Turturro Takes Time Off For Mini-Series

Thu., Feb. 26, 1998

Philadelphia Inquirer

Whatever happened to “NYPD Blue’s” Detective James Martinez?

We last saw Martinez (Nicholas Turturro) Jan. 6, being carried away on a stretcher when his back went out. He isn’t slated to return until the March 24 episode, says “NYPD Blue” co-exec producer David Milch.

Here’s the deal: Turturro asked off ABC’s “NYPD” after he won the lead as Sammy “The Bull” Gravano in NBC’s “Witness to the Mob” mini-series. Being the nice fellows they are, Milch and partner Steven Bochco agreed to write him off the show until he finished “Mob.”

“We’ve never felt it was in our interest to stop somebody’s big break,” Milch says. “To have an actor who’s embittered and frustrated because he’s lost that opportunity doesn’t help him or us.”

Martinez’s “process of reassimilation” in the last six episodes will be difficult, Milch says, because of all the other plots in progress. Among them: “Big changes” between Bobby (Jimmy Smits) and Diane (Kim Delaney) following her miscarriage, and a potentially fatal illness for Sipowicz (Dennis Franz).

P.S. “Mob” is NBC’s big-ticket entry in the May ratings “sweeps.”

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