Hostage Situation ‘Fired Up’ Star Sharon Lawrence Is Taken Captive By A Fugitive In Nbc Movie ‘Five Desperate Hours’

Sharon Lawrence is not immune to the glamour of success in Hollywood. She was at the Emmy’s dressed like a star, and she recently attended a San Francisco Symphony gala as a guest of Cartier, wearing $600,000 of their their loaned jewelry around her neck and wrist.

When she arrived in Hollywood six years ago, without an agent and virtually unknown in television circles, Lawrence decided to take responsibility for her future. Now, the attractive, versatile actress is part of the Thursday night ABC drama “NYPD Blue,” star of the Monday night NBC sitcom “Fired Up,” and co-producer and star of the NBC movie “Five Desperate Hours,” which airs Sunday at 9 p.m. on Spokane’s KHQ-Channel 6.

It took Lawrence a couple of years to develop this intimate drama which focuses on a hostage situation in which captive and captor find emotional common ground.

The idea for “Five Desperate Hours” was born from a real incident featured on the ABC news magazine “20/20.” Lawrence’s father, a television reporter, remembered the actual incident and called it to her attention.

“I felt it could be different from just another sensational and exploitative ‘woman in jeopardy’ story, and that in our racially divisive culture it had something important to say,” says Lawrence.

In “Five Desperate Hours” Lawrence portrays a suburban housewife whose home is invaded by a black fugitive, played by Giancarlo Esposito. While a trigger-happy SWAT team sets up and plans to storm the house, the couple inside forge bonds which cut through prejudice and stereotype.

NBC has clearly expressed faith in the project. Lawrence is particularly pleased that the network “sprang a lot of bucks” for Seal’s song “Crazy” to be played over the opening credits. Lawrence feels the tone and content of the hit song match the movie’s sense of “what really is crazy and what just seems crazy.”

Although Lawrence admits that the reality of producing a TV movie on a tight budget and time schedule forces compromises you wish you didn’t have to make (a situation of which - as producer - she is more acutely aware), she feels confident that the movie used its time, energies and talents well. “Five Desperate Hours” was directed by Dan Lerner and co-produced by Thomas Carter, the Emmy-winning director of “Equal Justice” and producer of the short lived but critically praised series about black family life “Under One Roof.”

There is no glamour to her hostage role. “The camera is hand held, but not shaky, much less a voyeur and more a participant. We wanted people to feel the sweat, the heat, the intensity, to focus on the intimate details of the relationship between these two troubled people,” she explains.