In profile, the sweep of his strong nose and balding forehead makes him look as aerodynamically designed as an eagle. He has just come down the stairs dressed in jeans and a sweater and carrying a pair of white sneakers. It is a few days before the Super Bowl and Franz is enjoying a rare day off at his Bel-Air home just across the 405 from the new hillside Getty Museum, whose unfinished monumentality looms clearly into view from his pool.
The writers really had to scramble for the first half-dozen or so episodes, and I think they did an amazing job for us to have sustained the popularity we have under those circumstances.”
“When you consider the transition that we had to make-the departure of one major character and the introduction of another, the whole story line for the entire season had to be shifted all around.
“It’s been difficult, it’s been good, it’s been easy, it’s been hard,” Franz says about the heavy lifting that has gone on in “NYPD Blue’s” second season. All the hype Caruso attracted the first season initially obscured Franz’s hefty contribution to the watchability of “NYPD Blue,” but with Caruso gone, there has been little doubt that Franz has stepped up and carried the show on Andy Sipowicz’s world-weary shoulders while the public waited to see if the Smits character could replace Caruso’s.