Marcia Gay Harden is perfectly legal in ‘So Help Me Todd’
In her return to series work, Marcia Gay Harden is laying down the law as both an attorney and a parent.
A recent Primetime Emmy nominee for her guest part on “The Morning Show,” the Oscar and Tony recipient headlines CBS’ seriocomic “So Help Me Todd,” premiering Thursday. Harden plays Margaret Wright, whose legal professionalism contradicts the scruffier nature of her son Todd (“Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist” and “Pitch Perfect” alum Skylar Astin), an ex-private eye taking whatever jobs he can get. His help on a case prompts her to hire him as her investigator, and possibly to bridge the gap between them.
“It’s a lovely bubble that’s floating right now,” the pleasant Harden said of her career fortunes lately, “and it feels fantastic, but we know it will pop. What goes up must come down, and that’s the life of being in this business — so when it’s happening (on the positive side), I really cherish every moment. It feels good.”
While cameras aren’t swirling around her constantly as in her last weekly project for CBS, the medical drama “Code Black,” Harden asserts “So Help Me Todd” (on which Dr. Phil McGraw is an executive producer) keeps the rules of the series game largely the same.
“You have do it really fast,” she said. “It’s almost like theater, except that you don’t get all the rehearsals, so you have to come in and figure things out right away. And I find that fun.”
Harden also finds it challenging to adopt legal jargon in her new role: “What is an arraignment? What is a deposition? These aren’t necessarily words that we all know, other than from television shows, so I find myself looking things up so that I can say them with authority. The writing team is amazing, though, and Skylar and I love to bounce off of each other. They’ve written beautiful banter for us, so … so far, so good.”
