Jersey-born actor likes legal roles

From:Courier-Post
Date:April 26, 2003
By BRIDGET BYRNE

Alan Rosenberg has played many lawyers in his career, but he believes his role as legal aid-crusader Alvin Masterson on the CBS drama The Guardian is the best one yet.

For starters, he finally has a first name with more than three letters. There's been "Eli, Stu, Ira, Sam, Max . . ." Rosenberg ticks off the clipped names with a grin. "This is a bit of a stretch; Alvin has got five letters."

Eli Levinson was a divorce attorney in both Civil Wars and L.A. Law. More recently, Stu Brickman was on call for legal issues on Chicago Hope. His `worst' job

Then there was Ira Woodbine, the ex-husband of Cybill Shepherd's character on Cybill, which became "the worst job of my life," said Rosenberg, when the actress took over the reins of the struggling sitcom.

Rosenberg now plays Masterson, who runs the office where troubled attorney Nick Fallin (Simon Baker) must perform community service on The Guardian. The drama, which airs Tuesday nights (9 p.m.), is in its second season.

"I enjoy the opportunities this show takes to reveal the issues of the day," the 52-year-old actor says. "I get a chance to say things that are sort of like my own politics, my own ideas, my own feelings. That's important, especially in these tumultuous times."

Rosenberg is eating corned beef and cabbage with other cast and crew in a parking lot behind a church in midtown Los Angeles. He apologizes for his "sloppy" eating habits. He explains that he somehow manages to be both "messy and disorganized" and "obsessive, compulsive." Would rather do good

"Alvin is a sort of refugee from the '60s with high ideals," Rosenberg said. "At least he used to have very high ideals but I think somewhere along the line he became a little complacent, until Fallin came into his life and started shaking him up a bit. He's opted for a life where he can do some good rather than make a lot of money, and he's comfortable with that."

Rosenberg also is comfortable with holding on to the ideals that made him very active in the antiwar movement when he was in college during the Vietnam era. "It's time for that kind of activism again and it's fun to play a character of like mind," he said. Wants to speak out

He believes actors should speak out on issues that concern them.

"I'm looking for more opportunities to speak out, actually," he says. "I think in times like these, we are all obligated to talk about what we believe."

Series creator David Hollander hired Rosenberg because he wanted someone who had a distinctly liberal feeling about him.

Rosenberg, who was born in New Jersey, studied political science at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio, then attended the Yale School of Drama. At moments when his acting career stalled, he dabbled with the notion of becoming a lawyer.

He credits his brother, the late studio executive Howard Rosenberg, and a 1966 copy of Playboy magazine with spurring his political activism.

"There was an interview Playboy did with George Lincoln Rockwell, the head of the American Nazi party," Rosenberg recalled.

"He said that there were a couple of Rosenbergs executed back in the 1950s for spying and there were a lot of other Rosenbergs walking around who deserved to be executed, too. That kind of opened my eyes: `Wow, there are people out there who hate just because of who I am and what my name is.' "

On TV
`The Guardian' airs 9 p.m. Thursdays on CBS.