Sharon Lawrence on NYPD Blue, Grace, and getting to beat up Larry David

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http://www.avclub.com/article/sharon...-beat-l-218666

NYPD Blue (1993-99)—“A.D.A. Sylvia Costas Sipowicz”

AVC: How did NYPD Blue come about for you? Was it just a standard audition?

SL: Yeah, an audition. They had decided that they needed more women to populate that world. The role was originally written for a man—it was just “Assistant District Attorney”—and Sipowicz’s line to the attorney after the cross-examination on the stand was, “Ipso this, you pissy little bastard.” [Laughs.] That was in the original script! But when they decided they needed women, I guess they pulled from professional-type women who had been within the Bochco casts before. Because of Civil Wars, I assume that’s why Junie Lowry-John’s team—the casting director—brought me in. It was as a day player, but they decided that the scene in that storyline was compelling enough to become a teaser for the show, and they decided to reshoot that very classic end to that sequence as an exterior. They brought us to New York to shoot it outside of One Center Street, the judicial building in downtown Manhattan, and that gave us all a chance to spend more time together. The creators saw Dennis and I hanging out together, enjoying each other’s company, and that’s when they had the idea to make this an unlikely love story. So it was really just a matter of them creating the Sylvia and Sipowicz couple.

AVC: Did you have a favorite Sylvia and Sipowicz storyline?

SL: I thought the way Sylvia dealt with Sipowicz’s alcoholism was very compelling. And accurate. We got to see her backbone. She was not just a saintly gal who only saw the good parts of him. She recognized the rest, and she had good boundaries there, and I think that was something that people felt was important to her. For the real-life average people who have a tender romance, that was very satisfying to a lot of viewers, but I think that hitting those bass notes of the challenges within the relationship was equally valued by our viewers.

AVC: Did you have any say in Sylvia’s final fate, or was it presented to you?

SL: I think when Milch was making lots of decisions because he was getting ready to leave the show, there was just an understanding that Sipowicz was always going to be a character who dealt with challenges. And the timing worked out for me, because Ladies Man… I literally shot Sylvia’s gunshot wound in the morning and then had the table read for Ladies Man that afternoon. So there wasn’t much of a time for me to feel like I was losing more than I was getting. Six seasons is a long time, as you know. Most shows don’t last that long.