TV Talk: Former Steelers linebacker James Harrison wrestles in ‘Heels’ – TribLIVE

For Steelers linebacker-turned-actor James Harrison there’s a commonality to playing for the NFL and acting in a TV series.

“It’s bonding, it’s team building,” he said of making “Heels,” a Starz eight-episode, first-season drama he co-stars in as a wrestler. “You can’t just go out there and think you’re gonna get the job done. You’ve got to study. … You’ve got to be able to read in between the lines to bring out the emotional expressions or lack of expression when you’re reading your lines. If I go out there and I put on a bad performance, that’s gonna let the whole group down. Same thing if I go out there as a linebacker and I don’t do my job, I let the whole team down.”

“Heels,” premiering at 9 p.m. Sunday, follows the rivalry between Jack (Stephen Amell, “Arrow”) and younger brother Ace (Alexander Ludwig, “Vikings”) who are both part of the family-owned, independent Duffy Wrestling League in a small Georgia town. Jack runs the business — when he’s not selling lawn mowers in his day job — and scripts the matches. It’s a bit of a Southern-fried “Kingdom,” the 2014-17 DirecTV series about a family of MMA fighters.

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Harrison plays Apocalypse, a journeyman wrestler who’s loyal to Jack even as some of his wrestling co-stars entertain dreams of greater professional glory.

“He’s loyal to them because they were loyal to him with his whole issue with sobriety and going through (Alcoholics Anonymous),” Harrison said last week during a virtual interview from his Pittsburgh home.

The show’s title refers to a wrestling term: A “heel” is a character scripted to be a villain; a “face” is a character positioned as a hero. Apocalypse has been both: “Whatever they need him to be in whatever match,” Harrison said.

Harrison relocated temporarily to Atlanta for nine months to film the first season of “Heels.” He started thinking of post-NFL career options long before he stopped playing football in 2018. First he got into commercial real estate (he owns seven buildings), then offered NFL commentary for Fox Sports and tried acting. Both on-camera roles mark an effort to overcome stage fright that dogged Harrison when being interviewed by reporters during his NFL career.

His first acting gig was in indie film “Remember Amnesia,” which partially filmed in Pittsburgh. He shot scenes on a Friday afternoon prior to a Sunday Steelers playoff game against Kansas City in 2017.

“I couldn’t really tell anybody about that because if we lose this playoff game, (they’ll say), ‘James Harrison was shooting a damn film,’” Harrison said, chuckling.

He had a guest spot in a 2019 episode of CBS’s “S.W.A.T.” and works with a Pittsburgh-based acting coach to prepare for all his acting roles, including “Heels,” which required him to learn wrestling moves.

“It’s all choreographed and you’re working with each other,” Harrison said. “Where in football this guy (on the opposing team) is not trying to work with me, he’s trying to get his job done like I’m trying to get my job done. It’s just forcing my will on him. In wrestling it’s me making it look like I’m forcing my will on him but he’s actually helping me do this so that we can get this done and make it look as violent as possible but in the safest way …” ”

Harrison said he’s been so busy filming “Heels” he hasn’t had time to study up on the Steelers, who they drafted and how they’re looking for the 2021-22 NFL season. But, he said, “I’ll definitely be watching when the time comes. You can take the boy out of Pittsburgh but you can’t take Pittsburgh out of the boy.”

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‘Nine Perfect Strangers’

Nicole Kidman continues to corner the market on Problematic Rich People mysteries. From HBO’s “Big Little Lies” to “The Undoing” and now Hulu’s “Nine Perfect Strangers,” if there’s a wealthy character with problems in a mystery, Kidman is sure to be in the thick of it.

“Nine Perfect Strangers,” streaming Wednesday, is based on a Liane Moriarty novel and adapted by TV writer David E. Kelley (like “Big Little Lies” was) and features a theme song that couldn’t sound more like the “Big Little Lies” theme if it tried.

Kidman plays Masha, a mysterious Russian businesswoman who presides over a luxe California wellness resort. Her latest nine clients range from an author (Melissa McCarthy), to a mousy, meek woman (Regina Hall) to grieving parents (Michael Shannon and Asher Keddie) to a gay Brit (Luke Evans).

While there is a sameness to all three of Kidman’s most recent TV/streaming projects, there’s no denying they’re addictive soaps. “Nine Perfect Strangers” benefits tremendously from Hall playing against type and the presence of McCarthy, who is so good in dramatic roles that she ought to consider passing on more of the blah comedies she’s starred in of late.

‘Schmigadoon!’ deep cut

Last week’s episode of Apple TV+’s gleeful love letter/skewering of Broadway and MGM musical classics “Schmigadoon!” included its deepest cut yet: Not only did Kristin Chenoweth get to perform a riff inspired by “Big Trouble in River City” from “The Music Man,” but there was also a hilarious reference to the dream ballet from “Oklahoma!”

At the 22-minute mark, the scene turns a garish purple as Melissa (Cecily Strong) looks into the distance and sees a woman, dressed just like her, approach and extend an arm.

“Is this a dream ballet?” Melissa says, standing alone in a field. “Oh, no, no, no, we’re not having a dream ballet. They’re annoying and stupid and they slow everything down. Nobody likes a dream ballet. Nobody.”

The dream ballerina, looking disappointed, turns around and walks away as the purple tinge quickly fades.

“Schmigadoon!” co-creator Cinco Paul told me that scene actually stemmed from … an actual dream ballet he had planned for “Schmigadoon!”

“We wrote a dream ballet. I conceived of a whole dream ballet and Allison Silverman, who wrote that episode, and I worked on putting it all together. And then when we were discussing production and planning, we thought, ‘This is crazy. It’s going to be a lot of work.’ And I thought, you know, I hate dream ballet,” Paul said. “They’re the worst part of any musical. You fast-forward. Why would we subject our audience to that? So I talked through it and thought, let’s keep the concept of it but let’s play with it. So it became a joke instead of an actual number.”

Kept/canceled

Disney+ renewed animated “Star Wars” series “The Bad Batch,” executive produced by Dave Filoni and co-starring Ming-Na Wen (both Mt. Lebanon High School grads), for a second season to stream in 2022.

HBO renewed “The White Lotus” for a second season to feature a new cast, characters and location.

“South Park” has been renewed for five more seasons and Paramount+ ordered 14 “South Park” movies, premiering two per year through 2027 beginning this year.

Apple TV+ renewed “Physical” for a second season; Fox did the same for animated comedy “Housebroken.”

Discovery ordered two more seasons of “BattleBots.”

AdultSwim ordered a third season of “Tuca & Bertie” and Ovation re-upped “Frankie Drake Mysteries” for a fourth.

Apple TV+ canceled “Little Voice” after a single season.

Channel surfing

Pittsburgh-based Fred Rogers Productions’ latest animated PBS Kids series, “Alma’s Way,” debuts Oct. 4 featuring a theme song by Lin-Manuel Miranda (“Hamilton”) and Bill Sherman. … PBS’s “Call the Midwife” returns for its 10th season at 8 p.m. Oct. 3. … Among Pittsburgh TV stations WQED-TV led the Mid-Atlantic Regional Emmy nominations announced late last week with 22 nominations. WPXI had 18 and KDKA and WTAE tied with 12 each. See the full list at natasmid-atlantic.org/2021-emmy-nominees/. Winners will be announced in a virtual ceremony Sept. 25. … “Jeopardy!” named its executive producer Mike Richards as its new host, succeeding Alex Trebek, with Mayim Bialik as host of primetime specials, including ABC’s “Jeopardy! National College Championship,” airing in primetime in 2022 and featuring students from 15 colleges and universities.