Street Smarts

Two days after winning the pivotal role of an ambitious Baltimore homicide detective in HBO’s summer series “The Wire,” British actor Dominic West found himself riding on the mean streets of the Maryland metropolis in a squad car with real homicide detectives.

“I rode along with the police a good two or three weeks before we shot the pilot,” recalls West, who plays Det. James McNulty in the gritty series that premiered to strong reviews on June 2. “One time, I was in the back of the police car with a detective in the front seat and a convicted murderer in the back seat next to me. I am sitting there desperately trying to make light that this is an ordinary day for me. He was really a sweet man but a crack addict. He was accused of smothering an old woman and stealing her money. When we got out of the car, I said to the detective, ‘He’s clearly innocent.’ But the detective said they found fragments of his sock in her mouth!”

On another ride-along, West found himself in the trauma unit of a hospital “with a guy who had been shot eight times--four times in the head. He was still alive. I was there with the relatives. You feel like a terrible impostor.”

The police, though, welcomed the cast and crew. “The police sort of like the TV thing,” West says. “That surprised me a lot. I am not sure it would be the same in England.”

“The Wire,” which wraps its season Sept. 8, was created by writer and executive producer David Simon, a former Baltimore-based journalist who wrote about crime and drugs and was executive producer of the Emmy Award-winning HBO miniseries “The Corner.” Simon wrote the story of “The Wire” with Edward Burns, a retired Baltimore homicide detective and city schoolteacher.

The 13-episode series tells the story of a single drugs-and-murder investigation as seen through the eyes of both the police and their targets.

“The series sort of mirrors the two worlds,” West explains. “They are essentially two corporations. One is slightly more efficient than the other. And it shows all the frustrations of being a foot soldier in a massive corporate structure.”

The large ensemble cast also includes Sonja Sohn as McNulty’s ally on the investigation, narcotics Det. Shakima Greggs, and Larry Gilliard Jr. as Angelo, a mid-level drug dealer with a conscience who beat a murder rap with the help of his ruthless uncle (Wood Harris).

Sohn says it’s been a challenge to play her tough, no-nonsense character. “She appears to be one way when you see her at work,” she says. “She’s portrayed being this strong, assertive, committed person, but you see a different side of her when she goes home and is with her girlfriend.”

Like West, she rode along with her real-life counterparts. “The few days I rode with the narcotics detectives, their female detective happened to be out on leave, so I got a lot of my information from those male detectives and also from Ed Burns and David Simon. I had to learn how to be familiar with a gun.”

The series shoots on location in the projects of west Baltimore, only about six blocks from where Gilliard grew up. “I lived in Baltimore for 10 years and then moved to New York to go to college,” says the actor. “My mother still lives there.”

He credits her with keeping him away from the drugs and violence that surrounded them. “My mother managed to keep me sheltered from all of that, but the neighborhood wasn’t as bad then as it is now. Now you walk through the neighborhoods of west Baltimore and east Baltimore, and entire neighborhoods are wiped out. It’s like some Middle Eastern country. All the row houses are abandoned.

“I can remember when all the neighborhoods were full of life. It’s a little bit scarier now, and it hurts a little bit now to see the city in that condition.”

“The Wire” can be seen Sundays at 10 p.m. on HBO. The network has rated it TV-MA-V,L (may be unsuitable for children younger than 17, with advisories for violence and language).