TV INTERVIEW: DONNIE WAHLBERG

Playing a New York Cop In The CBS Drama 'Blue Bloods'

By: Izumi Hasegawa

October 13, 2010

Star of CBS cop show Blue Bloods, Donnie Wahlberg describes the joys of working on location when that location is New York. He tells Buzzine of the riches to be had when actors share similar perspectives on and off set. In a world where everyone has an opinion on the role of the police in America, the actor shares personal experiences and carefully considered opinions of the men and women behind the badge. We also learn what it’s like when an actor finally gets to work with a hero.

Izumi Hasegawa: It seems like you're having a lot of fun, just from everything you put on Twitter and the interactions between the cast members. Could you talk about how you guys interact with each other? Do you find that you have taken on those familial characteristics like your characters? Like, is Tom the dad on set, and you and Will have a brotherly relationship?

Donnie Wahlberg: It's ironic how everything usually turns out right, at least when people do a good job of casting. Bridget [Moynahan] and I have a very, very great relationship, and while she's, in my opinion, one of the most beautiful women I've ever met, it is a very, very trusting, brotherly/sisterly relationship. We're both single parents, we talk about all types of stuff off-camera, and we help each other a lot as well off-camera. It flows very naturally onscreen when we work together. Sometimes I look at Will [Estes] and it's like looking at myself ten years ago on Boomtown. I see him wanting to explore certain elements of his character's story, the way I did. And of course with Tom [Selleck], he's sort of like everyone's dad. I'm sort of the nutty kid on set, but Tom knows I'm professional and I come to play hard every day, much like Frank [Tom Selleck's character] knows that's what Danny [Donnie's character] is.

IH: In future episodes, do we get to find out more about Danny's background and his time in Iraq?

DW: I'm using Will as a reference – when I was Will's age, I wanted every single part of my character, the story, to come out. Like in the very first episode after the pilot, in every subsequent script, I would say, "Man, when are we going to get to it?" and the reality is, I guess with age and experience comes a little more patience. Of course I want to get to it, but I'm not desperate to get to it. In a perfect world, we'll have a couple of seasons to explore all of this stuff, and as everyone knows, you run out of material after a while on TV. The more we can come up with of good stuff -- like Friday's episode, "Officer Down" -- and not have to go there quite yet, the more we can save that for when it's the right time and it's really needed. Obviously I want to go into a lot of the stuff that's going on with a lot of these characters, not just Danny. I want to know what's going on with Will, and I want to see whether or not he's going to investigate the Blue Templar. I'm very curious, and obviously that will have implications for my character, perhaps, but I want to see how it all goes. I want to see where a lot of this stuff goes. It's definitely what we all want -- the writers and the cast.

IH: This show has more respect for the police than most shows I've seen -- in particular, this episode. What was your viewing of the police way back when you were a kid, before you were famous, when you were in your wilder rock years? What did you think of the police back then?

DW: When I was in Boston growing up, I pretty much knew all the cops in my neighborhood because they had all arrested my brothers. I'd seen them around -- they knew me, I knew them. We knew a lot of cops, anyway. When you grow up in a city like Boston, a lot of kids become criminals or cops. I never really had a bad take on cops, other than I hate when there's one behind me on the highway. I generally feel like I've just robbed the bank, even though I did nothing. I don't know why that feeling comes over me. I'll never get used to a cop being behind me on the highway. I think, throughout the years, I've gotten to work with so many of them that, while I think I always had a certain level of respect for cops in general, it's grown so much over the years. As in every part of life, there are always some people who break the rules. They do things that aren't right, and a lot of times the cops...certain guys make mistakes, and the cop will pay for it. I think nine out of ten guys, maybe 99 of 100 guys and women are out there trying to do the very best they can in very scary, very dangerous circumstances. Sometimes they make judgment calls, and most times, they want to do the right thing, and every now and again it goes awry. Unfortunately, all the times they do make a proper judgment call are very rarely recognized, compared to the times they make a bad judgment call. For me, I get to explore that kind of stuff, and I'm kind of feeling what my character...he makes bad judgment calls sometimes. But I think a lot of the cops who watch the show respect it because they know it can happen. I don't think they want to go around sticking people's heads in toilets, but I know they sometimes maybe wish they could, if it's the right circumstance. When that character in the pilot all but admits that he has that little girl, it's at that moment that every person in the world -- the parents of a victim, the cops, anybody, friends of a victim... -- would all want to be able to take the law into their own hands and do something to save a child. Unfortunately, we can't always do that. In our pilot episode, it worked out for Danny and for the little girl, but it's a tough spot to be in. Imagine the burden of having to save a young girl's life, but having so many restrictions that you can't do what it takes. It's tough. Everybody has to have rights, and that's just the way it is, so we all gotta deal with it.

