Denis Leary and the cast of “Rescue Me” mix high-stakes danger with humanity to create a unique television drama.
Some Like it Hot
On the corner of Lenox Avenue and 120th Street in Harlem, it’s hard to figure out where reality ends and fiction begins. Case in point: A loud-mouthed girl yakking on her cell phone is oblivious to the fact that she’s walked onto the set of Rescue Me during the middle of a scene. When actors John Scurti and Steven Pasquale emerge from a brownstone, smoke billowing from the open door behind them, she pauses and takes a bewildered look at the two men in firefighter gear, soot on their faces, who are staring at her blankly. “Where are you?” she yells into her phone, shaken and confused. She glances at the fourth-story window above her. “Is your house on fire?” After listening to her friend’s response, she storms off in a huff, unaware that she has given an impromptu performance on one of television’s most riveting dramas.
To be fair, it’s a little surreal to be sitting on the sidewalk eating a sandwich while hearing someone yell, “We need more smoke. Lo-o-ots of smoke! We need more fire!” There’s an intense blaze brewing across the street, and as a first-time visitor to the set, I’m having a hard time suppressing my instinct to flee. Because, dude, there’s a fire just 50 feet away, and even though it flickers on and off like the flame on a gas stove, I can’t help being on edge, ready to stop, drop, and roll. Yet when I take a look around, no one else seems to notice it.
Between takes, Jack McGee, otherwise known as Chief Jerry Reilly, smiles and takes a puff from a cigar he has stashed on the side of one of two cherry-red FDNY fire engines. Actors Michael Lombardi and Diane Farr coo over two babies who have been brought onto the set. Denis Leary, the show’s star and creator, relaxes in a director’s chair and exchanges barbs with Pasquale and Scurti. Considering the heavy material Rescue Me deals with — from alcoholism to adultery, not to mention the ever-present danger of fighting fires — it would be easy to assume that after a day of filming, the cast would be emotionally drained and exhausted. And while there are definitely those days, there are just as many when the atmosphere is light, friendly, and full of wisecracks. Fortunately, today is one of those.
A favorite on-set pastime of the actors is to heckle one another. Take it from Lombardi, who plays Michael Silletti. His character is the newbie at the fictitious Rescue Me firehouse — his nickname on the show, “the Probie,” is the term used for new firefighters — and that translates into how he’s treated by his costars. “Everyone gets hazed, but I definitely get the new-guy ragging,” he says. “It’s fun though. It helps me work. When we all come in with this bunker gear on, everything just falls into place and you really do feel like that character in that situation.” Needless to say, the guy gets called Probie more often than he’s called Mike.
Then there’s Farr, the only female fire-fighter on the show. She might have been an easy target for the guys if Leary hadn’t preemptively called a meeting just before she joined the cast. “I’m in the makeup trailer and one of the girls comes in laughing,” recalls Farr with a giggle. “She says, Denis just called all the guys into the wardrobe room for a meeting and said, ‘She’s my friend. If any of you fuck her, you’re fired.’ I hear all of this before I meet person one’ They’ve been told I’m the plague! They had no idea what to do with me.”
Yet Leary needn’t have worried; Farr is more than capable of handling the macho atmosphere around her. In fact, her enthusiasm, brashness, and tendency to swear make her seem like a female version of Leary. And she’s not the cast member who’s on the Zone diet — that would be Pasquale and Daniel Sunjata.
Explains Pasquale, “If you read the first three episodes of last season, it was like, ‘Sean and Franco naked, Franco and Sean coming out of the shower, Franco with a hot chick, Sean with a hot chick, Sean tied to the bed.’ I was like, ‘Okay. I’m going to start being a little more vigilant about getting to the gym and eating right.’ I actually turned Daniel on to the Zone diet. On the set you’ve got all this crap available to you all the time, so I thought if I had somebody deliver healthy stuff to me, I wouldn’t be persuaded to eat the bad food.” Right. ‘Cause there’s nothing like the Zone diet and cigarettes to stay healthy.
Practically the entire cast smokes like fiends: Parliament Lights for Pasquale, Marlboro Light 100s for Leary, Marlboro Lights for Sunjata and Lombardi, Marlboro Ultra Lights for Scurti, and those cigars for McGee. Scurti even carries a fake lighter that zaps whoever tries to use it, so no one gets into the habit of “borrowing” his.
But just because they have a good time goofing off doesn’t mean they take the show’s material lightly. They all have tremendous respect for firefighters. Says Sunjata, “If there was a fire raging with people screaming inside, I’d like to think that I’d be heroic enough to go in there and save them. But unless it’s my own family, I probably wouldn’t.”
Working on the show has given its stars the opportunity to give back to those they portray. They all pitch in at charity events for the Leary Firefighters Foundation, which raises funds for the families of firefighters who are injured or killed on the job. It’s no surprise they get involved; Leary tends to recruit whomever he can. Two years ago Aerosmith played a benefit gig for the foundation; it was an intimate show for a crowd of 250, at $2,500 a head. Lead singer Steven Tyler also turns up at other events for the foundation when he’s in town.
