By Christina Radish

Benjamin McKenzie at the premiere of "The Wrestler" held at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences in Beverly Hills, Calif. on December 16, 2008.

Texas native Benjamin McKenzie, the former star of The O.C., spoke to MediaBlvd Magazine about playing a cop, police ride-alongs and what it’s like to fire a gun.

MediaBlvd Magazine> How has life been since The O.C.?

Benjamin McKenzie> Life has been very good. I’ve had the opportunity to do a few films. While I was on The O.C., I was able to do a film called Junebug. And, since then, I was able to do a part with Al Pacino in 88 Minutes, which was a real thrill for me. I also did a smaller film that got a limited release, called Johnny Got His Gun, which is a one-man adaptation of a play from a book. That was a real challenge for me, artistically. I’ve had a lot of those opportunities. I’ve had the opportunity to travel. I’ve had the opportunity to relax and see my family. It’s actually been wonderful. But, I’m ready to get back into it, and I’m excited about doing this show.

MediaBlvd> What is it like to play a character on the other side of the law now?

Ben> It’s fascinating. Going on ride-alongs with the cops in these tougher divisions, I noticed one thing immediately, which is that you’re in uniform, in a marked car, and you don’t know who anyone else is, but they all know who you are. You’re the mark. You don’t look like them, you don’t act like them and you don’t dress like them. They might come to you with a problem they need fixing, or they might create a problem with you. You never know. This character is very, very different from the character that I played on The O.C. He is a totally different beast, psychologically.                                               

MediaBlvd> What drew you to this show, in particular?

Ben> Ann Biderman (show creator/executive producer), John Wells (executive producer) and Chris Chulack (executive producer/director) are the reason why I was very hopeful that they would let me be a part of this. The script is incredibly dense, intricate and beautiful. And, Chris and John have been making some of the best television in the last 10 or 20 years, in my opinion. I can’t give away much about my character, but you’ll get a sense, pretty quickly, of the reason why he’s chosen to become not only a police officer, but a very specific patrol officer, starting at the bottom and working his way up. It has to do with other things going on in his personal life. There’s a lot to each  character, and every character is not only who they appear on the job, but has a whole host of emotional and psychological factors going on, behind the scenes, that inform who they are. It was an incredibly powerful script.                                   

MediaBlvd> Your character is very much the newcomer, who has a lot of things he doesn’t understand the first day, as we follow the show through his eyes. How do you see the character? Did you know anything about police work before you stepped into the character?

Ben> I knew nothing about police work before taking on the part, and one of the wonderful aspects of the production was the prep. We were paired up with Chick Daniel and his wife, who are both ex-LAPD officers, and I think Chick was actually in SWAT. They let us do ride-alongs with officers in pretty tough divisions, like South Central. And then, they also took us through a couple-week primer on the use of handcuffs and search procedures, and all sorts of code stuff. It was like a boot camp, but the actual boot camp is a lot tougher for an actual officer. Ours was the flaky actor version. My character is the focal point of the pilot, primarily as a storytelling device, to get viewers into the world that we’re entering. We need to have some fresh eyes for the world, and he has the freshest eyes of anybody. It’s his first month on the job, and he’s in over his head a little bit. The series will divert from that pretty quickly and tell a lot of different stories. With the pilot, you need a way to get into the world, and the way to get into the world this way is through a rookie, like me.

MediaBlvd> What sets your character apart from other rookie cops on other shows?

Ben> You’ll see. I can’t really give much away, but you’ll see why this guy has chosen to do what he does.

MediaBlvd> How empowering was it to put on that uniform for the first time?

Ben> It’s cool to fire the gun.

MediaBlvd> Had you done that before?

Ben> They took us to a shooting range. I grew up in Texas, so I’ve fired rifles and shotguns, but never handguns. My dad didn’t keep handguns in the house. Firing a 9 mm is definitely interesting.                       

MediaBlvd> Was there anything daunting about the preparation for this?

Ben> There was, yeah. Every time you do something like this, particularly after you actually talk to cops, you just want to make sure that you’re doing it well enough that you’re not the butt of their jokes because they’ll talk about shows that are on TV where cops are portrayed. It’s task work. How do you handle the handcuffs? How do you pull over a car that’s been speeding? What’s the proper placement of your gun? How do they teach you to fire your gun in the Academy? It’s a lot of stuff to learn quickly. As it evolves, we can start to get more comfortable with it. But, my character is a rookie and I’m not supposed to know anything, so for me, it’s easier. It’s probably harder to play guys that have been doing it for 20 or 30 years. For me, part of the character is that he doesn’t know what’s going on. 

MediaBlvd> Did you have any particularly heart-thumping or spine-tingling moments, while you were doing research?

