Dennis Franz pays tribute to Steven Bochco: He had to talk me into playing NYPD Blue's Sipowicz

The Hollywood Reporter

"I consider Steven to be a leader and a visionary in television," Franz, who starred as Lt. Norman Buntz on Hill Street Blues and played the iconic Det. Sipowicz on NYPD Blue, said Tuesday in reaction to Bochco's death. "He left such a beautiful legacy of so much memorable work, which to me puts him in an icon status." Franz was nominated eight times for the Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series, winning four Emmys, for his role as Andy Sipowicz. But Franz recalled having to be talked into playing his most famous role over lunch with Bochco, six months before the initial NYPD Blue script was written. "I read about my guy, and I thought, 'Who is going to care about this guy?'" Franz recalled. "He gets shot at the end of the pilot, and I thought, 'Who is going to care if he lives or dies? He is a womanizer. He is a drunk. He is a racist. He is a loose cannon. He is a bad cop and bad man.' And I expressed those feelings to Steven, and he said, 'You know, you will find a way to make him sympathetic.' And I asked how I was going to go about that, and he said, 'It is inherent in your personality. You have this.' And never did he say, 'You're right, we'll change the character.'"

ALSO:

• Kim Delaney says "Steven changed my life," from her Emmy-winning NYPD Blue role to the Philly series he created for her
• Amy Brenneman, who met her husband on NYPD Blue, says of Bochco: "Steven, thank you for my marriage and my life in Los Angeles. Thank you for your artistic courage which taught me how to have artistic courage of my own."
• "Steven Bochco was not about bull or baloney. He knew that life was too short for that stuff," says TV critic Tom Shales
• Adam Scott: "Steven Bochco generously gave me my first real tv job in 1995 on Murder One"