If you thought The Wire was slow, Ed Burns’s show, if he had another show, it’d be even slower. He’ll have a scene where somebody just walks. David Simon is cool, but he colorizes it up a little bit. I asked Ed, “What do you mean?” “Well, I would have that scene with McNulty just walking around the block.” David Simon would be like, “I just need something to happen. I know that’s what you want, but I need something to happen.” Ed Burns was like, “Why? Something is happening. When he walks around the block and nothing happens, it shows that these two have nothing to do.” He’ll go into what he’s trying to tell by the nothingness. You need somebody like David Simon to go, “Okay. That’s fine. Instead of a whole hour of that, we’ll do twenty minutes of that. How’s that? Then something’s got to happen.” You need that extra something. Like comedians, you’re trying to educate, but you got to do it with some sort of entertainment, otherwise people are going to turn it off. You need the balance. That was a powerful team between David Simon and Ed Burns.
While filming Frank Sobotka in Season 2, Chris Bauer stopped drinking, the longest he had gone without alcohol to that point in his adult life. “Forty days without booze made me think of how damn long Jesus was in the desert,” Bauer said. “Now that I’ve gone without for over eight years, I realize what a grandiose and distorted association that was. I drank till I didn’t. I’d love to play Frank Sobotka again with the part of my heart that has come back to life since I put down the drink. I would’ve been better, and they deserved better.” A few other castmates battled addictions following the show. For some, the shadows their characters created followed them long after The Wire.
MICHAEL K. WILLIAMS (OMAR LITTLE): I was in a lot of darkness. I was in a lot of pain. I was in a lot of pain when I filmed Omar, a lot of excruciating, emotional, and mental pain. I tried to use that, [with] the character of Omar, as a way to exorcise that and to put it into that character, but instead, I allowed it to make it worse. My daily crisis, I was on my way to worrying about some things about my inner self. I got hemmed up by vanity. Motherfuckers calling me Omar on the street and “Oh, we love you.” I was like, “Well, shit, this dude is more popular than me.” When that Band-Aid came off, it was a really ugly bullet wound. I had to get real with all of that and grow up, basically. Just plain old-fashioned grow the fuck up.
JERMAINE CRAWFORD (DUQUAN “DUKIE” WEEMS): It really took me years. I think it was probably when I was twenty-one that I got my groove back, because I kind of went into a depression afterward. It was hard on me. It really was.
BRANDY BURRE (THERESA D’AGOSTINO): I just said, I’m stepping back. I still get really weird people writing things to me. They’re like, “You were really great on the show.” I said, “Oh, thank you.” Then it’s like, “Do you have any naked pictures that you can send me?” I’m like, “Really? Like, really?” I can’t believe it. I shut all that down. Also, just seeing bad reviews. I wasn’t ready for any of that. One bad review would knock me off my feet, even if there were one hundred good ones. I’d be like, “I don’t want to see.” This was right at the time in life when you could Google yourself. I’m on foot fetish websites, because there’s weird people out there. My character isn’t that crazy in the show or anything. I didn’t like any of that. I didn’t like any of that attention. I also didn’t like the fact that the only roles I was being auditioned for were seminude, partly nude. I was just like, “I’m done. I did it. I did The Wire. What else do I need to do? It’s not going to get any better than that.”
GBENGA AKINNAGBE (CHRIS PARTLOW): That show changed my life, and I don’t mean just because of what it did for my career, but who I am as a person. To this day, the people I go to and talk to when I have important matters have something to do with that show. Like Jamie [Hector]. I seek advice from George Pelecanos, Ed Burns. I freelance for The New York Times. I wrote a couple pieces. My first piece, the first email I got in the morning when my first piece was published, was from David Simon. These people are still very much a part of my life. They care.
