From The West Wing to The Good Doctor, there is no doubt Richard Schiff has been a part of some good television. This makes the Emmy winner a well-deserved 2024 Ambassador for the Arts honoree at the North Fork TV Festival, which takes place on Long Island, New York, on August 27 and 28. Schiff also co-stars in the year’s comedy pilot winner Swipe NYC with Bridget Moynahan, which will screen at the event.
“We are beyond thrilled to have Richard for this award,” said panel moderator Adrienne Rose White, who also will be presenting the award to Schiff. “We really look for those who have done work that speaks to the zeitgeist. I think Richard’s work has spoken to the zeitgeist for years. Between his work on The West Wing, which had some of the best acting I’ve seen in my life to, and including, The Good Doctor. He has always taken on roles that speak to what is happening in the world and brings such compassion, and intelligence.”
The festival will also honor Marcia Gay Harden with the Canopy Award. Ahead of the event, we connected with Schiff to reflect on some of his TV touchstones and reflect on his farewell to Dr. Aaron Glassman and St. Bonaventure Hospital.
What does it mean to you to be honored at the North Fork TV Festival?
Richard Schiff: First I was concerned I was a lifetime achievement award recipient. I haven’t achieved that much and they also give those to you when you retire. I haven’t thought about it much. It’s nice. I’ll tell you how I feel about it after the event, but it’s very nice when they want to honor the work you do. From what I’ve heard about the festival, they all talk about a great experience and a good selection of films. Marcia Gay Harden is being honored as well. She is one of my favorite actresses of all time and one of the loveliest people I’ve met in this business. I guess they had to balance out the ticket, so they included me.
Tell me about Swipe NYC.
Sue Kramer, who directed and wrote it, is a really important friend of mine. She is just one of those people who will show up for you no matter what is happening and how bad it might be. I like to honor those people in my life…I read the script and it’s a very personal, funny, and touching examination of finding a connection in Brooklyn in the current climate of 2024. The way in which she told the story was really touching and work I’ve always liked to do. It resonates. I got to play someone nobody else would offer me that kind of role. It was a lot of fun.
Lisa Edelstein is the lead. She played my lesbian daughter in a show called Relativity, even though I’m only 10 years older than she is. That should have resonated more in the zeitgeist. That was still my favorite role. The show didn’t quite catch for one reason or another. Then she showed up as a prostitute in The West Wing. Then she was my oncologist on The Good Doctor. It’s only fair that after all that experience together we could finally have a date. That’s what this was, a blind date. It was a lot of fun. Lisa is fantastic. Sue is one of the best people and very talented.
The Good Doctor wrapped. How have you come to terms with that and the fate of your character?
I do remember reading it. I’m not sure how it played, but I know the show creators loved the relationship between Glassman and Shaun. Freddie [Highmore] and I had a really good time exploring that over seven years. My son is on the spectrum, which is one of the reasons I took the show seven years ago. To be able to contribute to the discussion about autism and people with autism was special. Freddie was great to work with. How they sent me off, they killed me. It couldn’t have been all that good.
In a meaningful way to go and be remembered.
Well, we all want meaningful deaths. I was ready to move on. Coming to grips wasn’t an issue at all. For me, seven years is too long. I understand why they do it financially, but it’s too long. I think the new Hollywood or streaming world, I think they are figuring out that three years is plenty. We could have done it in a year-and-a-half. Stretching it out isn’t something I feel for. I do it because they pay me.
We’re doing this whole thing with The West Wing. Mary McCormack wrote a book called “What’s Next: A Backstage Pass to The West Wing…” I’m here doing book events. The reason I bring that up is I pitched Aaron [Sorkin] and Tommy [Schlamme] that [Josiah Bartlet] really should lose the reelection and we get out of here. I said, “We’ve done three or four years what else can we say? Let’s lose. That will shock everyone.” They said the studio would never go for it. They pitched it and ended up leaving the show, so they had the right idea. Seven years is a long time to do one character.