IH: There's a good relationship with the partner he had on this episode -- the guest star. Is she going to be in more episodes?

DW: She's shooting her fourth episode now -- Jennifer Esposito, who I'm having so much fun with. She's really great. She's bringing a lot to the show, and certainly giving me room to play.

IH: And it works because she contrasts with you and tells you when you're wrong.

DW: She does. And after "Officer Down," there's an episode where I get to bring a lot of levity to my character and to the situation. It's not as intense of a crime that we're investigating. I get to have a lot fun and with Jennifer. I've been telling Will Estes, it's like, "Man, you don't know what you have with Nick Turturro. You have gold. Every day you show up to work, you have the potential for magic with an actor of his caliber." I feel like I have that with Jennifer Esposito.

IH: So now that this show is off and running and people are tuning in, does this take pressure off you, or does it add pressure?

DW: If I think about it, it only adds pressure, so I just try not to think about it because the reality is I control none of that. I just control what I do. For actors, for anybody dealing with numbers and polls and things like that, the more you look, the more pressure you put on yourself because, if you get 20 million viewers on day one, while if you look at the numbers on day two when they're down to 19 million, you suddenly start going, "Oh, what happened?" The reality is I think we're a couple million viewers more than anybody thought we would get, and that's good news. But it's really what we do on set and what the cast talks about -- really trying to control what we can control, and that's finding the right mix of what works for our audience, identifying who they are, and servicing what they want, and also servicing our characters as best we can. It's tricky, but the pressure never goes away. There are so many things at stake with every episode, and we treat every episode very importantly. I don't take days off, and I think my cast-mates are the same way. They know I come to play every day, and to me it's like a concert every day, or a movie every day, or a challenge every day, and I want to be as good as I can be every day.

IH: How does it feel to film in New York and actually be on location instead of a soundstage in Hollywood or up in Canada, pretending to be in New York?

DW: I'm shooting right now in a building that I live in that was built in 1885, I think. I'm looking out the window at the Williamsburg Bridge, and there's a cool breeze coming in, and... I just feel lucky every day. In the "Officer Down" episode, in the climactic scene, we're shooting under the Manhattan Bridge in DUMBO, and all these guys are up there working on the bridge. In between every take, they would yell down, "Donnie Wahlberg, we love you, man!" It was so much fun. It was so great. I don't know how anyone can even hear in DUMBO -- it's the loudest place I've ever been on Earth, but those guys' voices cut right through all the trains and the noise and the traffic and the drilling and the welding... There's nothing like playing a New Yorker and being on the streets of New York and having New Yorkers give you a pat on the back. That's been happening every day. Just today, walking down the street, a couple of guys doing some construction on a brownstone say, "Hey, way to go, Wahlberg." For a Bostonian, we live in the shadow of New York, and to be acknowledged by New Yorkers is really the greatest feeling. And take into consideration the magic of shooting on these streets, which is a whole another thing.

IH: Can you talk about the challenge of playing a cop hunting for a cop-killer?

DW: The struggle for me, and the challenge for me playing Danny in this episode, investigating a cop killer, is sometimes the writer and the story have their own purpose, and that's to get from point A to point Z, to entertain in a dramatic way with information to keep the audience informed. But for me, playing Danny, I looked at every single person connected to the case as a cop-killer. I think there's an element of truth in that. I think, if an officer does go down in the real world, and anybody associated with it is involved in a cop being killed, I think that raises the stakes for everything. So when I showed up, for example, in an early scene in the episode where there's an electrician guy who's being interrogated, to me, he was in cahoots with those guys, so I thought Danny's take is that they're all guilty. They're all guilty and they're all involved, so therefore they're all cop-killers. I think the challenge then became how to bring that spirit into every scene, even if the page didn't suggest that. If what was on the page was really about look, this guy will connect us to this guy, who will connect us to the actual guy who pulled the trigger. I want it to bring a sense to Danny that every guy involved might as well have pulled the trigger, because a young officer is gone because of all their choices. Had one of them stepped up, maybe it wouldn't have happened. I think the challenge is in respecting what's on the page, but also respecting the character and where he comes from, what his choices may be in a situation like this, and finding the balance, not going too far. But I'm sort of going rogue. As Donnie the actor is going rogue on the script and playing his own movie, but certainly pushing the boundaries enough that Danny is doing everything he can to see that justice is done in his eyes.

