The Closer Creator James Duff Talks Season Finale
It seems somehow fitting that we end our season about change by examining what happens to people when they refuse to accept it. But before we go into the ins and outs of this specific episode, I owe a few congratulations to our cast.
First, I speak for everyone here at The Closer when I congratulate Kyra Sedgwick on her Golden Globe nomination as Best Actress in a Drama Series. For the fifth year in a row, Kyra also got a nom from her peers at the Screen Actors Guild in the same category, making her five for five as an invited guest at both ceremonies.
Also singled out by SAG?
Our fantastic cast: G.W. Bailey (Provenza), J.K. Simmons (Pope), Michael Paul Chan (Tao), Corey Reynolds (Gabriel), Jon Tenney (Fritz), Raymond Cruz (Sanchez), Robert Gossett (Taylor), Tony Denison (Flynn) and Phillip Keene (Buzz) join Kyra in their fourth nomination as the Best Ensemble in a Drama Series.
And, for making our car chases and fistfights as realistic and vivid as Standards & Practices will allow, our hard-working stunt actors were also nominated.
I wish Mary McDonnell had been included in these honors because she has begun to feel so much like a member of our regular company. Certainly, her appearance in the finale gave us an extra bit of fun as we finished shooting Year Five in which we answer a few long-term series questions. For example, we learn why Fritz has never seemed to care as much about his job as Brenda cares about hers (and why that dynamic might be about to change).
Also, we flip the tables so that Deputy Chief Johnson and her team of detectives end up investigating a member of Captain Raydor's Force Investigation Division (though, oddly, it is at Raydor's own request). Does this portend a change in the way Brenda Leigh and Sharon Raydor treat each other? Or is their relationship a fixed star within the LAPD, one of those immutable elements, resistant to combination on the atomic level?
I wish I could answer these questions here, but then you wouldn't need to watch the show. This is our final bow until mid-summer of next year, but in the meantime, Happy Holidays from myself, Mike Robin, Greer Shephard, Rick Wallace, Andy Sacks, Mike Berchem, Adam Belanoff, Steven Kane, Sheelin Choksey and the entire cast and crew of The Closer.