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‘The Good Wife’: Chris Noth Took Peter Florrick Role Because Playing a Disgraced Politician Was ‘Really Appealing’

If you’re somebody who is into legal dramas, then you probably are quite familiar with CBS’ The Good Wife. The show was highly praised for its long plotlines and character development and won many, many awards. The show was so popular and so beloved that after its seven-season run, a spinoff entitled The Good Fight …
by Calvin Motley
Published on
3 min read

If you’re somebody who is into legal dramas, then you probably are quite familiar with CBS’ The Good Wife. The show was highly praised for its long plotlines and character development and won many, many awards. The show was so popular and so beloved that after its seven-season run, a spinoff entitled The Good Fight was made, which has been renewed for a fifth season. And on top of the show’s writing, the performances that the actors gave have also attracted considerable positive attention. Fans of this show are interested in the actors and how they approached these dynamic roles on the show, and how they made it to such a successful program in the first place.

So how did Chris Noth, who plays Peter Florrick, come to appear on The Good Wife? And what made him interested in the show?

Chris Noth smiling in front of a white background
Chris Noth | Cindy Ord/Getty Images

The Good Wife

The Good Wife is beloved for its intricate political and legal plot. The premise of the show is a real-life inspired corruption and sex scandal that leads to the arrest of Illinois state attorney Peter Florrick, and his wife, Alicia Florrick, returning to her work as a litigator. However, as the show progresses the plot grows, and the characters’ positions in society and relationships with each other change. Peter Florrick manages to demonstrate his innocence and returns to his political career. However, his wife struggles with her feelings for another man at her practice and maintaining her relationship with her husband. The show’s cast grew over the seasons, but Alicia Florrick stayed at the center of the show and its plot, and Peter Florrick remained a major character.

The show was incredibly successful. Critics gave it high reviews, and it won a slew of awards. It was so popular that its spinoff, The Good Fight, is continuing still, into its fifth season, with similar award success as The Good Wife. Even now, it’s still worth watching for an excellent legal drama.

Chris Noth

Chris Noth got his start as an actor in the late 1970s, in various off-Broadway productions. Initially, Chris Noth preferred theater to television or film, and even got his training at Yale School of Drama. However, by the 1980s, he would be on both the big screen and the small-screen. Many of these film roles were rather small, whereas he had a short recurring part on the 1988 TV show Hill Street Blues, then in 1990, landed the lead role, Mike Logan, on the first Law and Order series.

However, theater continued to be very important to Noth. While he continued to other major television projects like Sex and the City and Law and Order: Criminal intent, he participated in various live shows throughout the 2000s.

Noth and Florrick

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But what made Chris Noth so intent on taking the role of Peter Florrick? In a conversation with The Hollywood Reporter, Chris Noth talked about how this role appealed to him. He found the character’s ambiguous relationship with his wife fascinating and enjoyed being able to portray someone who was so dynamic across the seasons.

“We’re dealing with infidelity a lot in this relationship and what it means and what it means for the marriage and what marriage a means and its constantly shifting and it’s constantly changing. Then there’s forgiveness and then there’s regret and then there’s vengeance. It’s never one thing.”

However, Chris Noth wasn’t even “looking to go into a network.” He would have passed up on a CBS television show, until he found out the role was a “disgraced politician.” According to Noth,

“The idea of a disgraced politician was really appealing. I had no idea where it was going to go, but I knew it was in the political world and the political world holds a lot a dirty secrets and I thought it might be fun to jump on board and see where it goes.”

And he pulled it off well! Noth was highly praised for his portrayal of Peter Florrick. And while he looks back on the show fondly, he’s moving on to new horizons with a new show on CBS – The Equalizer. Perhaps the role on this show of an ex-CIA director intrigued him as well.

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