Judging Amy Brenneman

Movie Poop Shoot - December 5, 2003

By Josh Horowitz

It seems to me that Amy Brenneman could be anything she wants to be. She’s smart (Harvard-educated—we’ll get to that later), witty, and a good-looking woman. Not that I remember, but she was the first actor on NYPD BLUE to get naked, but you can check the DVD for yourself.

A few years ago, Brenneman looked to be at the outset of a solid film career co-starring alongside Sylvester Stallone in DAYLIGHT and Robert DeNiro in HEAT, not to mention getting berated by Jason Patric in YOUR FRIENDS AND NEIGHBORS. But then something funny happened, Brenneman, the self-professed “commitment-phobe” did a very commitment-y thing, creating her own television series.

Now well into its fifth season, Brenneman continues to star in JUDGING AMY, a show based on her mother’s experiences as a judge in Connecticut. Movies have been placed on the backburner, family on the front. She has a little girl and is married to film director Brad Silberling, whose blockbusters have included CASPER and CITY OF ANGELS. Family was much on Brenneman’s mind last week when I spoke with her on the phone from Los Angeles a couple of days before Thanksgiving.

Josh Horowitz: So are you off right now for Thanksgiving?
Amy Brenneman: Yeah, they’re shooting till tomorrow but I got today and tomorrow off.

JH: I’d ask if those slave drivers at JUDGING AMY were giving you the time off but as one of the executive producers and creators I guess you are one of the slave drivers?
AB: I am the slave driver. Yeah. It’s a constant schizophrenic conversation I have.

JH: Are you in the midst of Thanksgiving preparations?
AB: I am. It is actually the only time my entire family gets together so my brothers come in and my parents come from Connecticut. So mostly it’s about
making sure I have enough glasses and pillows. They disappear year to year. So that’s what I’m obsessed with today.

JH: Are you insinuating that your family members are stealing pillows?!?
AB: I don’t know. (LAUGHS) Something happened! I’m at Pottery Barn every year buying the same eight glasses.

JH: Most shows have to fight for survival from year to year but JUDGING AMY I guess has been on pretty sure footing from the get-go?
AB: From the minute we were on the air. That was the freaky thing that first year when we were like, we have a hit! That was the totally strange adjustment because I’m a bit of a commitment-phobe.

JH: What was the initial commitment to the show?
AB: They picked up the script to be written. I had a couple writers that were working on it that kind of sucked. It really seemed unlikely that it would be picked up to be produced. But then [Executive Producer] Barbara Hall came in and totally turned it around.

JH: The hazards and benefits of starring in a show where your actual name is in the title?
AB: That was weird. We had named it SHADES OF GREY. We gave in the pilot and my husband and I went to India. We were on our way back and my producing partner told me, “by the way, we have a new name.” Again, I cannot reiterate to you enough how much of a commitment-phobe I am. When I heard that, I was like, oh no I’ve got to do it now! NYPD BLUE was a nice little ensemble. You could come and go. It actually gets to be a bit of a drag. Whenever there’s strife on the set or someone is complaining
about something, someone will say, “well, it’s not called ‘JUDGING so-and-so,’ it’s called JUDGING AMY.” And my heart always sinks. I wish it was called JUDGING FRED sometimes.

JH: I was reading up on you today and I got very upset because I noticed I missed Lifetime’s “Intimate Portrait” of you that was on last night. Can you bring me up to speed on what I missed?
AB: (LAUGHS) My mom last night was like, “we have to go home to watch the Intimate Portrait!” I was so embarrassed so I stalled at work but then we ended up seeing the last fifteen minutes. It was actually fine.

JH: I know both of your parents went to Harvard Law. You went to Harvard for undergrad. Was there ever any desire to just completely rebel and go to somewhere horribly different like…Yale?
AB: (LAUGHS) Yeah. I actually really liked Barnard. I didn’t particularly like Harvard when I visited it. It was so my mom’s thing. But I got in early in November in my senior year. And I really wanted to leave high school. I was so done with high school. I was going to blow off Harvard. But then my brother Matthew who is really the brain of all of us said to me, “don’t not go because of mom.”

JH: I know acting and theater have been part of your life for a long time even before college. A Harvard degree obviously isn’t a prerequisite for an acting career. Was there ever the thought of skipping school to try and make a go of it immediately?
AB: Not really. I was in such a college culture. And I didn’t know any professional actors. There were so talented people around me [at Harvard] but we were just not in a pre-professional culture. I didn’t have an agent until I was 26 or 27. I look at these kids like Kirsten Dunst who are so savvy about that world and it amazes me.

JH: If I gave a Rubik’s Cube to you and fellow Harvard grads Mira Sorvino and Elizabeth Shue, who would finish first?
AB: (LAUGHS) Well, Elizabeth is my best friend. She’s very competitive so she’d probably kick my butt. Mira seems very smart, too. I’m not sure. We should do that. A little Harvard bake-off.