Now Leary is toying with the idea of having Tyler do a cameo on Rescue Me. Leary says, “I think it’s going to be one of those things where the guys see him at a sidewalk cafe and start arguing: That’s not him. He’s too small, he’s too skinny, what would he be doing here?’”
When I tell Tyler that Leary would like to have him on the show, the rocker has his own suggestion: “His ugly stepson that woke up from a coma and is really his brother.” Then Tyler adds, “I didn’t even know that he was thinking of having me on the show, but that’s sweet. I would do just about anything he asked. He’s a good shit.” Now that’s a compliment — and a sentiment that the cast and crew agree on. And since the atmosphere on the set is so congenial, it’s easy for the cast to forget that when they’re joking with Leary, he’s still the boss.
Watching Leary on the set, I myself almost forget he’s running things … almost. Even as he relaxes with his son, it’s obvious that he’s aware of everything going on around him, but he sounds off only when necessary.
He also indulges in the occasional payback when he’s working on the scripts. He’s been known to write in a run up a few extra flights of stairs for a cast member who mouths off too much. In fact, when I ask Pasquale to tell me a secret about Leary, he jokes, “Nobody knows that on weekends he doesn’t go by Denis. He goes by Denise and prances around downtown in the Village.” Then he suddenly realizes the possible repercussions of what he’s said and adds, “Oh, please don’t write that!”
Oops. Looks like someone’s gonna be running up some stairs in the future. Such is the price to pay for working on a show that blurs the line between fact and fiction.
Fired Up – Interview with Denis Leary
Denis Leary made himself a star by reinventing himself as a no-bullshit brute who swears like a sailor, smokes like a chimney, and drips sarcasm from every word. But there’s much more to him than his self-proclaimed asshole image.
At six foot four, he’s pretty damned tall, and has a habit of leaning in during a conversation — not because he’s a “close talker” (to borrow a term from Seinfeld), but because he’s an extremely focused listener. When he does speak, he’s honest and direct, instead of offering vague and worthless patter like many of his peers. This is a guy who’s beyond the Hollywood hype and head trips; considering the career roller coaster he’s been on for 15 years, it makes sense. The one thing that’s important to know about him is, he thrives on overcoming adversity.
In 1990 he and his wife, Ann Lembeck, were on a weekend trip to London when their son Jack was born, three months premature. They had to extend their stay, and when they returned to the States later that year with the baby, they also brought the manuscript for Leary’s well-received, notorious stand-up show No Cure for Cancer.
Nine years later, Leary’s career was still hitting its stride. His HBO special, Denis Leary: Lock ‘N’ Load, solidified his rep as a scathingly sharp comedian, and although his starring gigs in films like The Ref had failed to yield hits, supporting roles in major features, such as Wag the Dog and The Thomas Crown Affair, were making for a promising film career.
Then tragedy struck. In December 1999, Leary learned that his cousin Jeremiah “Jerry” Lucey and childhood friend Lieutenant Thomas “Terry” Spencer had been killed while battling a warehouse fire in Leary’s hometown of Worcester, Massachusetts. Leary was hit hard. Yet in typical fashion, he found a way to channel his grief into something positive. Today his Leary Firefighters Foundation has raised more than $2 million for fire departments in New York City, Boston, and Worcester. And as the creator, writer, and star of the hit FX show Rescue Me — he plays the cocksure but internally conflicted Tommy Gavin — Leary brings viewers into the often strange world of a New York City firehouse, and pays tribute to his late friends.
What have you learned about yourself working on the show?
I’m usually a painstaking writer, but because of the pace of this, I’ve learned how quickly I can write a new hour-long script. I’ve directed before, but I’m learning more about where to point the camera and stuff like that. I always use Clint Eastwood [as inspiration], because I did a movie [True Crime] with him and I picked his brain. This year especially. He’s 74, and I think his acting in Million Dollar Baby is some of the best he’s done. I ran into him at a couple of the award shows and said, “Hey, I really loved the movie.” He said he loved it because he didn’t know he had it in him as an actor to pull it off. I look at that and go, “Man, 74 and he’s still having fun and learning. That’s nice to know.”
Being in a show that balances lighthearted and dark subjects, is it hard to not get bummed out?
That’s a balance we’re always dealing with. There are days, especially when you’re dealing with remembering fictional people who died, where it’s impossible not to think of that [real-life] stuff. We have a scene coming up in the next couple weeks that involves me jumping out of a window because I’m trapped. I’m in a room saving someone and the fire explodes up toward the windows, so I have no choice but to jump out, which brings back memories of Black Sunday, which was in January. Six guys got trapped up in the Bronx and had to jump five stories. Two died almost immediately, and the others are in various stages of rehab. That’s the part that stays with you.
Didn’t your foundation present a check to them for $150,000?
Yeah, for the seven families. There were the six guys from the Bronx, and there was another kid who died in Brooklyn that same day. You hate to say this, but the only good thing about it is that it reminds people that it’s not just 9/11 and these big disasters that these guys deal with. Those calls happen every day.
