Blair Underwood

0:12This about a kidnapping yesterday in Brooklyn. You have the right to remain silent. You're crazy. I'm helpless. I got my hands in the head. Come on, hurt me. Hurt me like you hurt those little girls. So Iron Side, older viewers are gonna remember it. But I've heard you say it's a reimagining. It's kind of like the Batman, Christian Bale, Michael Keaton. It's not the same thing. You take it on this character. But how much Raymond Burgos into your portrayal of the rule? Good question. Not much at all. I mean, you know, it's- So no. No, I think that's a trap that you can get into. I mean, the reason I don't use the word remake is because it was made already, and brilliantly so. I mean, people have such a fondness for that.

0:59I was saying earlier, people when I hear it all the time when they mention Iron Side, the next thing out of their mouth, so often it's, I loved Iron Side. So it was done so well before. This is, as you said, it's a reboot. It is a reimagining. It's a different- It's a new updated contemporary version of this brand and franchise that was imagined in the 60s. A story about a detective named Robert T. Iron Side, who is brilliant at what he does, who happens to be in a wheelchair. And that's really the foundational core of what we started from, and just reimagined it from there. Do yourself a favor on this one and give me a break? Who's gonna give me one? Oh, you mean other than your own. Building a hand-picked team of detectives? Hey, none of that was given to me. I took what was rightfully mine. Where did you find the character? Where did you get inspiration from? I always started from the page. And when I read the script, because, you know,

1:46me too when I first heard the idea of me doing Iron Side, I started with what I knew, which was Raymond Burr. Didn't quite understand how they were gonna pull that off. But when I saw that it's, you know, not only contemporary, but he's very kind of in your face. He's very, he's got a lot of attitude. He plays by his own rules, to be sure. He's a womanizer at this stage in his life, which was new and unique. From a wheelchair? He breaks. Oh yeah, oh yeah. He breaks a lot of the rules. It's funny to say that. I said that to a friend of mine the other day. Because my mentor, this old project, is a guy named David Bryant, who is an engineer, he's an athlete, and he's a paraplegic for 34 years. So he usually taught me a lot about that lifestyle. And I said that to a friend, he said,

2:32well, he said he's a paraplegic, how can be an athlete? And there's so much, I think, to be learned from that. Because I mean, this is a man who has done 40 marathons in his wheelchair, as a disabled man. So there's so much that disabled people can do, and do nowadays that a lot of us who are able-bodied aren't even aware of them now. So I'm excited about that aspect, to be able to show that in this show. Including making love. We got a body. How the hell did you see that? I didn't even view the world from down here. Your mom's been in a wheelchair too, for about 10 years. So did she teach you how to maneuver a little more in the tricks of the trade kind of thing? Not so much that. She has an electric chair. And I, on the side, just like my mentor, David Bryant, has no handles on the back of his chair. And I asked him, why don't you?

3:17And he said, why would I want anybody to help me? If I can do for myself, I want to do for myself. He's very independent. You know what inspired me? Also, this show Push Girls. I don't know if you've seen that. It's beautiful. All of them are beautiful. They all happen to be disabled. But they're so independent. And I draw inspiration from that, and learn from the reality that's around us nowadays. When you played cops before, do you take the research you did into those roles into a role like this? Or do you start fresh, because it's a new character? You definitely build on what you've learned before. And you're having played cops before these certain things. That would definitely come in handy, just the logistical things, of how to hold a gun, how to carry a gun, how to enter a room, all of that. That said, we have our technical advisors on the set. They're always going to help us keep it real.

4:03Wednesday's at 10. Wednesday's at 10 this fall. He's not getting away with it. That's OK. All girls. I can't let you do that. What do you want to do? Tack them? No. She brought them in the leg. She hit the hostage. Did I stun him? It's Iron Side. It's Iron Side 2.0. I just do it in there. But he's the cop. He's a detective. And he does it his way, which is great. Because of this new version of himself, this disability, he thinks in a different way. So the way he deciphers cases is new and different. And I have to say, too, we have a lot of flashbacks. So we see him before the accident and after. So that's something very different from the original version

4:49of Iron Side. Come in. I'll let you go. All right, man. Man with the green shoes. Really? Do what I can.