Eriq La Salle Sick of Talking About 'ER'

[Brian Damage]

Hartford's Eriq LaSalle was at press tour to talk about a Hallmark movie in which he'll star.
But he kept being asked about his biggest role, as Dr. Peter Benton on the long-running hospital drama "ER."


Which started to get a little annoying to him.


"OK, I mean look, it was a defining moment, you know, for a lot of us as artists," La Salle said at last. "You know, it was a show that was a little bit ahead of its time. We had a great time doing it. I don't know what else to say. I talked about the show so much. I prefer to talk about 'Relative Stranger.'"


Complicating the moment was the fact that two of his costars in the movie had also been on "ER."


For their parts, Michael Michele said, "'ER' was a defining moment in my career and it continues to be." Michael Beach said, ""I had a great time on the show."


But when another "ER" question came, La Salle began to stew.


"You really want to talk about 'ER,' don't you?"


Well the show is ending its run next season, the questioner persisted.


"It was a great show," La Salle said. "I had a great time doing it. And I'm not doing it anymore. And I'm doing other things...That's it. I'm sorry...Let's talk about 'Relative Stranger.'"


So he did.


La Salle's character in the movie is an ex-football player who returns home.


"He was a standout all through high school and college and he played in the pros, got injured early into his career, couldn't really deal with certain pressures, and ended up abandoning the family," he said. "When that was met with failure, he just, you know, imploded and just basically disappeared.


"We pick up on the story six years later when his father has died and as he gets news of his father's death and him being summoned back because of a will reading. He comes back to find that his family has changed."




The character has to deal with his ex-wife, mother, brother and children - "one child being old enough to know what it felt like to be abandoned, the other child being too young to really comprehend that," La Salle said.


"It's just basically a guy who made some horrible choices and the ramifications of those choices. Now he basically has to deal with those."




After a beat, he cracks: "It's a musical."


Hallmark Channel Executive Vice President of Programming David Kenin said it took five years to make "Relative Stranger" because Hallmark films had been long dependent on financing from international markets. "And African-American themed movies were hard for us to get money for out of let's say Europe, which was a big source."




With a new production company, Faith and Family Entertainment, got involved, it was possible to fund films that were not as dependent on international money.


"It was just a huge breakthrough for us," Kenin said. "And you'll see more of these kinds of movies. Not necessarily African-American stories, but stories that we couldn't have made before and now we are able to."


"Relative Stranger," which also stars Cicely Tyson, premieres on Hallmark in January 2009.



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WHY THE ROMANCE WENT OUT OF ‘ER’ ; ACTRESS IRKED AT HER CO-STAR FOR ENDING INTERRACIAL AFFAIR

By Michael Starr

April 14, 1999 | 4:00am

THE break-up of an interracial romance on “ER” has sparked a war of words between stars Alex Kingston and Eriq LaSalle.

Kingston, who is white, says her black co-star, LaSalle, pushed “ER” writers to end the interracial romance of their characters, Dr. Elizabeth “Lizzy” Corday and Dr. Peter Benton.

“It was a positive relationship and generated a lot of positive feeling,” Kingston told the BBC on Sunday in London, where she’s filming a movie. “But it was something the actor in question had problems with, so it had to come to an end. I actually thought it was a wonderful thing to put out for America to see.”

The “ER” romance between the high-spirited Corday and the intense, brooding Benton played itself out over a number of episodes this season as Corday courted the reluctant Benton, who is dealing with the trials of raising a deaf son from a previous short-lived relationship.

In several print interviews, LaSalle said he pushed the show’s writers and executive producer Lydia Woodward to end Benton’s relationship with Corday because he thought it was sending the wrong message to its black audience, which last season was bigger than “Friends” and “Seinfeld” combined.

“As an African American man, it becomes a bit offensive if the negative things are all you’re showing,” he said. “Because in real life, we romance and get on each other’s nerves and laugh and do all the things that any other race of people do.

“So if the only time you show a balanced relationship is in an interracial relationship, whether it’s conscious or sub-conscious, it sends a message I’m not comfortable with.

“[The writers] were sending a message that I didn’t want to be a part of, which was the only time that this man becomes human and tender and vulnerable and open is when he falls in love with a white woman.”

LaSalle also noted that Benton’s previous two relationships – with Jeanie Boulet (Gloria Reuben) and Carla (“Ally McBeal’s” Lisa Nicole Carson) – were very dysfunctional.

“[Of] the two relationships that I had prior to Corday, one was an adulterous relationship with Jeanie Boulet and then the next relationship I got into was with Carla,” he said. “And unfortunately the writing there was, every time you see them they’re either fighting or [having sex].”

Kingston, the former wife of “Schindler’s List” star Ralph Fiennes, joined the top-rated “ER” last season as Dr. Corday, a British-trained surgeon.

This season, Corday’s status in the “ER” hospital was reduced to a lowly intern due to a funding shortage and paperwork problems. Her affair with Benton was Kingston’s first major “ER” storyline.

LaSalle, an original cast member, has said publicly that he might consider leaving “ER” after another original cast member, George Clooney, departed earlier this year.

Ironically, Kingston and LaSalle are represented by the same Hollywood talent agency.

“ER” is currently on hiatus. Both Kingston and LaSalle were unavailable for comment.