‘Law & Order: Criminal Intent’: Characters welcome?

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Jeff Goldblum has joined the cast of ‘Law & Order: Criminal Intent’ as Zach Nichols, whom the press release refers to as ‘a detective who was born and bred in New York City.’ And ordinarily, that would suffice for a procedural like ‘Law & Order.’

But because ‘Criminal Intent’ airs on USA, the ‘Characters Welcome’ cable network, TV reporters at Friday’s NBC summer press tour wanted to know more about this Zach Nichols guy. ‘How deep do we go with your character?’ asked one writer.

Goldblum, who has already shot seven of the season’s eight episodes featuring Nichols, wasn’t quite sure: ‘I don’t find out a lot of my back story,’ he said. ‘There are a few dribs and drabs about who I might be outside the job...Yeah, we don’t find out all that much more, do we?’

‘Here and there you get a whiff and a vapor. The specifics? Ration, ration.’

Don’t expect to get much more out of costar Vincent D’Onofrio’s Detective Robert Goren, who’s family drama dominated last season. ‘One of the things we wanted to do with this season for my side of the show is to go back to the early years where Gordon was completely fixated on his job,’ the actor said. ‘He’s obviously a strange character. He’s that guy who’s off. But he’s solving crimes like a...a mother honker.’

It’s ‘Law & Order,’ people.

-- Denise Martin