Hi everyone and thank you for tuning into the 440th episode of Awards Chatter, the Hollywood

Reporters Awards Podcast, I'm the host Scott Feinberg and my guest today is one of the

most respected and beloved actors of our time.

Described by the New York Times as quote, the thinking man's surrogate and the thinking

woman's hunk, close quote, and by the Los Angeles Times as quote, a pure actor, versatile,

dedicated, intelligent and very good indeed at home in any medium and any period, close

quote.

He has done outstanding work over seven different decades on the stage and screens

big and small, accumulating a Tony nomination and Oscar nomination and eight Emmy nominations,

one of which resulted in a win.

But he is best known for one role in particular, Jack McCoy, the New York assistant district

attorney, turned district attorney on NBC's Law and Order, a character he played from

1994 through 2010 and who he returned to playing this year.

In addition to also popping up in supporting parts on the Netflix comedy series Grayson

Frankie and the Hulu limited series, the dropout, Sam Waterston.

Over the course of our conversation, the 81 year old and I discussed how a guy who dreamed

of being a Shakespearean actor and made his name at Joseph Papp's annual New York Shakespeare

Festival wound up breaking into screen acting, how playing the parts of several practitioners

of the legal profession may have planted the seed in the mind of Dick Cook to cast him

as Jack McCoy.

How he has managed to keep interesting for audiences and for himself, a character whose

consistency and steadiness have been his defining traits over more than 300 episodes, plus

...