john ridley wrote it. it is so far from your character on "desperate housewives."ere you attracted to this rule because it was so different from her? felicity: i was so excited about what i saw on the screen. i had never seen anything like -- felicity: i had to think is this like lynette? i wanted to make sure the legacy of lynette didn't get in the way of john ridley's storytelling. you don't want to say, there is lynette as a police officer. and there she is as a nurse. gayle: i totally forgot all about lynette, and i followed "desperate housewives" from beginning to end. number one, she is a mom who is seeking justice for her son. so i felt her pain. her son is murdered. there is a part of her that is so unlikable. i was tussling back-and-forth with that. talk about the character. felicity: the way i had to get into the character, as an actor you always want to find something you can endorse. you have to fall in love with her character. gayle: do you have to fall in love with the character before you can play it? felicity: for me, i do. otherwise you have a dist

i never seen anything like that, john ridley wrote it, we'll talk about that.:l far from law jet scavo that i liked in desperate housewives. were you attracted to this role because it is so opposite and different fromrr>> no,me originally. it's always the script. if the script is compelling, if it's on the page it's on the stage. great writing makes your job as an actor easier. i read the script and i had to think is this like law net. i mean she'svlynnate and i wanted to make sure they didn't want to get in through the storytelling. oh there's law net about a police officer and there she is as a nurse. >> king: i never saw law net. number one she is a mom seeking justice for her son. i felt her pain. her son is murdered. i feltokpart still unlikeable felicity. talk about that for a second the character. >> the way i had to get into the character. as an actor you want to find something you can endorse. you have to fall in love with your÷nÑharacter. >> king: you do, before you can play them. >> yes. for me you have a distance, are judging your chair, you can't j

by john ridley. >> seth: it is a show that feels like a cable show, and it's so refreshing to see itn we were doing the pilot, i kept turning to tim, who i'd never met before, but instantly loved. and i went, "i love working with you." i'm never going to see you again. 'cause no one is going to pick this up. [ laughter ] and -- because it's such a cable show, and i gotta say, even for a cable show, it pushes the envelope out. but abc and paul lee got behind it, and gave them carte blanche. they went, "yep, your vision, do it." that is not at all what you get on usual network tv. >> seth: and i'm very excited. i also think it's very exciting as a viewer these days when someone tells you, we are going to tell a story, and we're going to tell it in 11 episodes. so no matter how good it does, we don't have to come back next year year and say, "that thing we told you isn't true because now we have to write more episodes." >> exactly, and also it's all up in the air, anybody can die at any time. >> seth: i love that! >> which was scary as an actor. [ laughter ] >> seth: i love that! >> it'

i wanted to make sure the legacy of lynette didn't get in the way of john ridley's storytelling. you don't want to say, there is lynette as a police officer. gayle: i totally forgot all about lynette, and i followed "desperate housewives" from beginning to end. number one, she is a mom who is seeking justice for her son. our son is murdered, and i felt her pain. i was tussling back-and-forth with that. talk about the character. felicity: the way i had to get into the character, as an actor you always want to find something you can indoors. you have to fall in love with her character. gayle: do you have to fall in love with the character before you can play it? felicity: for me, i do. you cannot judge her character. you have to be your character. she is a mother and she is seeking justice for her son. that is a noble motive patient -- motivation. the way it manifests in the world is offputting. but i wanted to make sure that you at least understood her, so maybe you could have empathy for her, so you could see her as a full human being. this is why people are uncomfortable with he

and john ridley the academy award winning screen writer 12 years a slave and his new show premiers tomorrowtives and i asked him what attracted him to a project like that? >> honestly it was much of that. that concept that crime unfortunately does happen to folks and for a lot of us it is a headline. we read it and form our opinions about it and we get to move on. but for the families of the victims and the families of the accused, there is no moving on from it, not from a daily or a weekly basis and sometimes it takes months or if not years for a case to go to trial and even at that they still have no resolution. there may be a decision in the case but for either side there is no resolution. >> we kick around the word closure a lot. and for a lot of families that go through horrific crime situations or things happen to them closure is hard to find. >> closure is very hard to find. that is often for the audience. and even in the audience in real-life court cases that we wait for that decision to come and it goes on live news and it happens and there is a lot of talk about what it means but

the creator john ridley wanted to have a whole new look at race in america and how crime touches all examined this one central crime and how it affects all the people on both sides of the crime, the victims, as well as the suspect's families and how, you know we don't treat each other -- we base a lot of our encounters on assumptions and our perceptions are immediate and quick and we jump to conclusions. i think the show deals with that. >> we could see in that scene how raw this is. i read somewhere that when you were first going through the descriptions you couldn't believe this would actually get made. >> oh no remember we had bets. we were doing the pilot and i said i love working with you, i'll never see you again. >> it's true. >> so i was forsure it wasn't going to get picked up. network television has never done anything like this so take my hat off to abc and paul lee because it's gutsy and cool. >> what do you hope people get out of it. >> me -- >> felicity. >> i think that they will connect with the characters. i think they'll see a bit of themselves in all of the characte