IH: Beyond the show, how do you view the real line between duty and vengeance for a police officer when one of their own is killed? Is that the line between good cop and bad cop?

DW: That's really an impossible question to answer because I'm not really a cop in real life. I could tell you if someone in my family was killed and what that would feel like... I could probably answer it better if somebody violated somebody who was very close to me what I would feel like and what I may want to do, but I'm just Donnie. I'm playing Danny, and Danny's want for justice, I think, is bigger than he even understands. I don't think he knows, really, what's pushing him. I don't know if Donnie knows what's pushing Danny at this point. There's a lot still to be discovered with these characters. There's a lot of curiosity as to what happened to Danny's brother in the show and what happened to the other son, Joe. He was killed in the line of duty investigating the Blue Templar, which Danny may be a part of. There's a lot of mystery to that, and I don't know what exactly is driving Danny. I know that, in this particular episode, based on how I played it, the way I think Danny should, is that he will not stop, he will not sleep until he gets the guy who did it, and as far as he's concerned, they're involved so they all need to be stopped. In real life, would I take vengeance on somebody? I don't know. I like to think I'm a little bit more of a forgiving person, but if I were out there on the streets every day risking my life and somebody carelessly mowed down somebody who's doing the same, I'm sure I'd be driven to do all I could to get that person off the street.

IH: What's your favorite part about playing Danny?

DW: The freedom that I have with him. I think a great day playing Danny is when I remember to be free and try something different every day... My favorite days are the days that, even though I'm being guided by the script down a certain road, I still am able to make discoveries and try things that are completely free and off the cuff. Today on set, I did a quasi-Columbo moment. It was really funand it didn't feel false. It felt within the realm of Danny, and it's what attracted me to this role. There were a few other opportunities for me to work in other shows and do other things, but this part, besides the fact that I love the cast and I love Tom and I love the pilot script, I really loved the freedom that this character presented for me as an actor.

IH: What do you think makes this cop drama stand out amongst the others?

DW: The audience is going to have their own opinion of what they think makes it stand out. I think the cast was amazing, the script was amazing, and my character is, in my eyes, the kind of character that I don't get to play very often, and very few actors get to play a guy who you can just play an emotional beat, if I want, with a suspect, I can play an angry beat, I can play a fun beat...I get to really explore the different colors of this character. The family stuff, I think, is a big part of what is working for the audience, and I think it's a big part of what works for the cast as well. When I read the pilot, I could see my sister sitting across from the table in real life, saying these lines to me. We've had many similar arguments as Bridget and I got to play in the show -- my sister and I in real life. When something resonates like that so truthfully, it definitely creates an attraction. When I did that dinner scene, I knew I was going to have a good time doing it. I knew it would be tense, I knew it would be fun, and I knew I would be alive. When you're doing television, it's a grind and you're working five days a week, and me personally, I look for something that's going to make me feel alive. My character has a lot of freedom which makes me feel alive, and the family scenes have a lot of truth in them, and that makes me feel alive. To feel alive a few days a week during episodic television, it's a gift to feel that electricity, and I get to feel it more than most.

IH: Did you do any research to prepare for the role, or spend any time with members of the NYPD?