One of my brothers on that show, Donnie [Andrews], before he passed, I went to the hospital to see him. I thank God that I was able to see him and be there for him while he was at the hospital. Donnie had affected so many people’s lives. If there was ever somebody who had done a complete one-eighty with their life and show how beautiful we could be as human beings, it was Donnie. Donnie was the real Omar. Fran, his wife, I’m still in contact with Fran. These are just beautiful people that had gone through hell, some of them brought hell, then came out the other side just barely, and then affected so many people. What’s great about my Wire family and what we were able to show and do is none of us are perfect. We’ve all been in it. We’ve all been good, bad. We’ve all been different sides of the story, the coin. But we’re all on that journey of aspiring to just get to the next day and hopefully being a better person, making different decisions than the day before. That is perfect because that’s what The Wire was, people just trying to get to the next day and aspire to make different choices than they did the day before.
ANDRE ROYO (REGINALD “BUBBLES” COUSINS): I can’t shake him off. Bubbles will stay in me for the rest of my life because of the idea that I’m going to keep trying to be a better person. I’m going to keep trying to do the right thing. I think, for me, that’s what I found to be the essence on how I played Bubbles, on what Bubbles was to me. Somebody that’s going to keep trying to be his best self. I will never shake that. When people see me in other characters, they see that sense of, He’s so human. He’s so real. There’s certain moments that I’ve been forced to question whether I want that in this business. For a couple of years, I couldn’t work. They were telling me that they couldn’t put me with another Wire actor because it was too iconic and people would start thinking about The Wire. This is back then. It’s different now. Back then, I can’t be seen with another Wire actor. There was a movie called Snitch that I wanted. They were like, “We want to give you this part. What part do you want?” I’m like, “I’ll take that part.” What happened to that movie? What happened was Michael K. Williams became the top dog and, “We can’t have you two in the same movie.” I was like, “Why?” “Because they’ll start thinking about The Wire.” I’m like, “What are you talking about? You have two good actors.” “No, you’re Bubbles. You got to understand, you’re Bubbles.”
This is, again, how this business is sometimes. They would tell me, “People would rather believe that Bubbles is not acting. They would rather go, ‘Wow, look at Bubbles’s career now. Good for Bubs.’ ” They would rather believe that, than the actor played by Bubbles is now in other stuff. They don’t want that. That’s not a Hollywood narrative. A Hollywood narrative is, “Remember that junkie that they cast in The Wire? He’s now working.” I was like, “What’s wrong with you people?” It’s one of those backhanded compliments where people really thought, because David Simon was casting so many people from the neighborhood and giving people an opportunity, they just thought they found me. People were like, “Yo, I thought you were a real junkie they found and was now working.” Mark Wahlberg was the first person. I saw him at an HBO party sometime. He’s like, “You’re doing a good job. Don’t fuck up. Don’t fall back on that shit.” I’m like, “What are you talking about, man? I’m from the Bronx.” “Shit, my bad.” They meant it out of sincerity. They meant it out of you were like the real deal.
With that said, it’s easier for somebody like Idris and Michael K., and Dom West. When you play a cop on TV, you got to understand, there’s always going to be another cop show. Those people can stay working. Once you’re known as a good cop, you play a good cop. You’ll stay working because they’ll always have cop shows. If Idris is playing this leader of this corner of a drug empire, he’s playing a leader. He can be a president in a movie. There’s always a dominant leading role for somebody to have that presence of power. Michael K. was the thug with the heart of gold. He played the thug so beaut
ifully that he can always play a menacing type. There’s always going to be other joints he can do. When you play a junkie, a downtrodden, hapless person, there’s not that many characters on TV that they feel you can drop into. They don’t like those type of characters to be series regulars on another show. It was hard for people to see or believe that I can portray another type, even though they said I portrayed a junkie so well.
It took a long time. That would start to affect me. The backhanded compliment is, I’m honored to have played that character that well because I’m honored to have brought people to not look at the downtrodden or the homeless or somebody down on their luck in a way of dismissal anymore. I can’t help everybody, but they at least know that person right there, at least he’s trying. He’s a human being. For that, I will never shake off Bubs.
