Gary Sinise (Mac Taylor) sat down with Hannah Storm of CBS News to discuss CSI:NY’s status in the Top 10 this season, his on-screen love interest and character development in a crime drama.

Sinise credits a number of factors for the reason viewers are tuning in this season. “Word is spreading that we’ve got a good show going on. We’ve got a good spot on Wednesday night. We’ve got a good show leading into us with Criminal Minds,” says the actor. “Our writers are getting better and better. The stories are getting better. I think people are tunings into our characters and starting to enjoy what we’re doing. And we’re doing more character work, where we get to see into the back stories of some of the people a little bit more and I think the audience appreciates that and is enjoying watching that.”

Humorously, Sinise forgets the character name of his on-screen love interest played by Claire Forlani, referring to her as “Peyton Manning.” He compensates by calling her beautiful and saying they have some nice stuff going on.

Of bringing the personal side of the characters to life, Sinise says, “You know, we’ve been working toward that. We’re a crime drama. We’re a forensics crime drama. I think the audience likes the science of the show quite a bit because the CSI franchise has sort of re-energized the crime drama and, you know, I think that’s what happens. It seems like there’s an endless parade of police stories and series that work all the time and somebody always reinvents it and Anthony Zuiker and the folks who put CSI together have done that and I think the audience really appreciates that because mysteries are something that we all enjoy watching.” However, he goes on to emphasize the importance of the character, saying, “But at the same time you’ve got to be involved with the characters and over the course of the last three seasons I think we’ve done that and the audience is ready for that and they want to see where we’re going to go and that’s one of the fun things about a series is you don’t know where it’s going to go and once the audience keeps watching, we’ll keep throwing surprises at them and who knows who will come out of the past.”

To view the 4:42 long video interview, head over to Discuss this news item at Talk CSI!
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