by Richard Huff
The game has changed this season for FX's "Nip/Tuck."
When viewers last saw Dr. Christian Troy and Dr. Sean McNamara, they had left their lucrative, but troubled, Miami plastic surgery practice for the bodywork capital of the world: Hollywood.
That's a good thing for the stories and the cast, says Dylan Walsh, who plays McNamara.
"It's been great, to be honest," says Walsh. "With a TV series, the stories are so much driven by the sets that you have, and you find yourself on the same set, in the same kitchen, for the 112th time having almost the same argument with your wife. The theme this year is we have a fresh start."
But that freshness lasts only so long.
The show picks up with McNamara and Troy trying to get a practice going in Hollywood, only to find out they're a little out of their game. So they head to clubs to drum up business. And they land a gig as consultants to a TV medical series.
Eventually, of course, family members and some of the characters made famous in earlier seasons return to wreak havoc with the doctors' lives.
"We easily could have done another full season set in Miami," Walsh says. "But [creator] Ryan [Murphy] was smart in anticipating it was going to get stale, rather than letting it get stale."
"Nip/Tuck," of course, is not a typical drama. Set in the world of plastic surgery, each episode is built around patients wanting to tweak their looks in some way. But, outside of the operating room, the show has delved into the personal lives of the doctors, ranging from McNamara's attempts to keep his family together - through affairs and other odd revelations - and Troy's struggle to find a family, while running through a string of beautiful women. Along the way, the doctors have been the victim of a serial slasher and tormented by a drug dealer they had given a new face in the fi rst season.
"In Miami, it was a show about vanity, that simple need to change your look," Walsh says. "Now it's vanity for your career. We're plugged into something more serious: You could have a career if you changed your looks."
Walsh says one of the draws of the show is that it mixes drama with farcical, over-the-top humor.
For the first time in the show's existence, 22 episodes of "Nip/Tuck" are being produced in a row, though the shows are likely to be broken into two seasons. Walsh says he expects some sort of plot twist in episode 14 to set up the next season.
"This show has a different tone to it than most shows on TV," Walsh says. "You've got to give it credit for its tone."
As for Walsh, he says his role as McNamara has led to him getting offers for softer roles in Lifetime Christmas movies, but that's okay.
"I think the benefits of the show will happen later," he says. "Right now, people will rather identify me as Sean McNamara. It's definitely put me on the map like nothing ever did. It's given me a home in the business. It's given me a job where I'm challenged every day. It's really everything I've ever wanted."
http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv/2007/10/28/2007-10-28_niptuck_gets_a_hollywood_facelift-1.html