Now, I’m a man of fashion. I like clothes. My dad had a couple of stores in Harlem. I knew about clothes. In my own little sneaky way, every once in a while, I tried to make Bubbles have a little flair, a leather jacket. I think at one time I wore an Ed Hardy shirt with colors on it and dusted it up a little bit. People always get surprised in the beginning of the seasons when they saw me at parties and whatever. They were like, “Oh, my God.” I know how to put on a suit. I like colors. That part of Bubbles, he’s easy to shake off. Other than that, his essence will always be a part of my life forever.
DOMINIC WEST (DET. JIMMY MCNULTY): People haven’t appreciated Andre as much as they should. No one’s given him the role which would show the world how really great he is. He was great as Bubbles, but he’s nothing like Bubbles. He’s the funniest man I’ve ever met by far.
TRAY CHANEY (MALIK “POOT” CARR): I got pulled over a couple days ago by police for speeding. When he came to the window, I just looked at him, “Okay, officer, how can I help you?” He was like, “Yo, you’re the guy from The Wire. You were speeding, but I’m going to give you a warning.” I got that shit. I was like, “Yo, this is crazy.” It’s crazy man. The perks that come from such an awesome show.
J. D. WILLIAMS (PRESTON “BODIE” BROADUS): It’s that strange, cock-your-head-sideways look. People are like, “You look so familiar.” Police who don’t get it right away always think they’ve arrested me. I have to convince police all the time that they have not arrested me.
GBENGA AKINNAGBE (CHRIS PARTLOW): Somebody brought [me and Jamie Hector] to meet Russell Simmons once at a party or something like that. The elevator doors opened, and there was Russell. I guess he was going someplace and we were going to meet him. It was like his breath stopped and he took a step back before he realized it was just us. I always forget the power of us being together because so many people have seen us together in certain circumstances, and it’s usually not good.
By its final season, most television critics had belatedly come around to The Wire. Emmy voters never did. The Wire is considered one of its biggest snubs. In its five seasons, the show received only two Emmy nominations for writing—for “Middle Ground,” by David Simon and George Pelecanos, and the series finale’s “–30–,” by David Simon and Ed Burns. Neither episode claimed the award. The second season captured a Peabody Award, but the show would be comically overlooked by major award voters throughout its run. “It’s like them never giving a Nobel Prize to Tolstoy,” Slate’s Jacob Weisberg described to the Associated Press. “It doesn’t make Tolstoy look bad, it makes the Nobel Prize look bad.” Simon never emphasized superficial accolades. The Wire had always been steeped in Baltimore, satisfied to tell the totality of its hometown story and unfazed by Hollywood’s lure. But many who worked under him remain upset over the lack of recognition. “I’ll be pissed off about it until the day I die,” said Lance Reddick. “There’s nothing to do about it. It’s just what it is. Yeah, I’ll always be angry about that.” The disregard can be attributed to the dense plot and a story that voters could not relate to told by a cast that did not look like them.
NINA K. NOBLE (EXECUTIVE PRODUCER): We got several [NAACP] Image Awards nominations and I attended the event several times and it was always so frustrating to me, because it wouldn’t be our show. Take your pick of great minority actors and actresses. It was always the show that had the one Latina. The fact that we were so proud of the work that we were doing was always enough. It was never about the accolades from the outside.
CLAIRE COWPERTHWAITE (SCRIPT SUPERVISOR): How Hollywood treated the show, it was a metaphor for what I thought the country feels.
DENNIS LEHANE (WRITER): Look, we weren’t unaware we were doing good work, don’t get me wrong, but we weren’t so egomaniacal to ever consider we were doing great work. But there seems to be the consensus in some quarters now that maybe we were. I have no idea if that consensus is correct, but, hell, I’ll take it. I take no credit for it, mind you—it was David’s and Ed’s vision—but it was nice to be a platoon player on a championship team.
