Smith case echoes in ‘Criminal Intent’

It could have taken longer, but it wasn’t likely.

Since many crime shows look for ripped-from-the-headlines ideas, the saga of the late Anna Nicole Smith was a virtual lock to be dramatized before this television season ended. NBC’s “Law & Order: Criminal Intent” got out of the gate first, and producer Dick Wolf’s franchise airs the resulting episode Tuesday -- exactly three months after Smith died.

Subtitled “Bombshell,” the tale casts guest star Kristy Swanson as Lorelei Mailer, an ex-stripper and billionaire’s widow who dies shortly after her son does -- and soon after she gives birth to a daughter. Her last companion (played by David Cross) fights others over her money, but it’s up to a DNA test to determine who gets the inheritance.

Hmmm. Close enough to the real thing?

Police detectives Wheeler and Logan (Julianne Nicholson, Chris Noth) are on the case.

Finding the right performer for the Anna Nicole-ish part proved relatively free of problems. Not only did Swanson want to see the script as soon as she was approached, she had the right physical look, since she and her “Skating With Celebrities” partner (and now fiance) Lloyd Eisler welcomed a son in February.

“I didn’t plan on going back to work for about six months after Magnus was born,” Swanson explains, “because I thought I’d have to lose the weight and get everyone settled and comfortable. When this opportunity came up, the role was interesting and my weight wasn’t a factor. The first questions to my agent were, ‘How does she look?’ and ‘How is she feeling?’ I’m kind of tough, so I just bit the bullet and went, and it was totally worth it.”

Executive producer Warren Leight believes the “Criminal Intent” story mirrors “what we’re seeing with people like Britney [Spears] and Lindsay Lohan, something approaching a celebration of self-destruction. There’s some comment about that in our show. It’s a bit of a high-wire act, but Kristy’s performance is really intelligent and character-driven.”

Leight recognizes the danger of being labeled exploitative with scripts that barely disguise actual situations, but he notes that suggestions are always around. The biggest challenge in fictionalizing true life is to make the figures believable.

“The solution is to make the characters real, as opposed to just plot vehicles,” Leight says. “What we strive for is some sense of empathy, rather than ironic distance or mocking. If they’re real people you care about, I feel a little less corrupt.”