SharonFan21
07-02-2006, 01:55 AM
Located at http://www.masslive.com/living/republican/index.ssf?/base/living-1/115173981529840.xml&coll=1&thispage=1
Sharon Lawrence has done extensive theater, television and film, yet she's still most closely associated with Assistant District Attorney Sylvia Costas, the character she played on "NYPD Blue" from 1993 to 1999.
"The quality of that show is undeniable," said Lawrence. "Nobody's more aware than I am of how that changed my career ... When you're in someone's TV set every week, people become very attached to that. I value that, I respect it."
Lawrence chatted during an airport layover recently en route to the Williamstown Theatre Festival, where she plays Reno Sweeney, an evangelist turned nightclub star, in a revival of Cole Porter's 1934 musical "Anything Goes," directed by artistic director Roger Rees and opening Wednesday.
The effervescent Reno Sweeney, and many of the lighter roles she has played, suit Lawrence in ways that serious Sylvia didn't, a fact that might surprise fans of the ABC series.
"Most of us are not the people that we play," she said. "People are constantly surprised that I don't look like Sylvia, that I don't move like Sylvia, that I can sing and dance and do comedy."
Lawrence, a native of Charlotte, N.C., went to New York to pursue a stage career in 1983 after graduating from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A former Raleigh Junior Miss, her credits include the national tour of "Zorba" in 1985 with Anthony Quinn, playing a Kit Kat Girl in the 1987 revival of "Cabaret" with Joel Grey, and "Fiddler on the Roof" with Topol, on Broadway from 1990 to 1991.
When that musical ended, she went to Hollywood, where she got a role on the TV show "Civil Wars" that eventually led to "NYPD Blue."
The character of Sylvia eventually became the wife of detective Andy Sipowicz (Dennis Franz) and mother of their young son. Sylvia's death after a courtroom shooting at the end of the sixth season marked her final exit from the show, at her request, after she had taken a break from the show in 1997 to star in the short-lived NBC sitcom "Fired Up."
"I had so many other opportunities that were going to be more challenging," she said. "The character was great, but after the first three seasons there wasn't much to do."
The day after she shot the scene with the bullet in her gut, she was filming the CBS comedy, "Ladies Man," opposite Alfred Molina. And soon afterwards, she played seductive murderess Velma Kelly on Broadway in "Chicago."
Since then her roles have also included Maisy Gibbons, a prostitute on the ABC series "Desperate Housewives."
She liked the style of Gwen Leonard, the character she played on "Fired Up," and sees a connection to the role of Reno Sweeney at Williamstown.
"She was so musical in everything she did. She was a female Frasier. Her turn of phrases were all 1930s comedy, more removed from Sylvia than Maisy. Even though she (Maisy) was a stay-at-home prostitute, the show was in some ways more anchored in reality."
Lawrence said she loves half-hour sitcoms, because they use all her skills.
"You are performing in front of a live audience, and that feeds your energy more. Comedy requires a musical sense of timing," she said.
And as for the role of Reno, "It's similar to the skill sets I get to use in half-hour comedy. The style is something I'm finding, as I hit this age range, that I'm suited to," said Lawrence, who is 45. "She has a sense of humor, a real sense of play."
She admires the great comediennes of the past "who had a certain poise and style." Having studied dance for years, she said it might be that training that gives her an affinity for the flow of comedy.
"Anything Goes" takes place on a Transatlantic liner on which gangsters, socialites and sort-of-celebrities encounter their share of ridiculous situations and romance. Williamstown publicity summarizes it this way: mayhem and madness. The book, by Guy Bolton, P.G. Wodehouse, Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, was built around Cole Porter's classic music and lyrics.
Reno Sweeney's role is called the real star turn because she gets to sing "You're the Top," "I Get a Kick out of You," "Blow, Gabriel, Blow" and the title song.
"They're all classic songs. You really have to do them justice," Lawrence said. "I think of it as a responsibility to the material, an obligation to give Cole Porter his due. These songs have touched so many people around the world because the lyrics are so satisfying and witty, and the melody and the rhythm are almost archetypal in the joy they produce."