JH: You were a part of a group called The Cornerstone Theater Company that still exists. When did that association begin?
AB: I met up with the people I formed that company with when I was 19. We continued to do theater as a group in college. Then I traveled with them until 1991.

JH: Where did you go?
AB: Our favorite thing would be to go to geographically isolated places. We went to this town in northwestern Kansas of about 190 people. We did a production on an Indian reservation in Nevada. We lived in a town called Ft. Gibson, Mississippi and did a production of ROMEO AND JULIET. The idea was to create theater with people, not for people. We would start meeting people and then we’d cast from the town. The idea is we would create with them.

JH: Do you miss the life of a vagabond starving artist?
AB: Yeah. The people that I traveled with will be my family for life. We were everything to each other. That level of dependency forged bonds. I’m not a very hierarchical person and that all comes from Cornerstone. We just were little communists. We knew that if the electrician wasn’t doing his job, I as the actor can’t do my job. Hollywood is all about the hierarchy and who’s number one on the call sheet, all this crap that was borrowed from corporate structure. But it is actually a collaborative art form.

JH: So when you started to realize that this was the way Hollywood worked after being sort of sheltered from it in your early theater experiences, did you ever become disenchanted?
AB: Not really. I was old enough at 27 that I wasn’t looking for Hollywood to define me which I think is key. I didn’t really do my growing up here [in Hollywood]. And I knew I was a good actor. I was confident in what I could bring to a project. The first series I did was called MIDDLE AGES. Then I went back to New York and I was offered the lead in ST. JOAN at Yale rep, which I really, really wanted to do. And my agent said, “don’t do a play, it’s pilot season.” They really put this tremendous pressure on me and I couldn’t decide. And then I remember thinking, oh they just want to make money off of me. But I didn’t hate them for it. That’s their business. It’s a bottom-line business. You can piss and moan about so and so getting all the attention. Well, it’s because their last three movies made a hundred million dollars. In a way, the pure Marxism of it kind of frees me and I don’t take it personally.

JH: So you chose to do the play?
AB:Yeah. And I got NYPD BLUE. And of course I got that because Stephen Bochco came to New York to cast that. So I probably wouldn’t have gotten it if I didn’t do the play.

JH: You say you’re a commitment-phobe but does the TV series lifestyle suit you better than going from movie to movie?
AB: It does suit me well because it reminds me of the years with the theater company and the work is steady. The day to day aspect suits me well. It’s
more the idea of doing the same thing every day that scares. When I was doing NYPD BLUE, the standard order was 22 episodes so you had three and a half months of vacation. So you could take a vacation or do a movie or whatever. Now the standard is 24 episodes and with my daughter, there’s just no way I can do anything else but rest. So that’s a bit of a bummer.

JH: You have to negotiate one of these FRIENDS or EVEYBODY LOVES RAYMOND-type deals where you make like eight episodes a year.
AB: Oh my god, I keep seeing Patty Heaton at these CBS events. She tells me about her work days and I just want to shoot her! I just can’t stand it!

JH: Some career highlights…you were on MURDER SHE WROTE?!?
AB: I was!

JH: Did you do it in the study with the candlestick or what?
AB: (LAUGHS) I did. I was a Santa. I was a murdering Santa in their Christmas episode. I haven’t gone back and looked at that one. I always picked and chose really carefully and my agent at the time was like, there’s just one thing on your resume that I regret. I know what she meant but I’m going to wave that freak flag proudly.

JH: In my opinion Heat really stands up as one of the best films in many years. Did you have to audition for it?
AB: I did. Michael Mann was a fan of mine from NYPD BLUE. So I read that script and I didn’t like it. It was very violent and it just wasn’t my thing. He originally was going to see me for the part Ashley Judd played. They said he really wants to meet you. So I went it and he said, “I hear you don’t like my script.” And I said, “I don’t. It’s really violent. I think the people are depraved. I’m kind of sick of watching men shoot at each other.” Michael told me later that was the second he knew he had to cast me in the role that I played because that was her point of view.

JH: Is it tougher going toe to toe with DeNiro or Michael Mann?
AB: Well, Michael Mann for actors is fine. It’s really the crew he drives crazy.

JH: Your husband, director Brad Silberling, made a very personal film [MOONLIGHT MILE] last year that mirrored what he went through when his girlfriend, Rebecca Schaeffer was killed by a stalker. Did seeing that film or him going through that experience of making it change your understanding of him or your relationship at all?
AB: Brad always said he could see a future with me because I could deal with it [Rebecca’s murder]. I saw a picture of myself 15 years ago and I look so much like her. The actual making of that film was a bit of a pain in the ass because he went to make it just ten days after our daughter was born which had me filled with rage. It wasn’t a very beautiful time, to be honest. Then at Toronto, at the premiere, I saw Rebecca’s dad and I had a really strong involuntary big old cathartic cry with him. I would have felt uncomfortable if the film was all about deifying the dead girl but it’s really all about falling in love with the future. I felt like that’s where I came in.

JUDGING AMY airs Tuesdays at 10pm on CBS.


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