Mike suffers from Parkinson’s disease, but, after several years retired from the anchor desk at home with his family, he is persuaded by Harris to return to work (just as Fox is returning to full-time acting after a dozen years of limited performances).
Even though Harris sees Mike as his meal ticket (“Guaranteed ratings!” he crows when Mike agrees to come back), they are truly friends, and, reflecting that, Pierce and Fox have forged a chemistry that pops on screen.
At one point, Mike needles Harris about his resistance to settling down with a woman and being a dad.
“Thirty years of lovemaking, not even one slip!” boasts Harris. “Not even a scare.”
“Maybe you’re doing it wrong,” Mike offers.
Pierce says he and Fox have meshed well.
“Michael has a really wonderful sense of timing, and he’s really authentic,” reports Pierce. “We’ll do a take and I’ll say, ‘Ah, I feel like I’m in a vacuum.’ And he’ll say, ‘I like working that way! Stay in the moment and the moment will inform you.’
“Michael has helped remind me of that: You create all those memories that in your real life you take for granted. In your heart and your mind, you create a world for your character so strong that it induces your character’s behavior.”
Pierce is perhaps best known as Bunk Moreland, the dapper, dry-witted detective on HBO’s epic urban drama “The Wire.”