Tony Goldwyn Joins ‘Law & Order’ Following Sam Waterston’s Departure

Actor also directs new movie ‘Ezra,’ starring Robert De Niro

Gayle Jo Carter,

AARP

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Published April 11, 2024

Tony Goldwyn against green ombre background

Photo Collage: MOA Staff; (Source: Virginia Sherwood/NBC)

Tony Goldwyn, 63, is stepping into big shoes as Manhattan District Attorney Nicholas Baxter, replacing Sam Waterston’s DA Jack McCoy on NBC’s Law & Order. “They’ve created a very different character, so it’s just fun to bring whatever I can to it,” Goldwyn says. He also stepped behind the camera as director of the movie Ezra, in theaters May 31, which stars A-listers Robert De Niro, Rose Byrne, Whoopi Goldberg and Rainn Wilson. He tells AARP why he decided to direct, how he’s keeping in mental and physical shape and what he’d like his younger self to know.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

How do you like shooting Law & Order in New York City?

Oh, it’s fantastic. I love working in New York, because it’s home, and it’s always such a treat to get to work here. Making films and television shows in New York is a very special, unique kind of experience. The city is always a major character in whatever you’re doing. And as soon as I walked onto the set of Law & Order, I [recognized] several of the people who were on the crew I worked with in the past [Goldwyn directed a Season 16 episode in 2006 and acted on Law & Order: Criminal Intent in the mid-2000s] and some [from] the film I just directed. So it was a familial atmosphere.

Tony Goldwyn, Odelya Halevi, Camryn Manheim, Reid Scott, Mehcad Brooks, and Hugh Dancy with words Truth Always Prevails, Law and Order, NBC

Goldwyn stars as Manhattan District Attorney Nicholas Baxter on “Law & Order.”

Vivian Zink/Bravo/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images

You’ve publicly invited your Scandal costar Kerry Washington to guest star on Law & Order. Do you have any other dream guest stars?

Maybe Bob De Niro. He’s in my movie [Ezra]. He’s incredible.

Ezra features a star-powered cast, including De Niro, Rose Byrne, Whoopi Goldberg, Vera Farmiga, Rainn Wilson and Bobby Cannavale. How did that all come about?

As movies go, it came together quite easily, especially in independent films. My oldest and dearest friend in the world, who I’ve been friends with for 40 years, Tony Spiridakis, wrote the script. He has an autistic son and wanted to write a movie inspired by his experience. He wrote this beautiful script about a comedian [whose] 11-year-old son is autistic, and he’s going through a divorce and living with his dad, and they’re going through a bit of an ordeal in their family. Tony and I decided to do it together, and then the cast came together quite quickly, and suddenly we’re making a movie. It was really beautiful to do that with my best friend.

Were you always interested in directing?

No, no, I had no desire to become a director. I became a director because I became a little frustrated with my acting career. It took me a few years to get the ball rolling, and I finally had some real success. I thought, OK, now I’ve kind of arrived. And then I realized, Oh, it’s not like that. It really depends on what your last project did at the box office and how hot you are. And I thought, Oh, my God, this lack of agency is not what I’d anticipated. I started looking for projects that I could be central to and sort of a driving force behind. At first, I thought that would just be producing movies that I would then be able to act in. But I found one in particular that I fell in love with and realized that in order to get it done the way I thought it should be done, I had to direct it myself — not really thinking I would love doing it or that I might be particularly good at it. But I discovered that I really loved it and had a knack for it. It opened up a lot of opportunities for me, and it was just a great fork in the road.

What do you love to do when you’re not working?

I love to ski. I spend time with my family. My wife [production designer Jane Musky] and I travel whenever we can. I really love to hike. Something we do together is go on hiking trips. We were in Switzerland in September. I spend a lot of time with my kids. I love going to the theater, but that’s sort of an adjunct to work. I exercise every day and love to play sports. I’m athletic.

Are you doing anything differently in your 60s to stay healthy?

I’ve always been fairly conscientious about my health, but I may be more aware. Maybe those doctor’s appointments that I used to put off for years at a time, I think, “You know what, I better get that done.”

What do you do to keep your brain sharp?

I eat a Mediterranean diet mostly, but not spartan. And then yoga I find very good for [staying sharp], and meditation and breathwork. But that’s also part of what I do as an actor. That’s just very useful. So it’s usually part of your technique as an actor to do breath work — that’s really amazing for people in terms of keeping clarity. And the other huge thing for me about mental clarity is hydration — drinking a lot of water. Whenever I’m at work and I feel a little bit foggy I go, “Oh I haven’t been drinking water.”

What’s your attitude about aging?

I don’t look forward to the coming aches and pains that are inevitable, I suppose. But for me, in terms of a happiness quotient, I would say it only has gotten better as I’ve gotten older. And as the cliche goes, I wish what I know now, I knew when I was 25 years old. The older I get, honestly, the happier I get. I’ve been grateful to be in a good marriage and have a great family and a career that’s still thriving.

If you could tell that 25-year-old something, what would it be?

I would say, “Just relax and trust your life. Work your ass off and trust that life is full of surprises, and that the ups and downs of it are part of the party.”

Mehcad Brooks as Detective Jalen Shaw and Tony Goldwyn as District Attorney Nicholas Baxter in a still from Law and Order; police officers in the background

“Law & Order,” now in its 23rd season, airs Thursday nights on NBC.

Virginia Sherwood/NBC

A Family Filmmaking Affair

Given his family lineage, AARP asked actor-director Tony Goldwyn if filmmaking is in his blood. “I suppose so — it’s third generation,” he says. “I tried to stay away from it, but my gene pool had something more to say about that.”

Goldwyn’s grandfather was legendary filmmaker Samuel Goldwyn. He produced dozens of movies throughout the 1930s, ’40s and ’50s, including Wuthering Heights (1939) and The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), and a series of Technicolor musicals including Guys and Dolls (1955) and Porgy and Bess (1959). His father was film producer Samuel Goldwyn Jr., known for Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003), The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013) and Mystic Pizza (1988). And his mother, actress Jennifer Howard, appeared in the TV series The Twilight Zone (1960), Suspicion (1958) and Playhouse 90 (1956-59), and in the film The Chapman Report (1962).

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Gayle Jo Carter is a former entertainment editor at USA WEEKEND, who during her 30-year reporting and editing career, has worked at USA TODAY, Voice of America and Feature Story News. When not interviewing high-profile people, she’s teaching reformer Pilates classes and doing her best to raise two empathetic, curious, healthy young people to adulthood.

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