KWAME PATTERSON (“MONK” METCALF): You’ve just gotta chalk it up as maybe it was too black, in a sense. Yeah, that’s pretty much it. There’s no excuses. Numbers and every critic you can think of, that’s all they can even talk about is how amazingly written that show was, how authentic the acting. It’s just one of those things where, in our culture, we’re used to it. Our projects don’t get the critically acclaimed spotlight all the time like they should.
REG E. CATHEY (NORMAN WILSON): Life is funny. If I thought about that, I would lose my fucking mind. I would be in a home for the bewildered.
David Simon once equated why The Wire didn’t get the kind of acclaim that it deserved was like if you have two neighborhoods and they’re both the same socioeconomic levels. The houses are the same. The education and the people who live in the two neighborhoods are exactly the same. The only difference is seventy percent of one neighborhood is black and seventy percent of one neighborhood is white. The neighborhood with the seventy percent black is going to be thought to be inferior.
GEORGE PELECANOS (WRITER/PRODUCER): It doesn’t really matter that we never won any awards or that not a lot of people watched us. What mattered was that over this period of almost twenty years now, is that it’s still alive and that the best compliments we ever get is not, “I loved your show.” It’s happened to me several times, actually, when people have come up to me at book signings and stuff and said, “I became a teacher because of The Wire” or “I joined the Peace Corps because of The Wire.” That, to me, is the highest compliment that you can get.
JIM TRUE-FROST (DET. ROLAND “PREZ” PRYZBYLEWSKI): You won’t be surprised to hear that a lot of the people that take the time to stop me on the street and express their appreciation for the show and my character are people who are teachers now or were teachers or did Teach for America. To those people, I think that Season [Four], which a lot of people just enjoyed as really great television, they have a special appreciation for it, because it’s such a rare example of their story being told in a truthful way.
DARRELL BRITT-GIBSON (DARIUS “O-DOG” HILL): I’m in LA, and this lady comes up to me. I’m in a conversation, and she sort of politely interrupts the conversation and she says, “You’re on The Wire.” Then, within five minutes, she’s sobbing and she’s telling me this story of how she is a schoolteacher and how Season Four ripped her apart because she said, “I teach those kids.” She’s sobbing, and everybody is kind of looking at the conversation, and I embraced her. In that moment, I said, “Oh my God, this is bigger than television.”
Maria Broom grew up in Baltimore, exposed to the sum of its virtues, its warts. She depicted the drug-addicted Bunchie in The Corner and The Wire’s Marla Daniels, a councilwoman and the estranged wife to Lt. Cedric Daniels. The Wire had been off the air several years when unrest erupted over Freddie Gray’s death. Broom reconvened with several of her castmates at the behest of Sonja Sohn. They met with citizens in Baltimore and listened to their stories of injustices witnessed firsthand. “We wanted to know from them, ‘What specifically
were you doing?’ What happened? What did you see?’ ” Broom said. The actors monologued the struggles onstage. “You got to see the actor from The Wire reading the words of the real person who gave us those words,” Broom said. “It was very successful. People were impressed and kind of thrilled to see the actors in person, but also to have all the real people acknowledged. People were touched. People were moved by it.”
The event continued the show’s established spirit of philanthropy toward Baltimore during The Wire’s run. “Coat drives, food drives, we did large fund-raisers to raise money for the Ella Thompson Fund,” said Laura Schweigman. David Simon had featured Thompson in The Corner. A man raped and murdered her youngest daughter, Andrea Perry. Thompson tried transforming the tragedy into a positive by heading a recreation center that shielded youths from the often violent streets. She died in 1998 at the age of forty-seven, from a heart attack, while picking up donated computers. “We had a huge gala every year of The Wire, which, by the end of the show, had made five hundred thousand dollars for the Ella Thompson Fund,” Nina Noble said. “We wanted to create an endowment through the Ella Thompson Fund, so that the recreation center could go on in perpetuity after The Wire was over. Every year, we’d give each actor a shoebox and we’d have them put items in it to auction off.”
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