Sharon Lawrence has done extensive theater, television and film, yet she's still most closely associated with Assistant District Attorney Sylvia Costas, the character she played on "NYPD Blue" from 1993 to 1999.
"The quality of that show is undeniable," said Lawrence. "Nobody's more aware than I am of how that changed my career ... When you're in someone's TV set every week, people become very attached to that. I value that, I respect it."
Lawrence chatted during an airport layover recently en route to the Williamstown Theatre Festival, where she plays Reno Sweeney, an evangelist turned nightclub star, in a revival of Cole Porter's 1934 musical "Anything Goes," directed by artistic director Roger Rees and opening Wednesday.
The effervescent Reno Sweeney, and many of the lighter roles she has played, suit Lawrence in ways that serious Sylvia didn't, a fact that might surprise fans of the ABC series.
"Most of us are not the people that we play," she said. "People are constantly surprised that I don't look like Sylvia, that I don't move like Sylvia, that I can sing and dance and do comedy."
Lawrence, a native of Charlotte, N.C., went to New York to pursue a stage career in 1983 after graduating from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A former Raleigh Junior Miss, her credits include the national tour of "Zorba" in 1985 with Anthony Quinn, playing a Kit Kat Girl in the 1987 revival of "Cabaret" with Joel Grey, and "Fiddler on the Roof" with Topol, on Broadway from 1990 to 1991.
When that musical ended, she went to Hollywood, where she got a role on the TV show "Civil Wars" that eventually led to "NYPD Blue."
The character of Sylvia eventually became the wife of detective Andy Sipowicz (Dennis Franz) and mother of their young son. Sylvia's death after a courtroom shooting at the end of the sixth season marked her final exit from the show, at her request, after she had taken a break from the show in 1997 to star in the short-lived NBC sitcom "Fired Up."
"I had so many other opportunities that were going to be more challenging," she said. "The character was great, but after the first three seasons there wasn't much to do."
The day after she shot the scene with the bullet in her gut, she was filming the CBS comedy, "Ladies Man," opposite Alfred Molina. And soon afterwards, she played seductive murderess Velma Kelly on Broadway in "Chicago."
Since then her roles have also included Maisy Gibbons, a prostitute on the ABC series "Desperate Housewives."
She liked the style of Gwen Leonard, the character she played on "Fired Up," and sees a connection to the role of Reno Sweeney at Williamstown.
"She was so musical in everything she did. She was a female Frasier. Her turn of phrases were all 1930s comedy, more removed from Sylvia than Maisy. Even though she (Maisy) was a stay-at-home prostitute, the show was in some ways more anchored in reality."
Lawrence said she loves half-hour sitcoms, because they use all her skills.
"You are performing in front of a live audience, and that feeds your energy more. Comedy requires a musical sense of timing," she said.
And as for the role of Reno, "It's similar to the skill sets I get to use in half-hour comedy. The style is something I'm finding, as I hit this age range, that I'm suited to," said Lawrence, who is 45. "She has a sense of humor, a real sense of play."
She admires the great comediennes of the past "who had a certain poise and style." Having studied dance for years, she said it might be that training that gives her an affinity for the flow of comedy.
"Anything Goes" takes place on a Transatlantic liner on which gangsters, socialites and sort-of-celebrities encounter their share of ridiculous situations and romance. Williamstown publicity summarizes it this way: mayhem and madness. The book, by Guy Bolton, P.G. Wodehouse, Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, was built around Cole Porter's classic music and lyrics.
Reno Sweeney's role is called the real star turn because she gets to sing "You're the Top," "I Get a Kick out of You," "Blow, Gabriel, Blow" and the title song.
"They're all classic songs. You really have to do them justice," Lawrence said. "I think of it as a responsibility to the material, an obligation to give Cole Porter his due. These songs have touched so many people around the world because the lyrics are so satisfying and witty, and the melody and the rhythm are almost archetypal in the joy they produce."