DW: I did spend time with them, and I spent time with them before on other projects. I actually played a hostage negotiator on a show called Kill Point. I was playing a guy in Pittsburgh, but I worked with Jack Cambria, who's the head of the hostage negotiation team for the NYPD, and I've worked with other New York cops before. The other part of this character is that he's a very experienced guy who sort of marches to the beat of his own drum, but he is the son of a very powerful man, and I think that's the part I really wanted to explore a lot and wanted to discover with each episode. Given a little freedom in that, if I can take a lot of time, if allowed to on this show, to interpret scenes the way we want... And certainly I can't read a scene that says, "Danny goes into prison, eats a pizza," and I suddenly come out and decide that Danny is hallucinating on drugs -- it's not like we're a bunch of insane people running in the asylum here. But with each scene, for example, that Danny has with Frank, what's it like to be the son of a powerful man, following in his footsteps, but trying to be your own man? I'm sure there's a lot of resentment for Danny toward his dad. I'm sure there's a lot of gratitude. I'm sure there are times when he takes full advantage of his relationship with his dad, and I'm sure there are times where he resents that relationship tremendously and thinks it's a burdenor an assistance. It gives him privilege that he shouldn't have or hadn't earned. There's so much in that relationship, that is really the part I didn't want to research -- I wanted to discover it with each episode. I wanted to try a different take because the reality is there's no one answer. I'm not playing a guy who simply resents his dad or simply worships his dad. I'm playing a guy who runs the full gamut from everything in between both of those scenarios, and each scene offers me a chance to play a different color or a different shade of that.

IH: Can you explain what we might see from Danny going forward?

DW: I think my TV experience has put me in a position where I'm really taking this show as it comes. I think, if you asked me this question ten years ago on Boomtown, I would tell you where I think he's going to go. But I think, with this show, I don't press the writers to find out. I'm not pressing to know the answers myself. I want to discover it when I get there. I think I have a good grasp on this character. I think I know who he is, and I'm connected to him. I don't think there's anything that's really going to surprise me that they might come up with or that I will feel can't be played honestly. That's what I mean by surprise. I hope they surprise me. I plan on being surprised, but at the same time, I don't feel like I need to be thinking in week four about what's going to happen with him in week 20, because I think it will be a surprise to him. I think if Danny is battling scars from Iraq and they suddenly erupt in his life, it probably will be a surprise when it happens -- to him and everyone around him -- so I figure I might as well let it be a surprise to me too and see what happens when I open up that script one day, hopefully.

IH: What aspects of Danny do you find are most like yourself?

DW: I was doing a scene today, and it seemed a little bit insensitive of a moment to play. I became aware that it was a little insensitive, and I started playing the scene a little bit softer, and I caught myself after a take. That's when I said, "What are you doing? This is not your point of view -- this is Danny's point of view. This is Danny's take on things, so relax. If it ruffles some feathers, then so be it -- that's who he is. You're not playing you, you're playing him." But I think the way that Danny is like me is I think he's mischievous. I think in last week's episode, for example, in the final scene with the cigar, there was a lot of Donnie in that scene. Danny was riffing Dad in the final scene, and teasing Dad a little bit, but at the same time, that's very much a Donnie characteristic. I like being a leader in real life, and I'm very much a leader in a lot of the work I do or that I've done in my career, but at the same time, every now and again I have to deal with other leaders who have a little bit more authority than me, and I think that is somewhere I definitely connect with Danny. It's fun, interesting, and electric, playing Danny and having to deal with his dad, Frank. At the same time, it's fun being Donnie and being on set every day with Tom. I gotta say it's fun, and it really makes the job great for me. It's fun coming to work every day and working out scenes with Tom, working on ideas, and knowing how I like to work, and also knowing and respecting who he is. We do have a great mutual respect, but much like the characters, there's an experience difference. There's an age difference. There are differences that ring true in every scene that we do onscreen and off, and it's a treat to explore that, and it makes it very real for me.

IH: Were you a big fan of Magnum, P.I.? Had you even met Tom before this?

DW: I never met Tom. I was a huge fan of Three Men and a Baby. My mother was a huge Magnum fan, and she's in heaven right now. Every Friday night she's watching the show, and I could call her at 4:00 in the morning to get her take on the show, and she'll wake right up out of bed and say, "Oh my God, I love when you made Tom laugh." She's in her glory. Of course I remember Magnum and stuff, but I really came to respect Tom a lot later. Three Men and a Baby was one of my favorite movies, and as Tom went on in life, I've seen him do different interviews and do different things, and I've gained a lot of respect for him throughout the years, and never more than I have for him now. To see how far he's come, the level of success he's had, and to see the grace he shows on set every day, that's something one can only aspire to. It's one thing to have the success, but to have the humility after the success is really what impresses me, and that's the kind of life I try to live, and to see that you can actually do that and that there are people like that who exist is very encouraging.