Madonna’s ‘Papa Don’t Preach’ Backed Him Into NBC’s ‘Corner’

Alex McArthur had no idea that playing Madonna’s grease-monkey boyfriend six years ago in her “Papa Don’t Preach” video would change his career. But it did.

“It was a three-day job,” McArthur recalls. “I had done eight movies before that. But it certainly did open a lot of doors and bring me into the public eye.”

McArthur has since starred in the popular “Desperado” Western movies for NBC and recently traded in his cowboy duds to play a DEA agent in NBC’s miniseries “Drug Wars II: The Cocaine Cartel.”

And McArthur makes his TV series debut in NBC’s “The Fifth Corner,” which premieres Friday with a special two-hour episode. Kim Delaney and James Coburn also star.

In the suspense thriller, McArthur plays Richard Braun, a super-industrial espionage agent who wakes up one morning in bed with a dead girl. He has no idea who she is or who he is for that matter. “He had been hit over the head and has amnesia,” McArthur explains.

McArthur says he’s in the dark as to his character’s true identity. “I have to read the next couple episodes. My character finds six different passports and sets of papers that have his picture on them. But in each picture he looks completely different.”

Each week, Braun will discover a little bit more about his past. “The more I find out, the more I don’t like.”

McArthur hails from Allentown, Pa., and attended San Jose State University. He eventually went to New York to study acting and earned his living as a carpenter. “I did have my own construction company,” McArthur says. “I had five guys working for me.”

Being a carpenter actually helped him get an acting agent in Los Angeles. “I did a job for Chen Sam, who was Elizabeth Taylor’s press agent. She helped me when I came out here. I got my agent through someone she introduced me to.”