`I haven`t done this since `Police Story` and `The Onion Field,` ” said Joseph Wambaugh, the Los Angeles ex-cop turned author, who`ll have a hand in reviving the anthology format on NBC in the fall.
A film is in production on the West Coast titled ”From the Files of Joseph Wambaugh: Jury of One.” It stars John Spencer and was written by David J. Kinghorn. It`s based on Wambaugh`s experiences and will serve as the pilot for the potential series. Wambaugh is creative consultant.
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”All I know is crime and cops-I`m stuck with them,” said the 55-year-old author, by way of apologizing for never straying from the genre.
All 12 books he has written deal with police work. The list includes
”The New Centurions,” ”The Choir Boys” and ”The Onion Field,” as well as works adapted to TV, such as ”Police Story.”
Wambaugh, who`s waiting for the writing muses to visit again, as well as overseeing the TV story about a cop on the skids, admitted that holing up in his San Diego home playing author cuts him off from his old police sources.
”Every couple of years, when I`m ready to write a book,” he said, ”I call up all my old police contacts and take them to dinner, five at a time, to find out what`s going on.”
As creator of the series, Wambaugh explained that if the film takes off, the stories will be two hours long and will run three or four times a year.
His cop in the first film, Detective Mike Bulick (Spencer), is overcome with guilt after accidentally shooting and killing a police officer. He starts to drink heavily, which puts his career and marriage in jeopardy.
”All my cops drink in my stories,” Wambaugh said. ”All have these problems,” as did he once, he confessed. ”We think it`s a good sedative for a stressful life. That is, until we grow up and get hurt by it, when we learn it`s not a good escape. But I find it`s interesting to write about.”
Wambaugh hasn`t changed much since we first interviewed him during his
”Police Story” days of the mid-`70s-except that he has become more resigned and cynical, especially after what happened in South Central Los Angeles this spring.
”I was on the L.A. police force when the Watts riots broke out in 1965,” he recalled, ”and I thought it was impossible to happen again. Now I think it`s a recurring problem in our society.
”The cops couldn`t win in this situation. If they responded with excessive force, as we did in the Watts riots, the rioting would have happened anyway. Whatever they did, they`d be criticized.”