What would have happened if The West Wing came out now as opposed to when it did?
Aaron Sorkin answered that question last night. I think the only thing he said, and it’s probably true, is to portray any Republican as reasonable would be very difficult to buy nowadays. He made the point that we made an attempt to portray Republicans in a reasonable way and with traditional conservative values and so on. I still don’t think we did that as well as he thinks we did. I remember the oppositional James Brolin was portrayed like a dingus, which I think Aaron felt about George W. Bush at that time. I was pitching, “No let’s make him formidable as these guys are getting 50 percent or 49 percent of the vote. There is something smart that got him to the place he got. Let’s not make it so easy.” Then the result of the election was a landslide. I’m not sure we portrayed it fairly, let’s put it that way. But I think he did a good job trying to do that. I think nowadays we wouldn’t be able to do that and have people believe it unless there was a maverick like John McCain and Mitt Romney.
I think he feels the idealism, and purpose to create a political show where people actually want to do the right thing and leave the world a better place as I put it than how they found it. I think that is why people are attracted to them on the show. In actual effect, they did very little to change the world, but a story about doing the right thing and bringing our best foot forward, and trying to leave the world a better place than how we found it. That’s what resonated. I think it’s why people responded to Glassman and Freddy on The Good Doctor…Both those characters and many characters on that show were about people trying to do the right thing. Playing bad guys though is much more fun and freeing.
We’re coming up on 10 years since Ballers came out. Brett Anderson was one of my favorite roles you’ve done. What do you remember about that time filming and your dynamic with Dwayne Johnson and Rob Corddry?
I absolutely loved working on that show. It was one of my favorite eras of my career. They wanted to make me a regular on another show. J.K. Simmons’s show [Counterpart]was shot in Berlin. I was doing both of those shows because I didn’t commit to either one. I was like this is how I want to live my life. I want to jump into Miami to have a blast with Rob and Dwayne and other people. Steven Weber was my brother on the show. Then get out of Miami and do this really smart split universe idea of a show J.K. and Olivia Williams. I had the best of both worlds. I have very fond memories of that whole few years.
Specifically, working off the genius of Rob Corddry while I was trying to do improv and work with comedy. He was a quiet genius. He doesn’t show off a whole lot. Dwayne is one of the really good people. Everything you see is what you get. He was always ready to play and always wanted to learn and was curious and a really good person. It’s fun to work with people like that. I had a blast with that character. I thought he was hysterical. I want more like that.
Looking at your career, you’ve had so many stops in different shows. Was there one you’d love to stick around in? You’ve done everything from Murphy Brown to ER.
Murphy Brown was great. I was young in my career. I started acting late, so even though I wasn’t young, it was a young job. I had a blast on the show. I loved the character created. It was clearly a come-and-go character. It’s funny because I did Chicago Hope and ER, but oddly I can’t stand watching hospital shows. I didn’t realize that when I took The Good Doctor. That I would be acting on a hospital set for seven years. I have a bad reaction to hospitals.s I don’t liek them. I spent the first three years of my life in and out of hospitals. I don’t like watching sick people. I had no desire to do that, but acting on those were great experiences. I can’t think of one.
I would have loved to be on Succession. I never had a chance to do that because I was too busy and they probably never thought of me. Shows like that I would love to be a part of. I love good acting and smart writing and directors who leave you alone and know what they are doing. Breaking Bad I think is one of, if not the best-written show of all in terms of beginning, middle, and end and how it all tied together, and how every seed planted bared fruit. It was brilliant. I had no desire to be on that show, but I loved watching that. I only had that experience once of wanting a role that I would have liked to play. It was what led me to want to explore acting. A movie called Daniel with Mandy Patinkin and Timothy Hutton. I looked at that movie and thought I could play that role Timothy did. I’ve never experienced it before or since.