How does it feel to work on a show that can directly impact the lives of the people you’re fictionalizing?
Well, it’s a double-edged sword. Especially when you’re basing it on reality. You get two or three guys that say, “Wow, you guys really nailed it,” and then you get one who’s like, “Hey, man, why are you putting these secrets on TV?” Most of the time I find that those guys are afraid their wives will find out what’s really going on. But the best stories come out of the truth. You can’t make it up.
Since the show deals with life and death, here’s a morbid question for you: If you could choose how to die, what would it be?
Well, everybody’s first choice would probably be fucking your brains out. I think two shots to the back of the head right behind the right ear is supposed to be the quickest way to go. Back of the head, twice, close range. I’m not one of these people who wants to be plugged in to anything.
Before you’re shot in the back of the head, is there a character you’d like to play?
The stuff I’m writing. One guy’s a singer, the other guy’s a hit man.
That’s a pretty wide range.
Yeah, well, unless you’re going to play a singer who was a hit man.
Is there a role you’ll never play?
I’m not a Shakespeare guy.
We’ll never see you in tights?
I don’t think you want me doing that role. I hated Shakespeare growing up. The first time I actually thought about being an actor was when I saw Mean Streets when I was a teenager. It was the first time I went, “I know guys like that on the end of my street.” That’s when I realized you could come from where I came from and be an actor.
Which actors do you respect most?
I’ve been very lucky and gotten to work with three of my favorite actors growing up. One was Clint, the others were Bob De Niro and Dustin Hoffman. I got to work with both those guys on [Wag the Dog], which was outrageous. I met up with Bob very early in my career. He helped me set up my production company. I learned a lot from Clint too. I learned to run the set the way he runs his set-how to make it an eight-hour instead of a 16-hour day. After Clint, anybody else I work with is going to be gravy because I’ve already met the best.
I know you’re passionate about hockey. What do you think about the locked-out NHL season?
It’s ridiculous. I understand the players’ point of view and that you have to go through the process and do it the right way, but what they’re doing is killing the sport worse than baseball with the steroid scandal. As this year goes by, they’re not losing casual fans, but people like myself who are the hard-core fans. I’ve been watching college hockey and minor-league hockey, if at all.
You wanted to play in the NHL.
Yeah, for a long time. I’m really glad I didn’t, because all of my close friends who played are hobbled. They have fake knees or fake hips, or they’re going to get them. This job I can do until I drop dead. That job, the way I played, I think I would have been crippled. I was a lunatic.
When they’re playing, who’s your team?
Boston Bruins.
And you’re a big Red Sox fan.
Huge Red Sox fan.
Were you shocked last year?
Yeah, it was outrageous. [Actor] Lenny Clarke and I kind of got folded into this Sox run. We threw out the first pitch in the middle of August, when they were just starting their come-back. We did some announcing in the booth and they turned around that same night, so we kind of became their mascots. We ended up presenting them with their Sports Illustrated trophy and going with them to all these parties after they won.
Were you nervous about pitching?
No, I had thrown a first ball out at Shea years ago.
So this was old hat for you.
Well, it was different because it’s where I’m from. I said to Lenny, “We’re going to go to the park and we’re going to throw the ball the same distance it is from the pitcher’s mound to home plate.” Which is 60 feet and six inches. What I really did is count off almost 90 feet. We kept throwing the ball back and forth and he kept bitching at me, saying, “This is not 60 feet, this is way longer.” And I’d go, “No, it’s not. I just counted it out.” We practiced for a good two hours that afternoon. When we walked out onto the mound [at the game], he went, “You son of a bitch.”
Your son Jack is making his acting debut on Rescue Me?
He was in this movie I did called Monument Avenue; he played me when I was young, and he was seven. He was in Contest Searchlight about three years ago. This is the first time he’s been in a dramatic scene.
So he plays someone the crew is going to save?
Yeah, he gets his head stuck in a fence. And he was actually telling me that he doesn’t think he should say the line as it was written.
Who’s on your “celebs to make fun of” list these days?
Jeez, I’d have to think about that one. Want me to throw out some names? Sure.
Kevin Federline.
That’s just easy; that’s target practice.
Paris Hilton.
I don’t find her attractive. Most guys I know don’t. Obviously her TV show is about stupidity. I think that’s more the case of the media sort of glomming on to somebody who is sort of a fool so they can catch her in nine different foolish circumstances.
Let’s wrap it up. If there were something you could change about the world, what would it be?
Firefighters need to be paid more, and we should probably get somebody else in the White House. Almost anybody else. Even Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Fortunately for us all, we can still go see Denis Leary in person — even if we did not particularly love “Rescue Me” and mostly just feel sorry for Red Sox fans. The Bruins are fun, though, and that’s what really matters. You will need to check around for tour dates, however, as those seen a tad sporadic. Of course this could be because of his Firefighters Foundation taking up much of his time. If you need a worthy cause, we found another one for you.