Ben> We arrived on the tail-end of a shoot-out, when this guy had just spotted someone from a rival faction gang and took him out, and then he ran. The police, who just happened to be on the block, saw it happen and chased him, and he tossed the gun. They tracked him down on foot, got him and got the gun back. We got there too late to see it happen in front of us, but that was just a random daily occurrence. Things like that happen, all over the city, all the time. It can be from the smallest thing, like “My cat’s in a tree. Can you get him out?,” to a guy who got shot. Sometimes, you’re dealing with people who are not in the right state of mind. There is a lot of drug use, in certain parts of the city. You have to deal with people who are trying to find their shopping cart because they lost it. You can only do so much because you’re dealing with bigger issues.                                                                                                      

MediaBlvd> Did you bond with any of the real-life cops that you got to know?

Ben> Yeah. I think we’ll get to do a lot more ride-alongs, now that we’ve got some time. Every person is different. Everybody’s got their own little history and take on things, and reason why they chose to do it. But, I was pleasantly surprised by how hard they work at what they do, almost always for the right reasons. They’re not perfect people, but they’re actually trying to do something that’s kind of amazing, if you think about it.

MediaBlvd> So, you have a whole new appreciation of cops?

Ben> I do, actually. But, it still pisses me off when they give me a ticket. You never know what’s going to happen. You pull over a guy for going 45 mph in a 35 mph zone, and he has a loaded handgun or he’s on PCP.                                                                

MediaBlvd> Do you have to do anything, fitness wise, for this?

Ben> No, I just try to stay in good shape. I’ve been getting into boxing a little bit.

MediaBlvd> Are you going to get a love interest on this show?

Ben> I have no idea. I don’t know. That’s up to the writers.

MediaBlvd> Are you more comfortable in this role than with something more teen-centric, like The O.C.?

Ben> Where I am, right now in my life, I am because of my age and because I hope I’ve grown up a little bit. This is the perfect fit for me. It’s the right fit on a meta-level. I’m playing the young rookie cop, but he’s not a kid. This character has some substance. He’s just a little green, and he’s going to learn the hard way.

MediaBlvd> What made you go back to television?

Ben> This was the only project that I really pursued in television. It was not necessarily in my plans, when I ended The O.C., to go back so quickly. But, the script that (show creator/executive producer) Ann Biderman wrote was really very powerful. Then, I looked at the pedigree of the people involved -- Chris Chulack and John Wells -- and I thought, “This is going to be good.” It was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up.

MediaBlvd> And, hopefully, it will get you out of some speeding tickets, if the cops like the show.

Ben> Absolutely! I hope so. I hope to be visible enough that I get a little cred with the cops.

MediaBlvd> Were you surprised when they told you the ratio of police to citizens in the city of Los Angeles?

Ben> It’s outstanding. It’s amazing. They told us that on our first day of boot camp and it still shocks me. There is a far fewer number of officers per capita. L.A. is so spread out, and that really does make a difference. If there’s a cop walking down a block in New York, you’re far less likely to commit a crime. You see them, you feel them and you know that there’s law around. You can’t do that in L.A. Everyone is off in their own private houses or apartments, or whatever. Who knows what goes on? Sometimes, things just happen and it’s very difficult to provide law enforcement.                                                                                                                                      

MediaBlvd> So, if this acting thing comes to an end tomorrow, there’s no chance that you’ll want to join the police force?

Ben> No, probably not. Although, my mom still reminds me that I could go to law school. 

MediaBlvd> How is it to get back into the grind of TV?

Ben> The pilot was great because it was only three weeks of work. The great thing about this is that there are at least half a dozen plotlines going on, and everybody is given ample work to do. It’s not resting on my shoulders, and I’m not going to be doing it every day. They’ve designed the show specifically to be able to follow whichever characters they want to follow, at any point in time. I think that’s actually going to make the whole thing work better because no one person in the cast is going to feel like they’ve got to carry it, all the time.

MediaBlvd> Are you still in touch with any of your castmates from The O.C.?

Ben> I see Adam Brody a lot. We’ve remained very good friends. And, I talk to Peter Gallagher, every once in awhile.

MediaBlvd> What did you learn about yourself and about fame, from doing The O.C., that you carry with you now?

Ben> I learned that it’s not the be all, end all. It’s not the goal. It’s just part of what happens. It has lovely aspects and negative aspects, but it’s just part of the process. I am very thankful that it happened, but I’m also thankful that I was at least at an age, out of college, where I could handle it, with some degree of understanding that it wasn’t about me, but about this thing that had been created. I was a part of it -- an important part -- but not the only part. Sometimes, you get lost and you think that the guy on the screen is actually you, and it’s not. It’s a blur. When you’re in it, sometimes it feels like it’s going 60 mph, and sometimes it feels like it will never end, and then you’re here and you realize, “Oh, wow! That was just a moment. That was blip in time.”

MediaBlvd> Do you think your existing fan base will be pleased to follow you to this show?

Ben> I think so, actually. This is a very different show. It’s fundamentally about the characters. It’s not a crime-of-the-week series. It’s about who these people are, what their private lives are like, and how they can get through each and every day, seeing what they see. It’s not a soap opera, but it is about the interpersonal relationships.