Short Takes : Carradine Gets Into Roles

Actor Robert Carradine, in New Orleans doing a movie for HBO, is spending his spare time riding around in police cars, picking up pointers for his role as a drug enforcement agent in “The Barry Seal Story.”

This isn’t the first time he’s gone out of his way to get a feel for a character. When filming “Revenge of the Nerds,” released in 1984, he said he wore nerd clothes, wig and glasses everywhere he went for two weeks before filming began.

While in character, he and another actor went to fraternity row at the University of Arizona for rush week and asked the head of one fraternity if they could join.

“The guy took one look at us and said, ‘No way,’ ” he said. “By the time the first day of shooting rolled around, I was in full flight as a nerd.”