Nothing But the Truth

Television is all about firsts, and starting Wednesday night, Third Watch star Anthony Ruivivar has a chance to log his own. Ruivivar stars as multiracial, openly gay attorney Alejo Salazar — with a high-ranking D.C. political figure as a partner — in the new Jerry Bruckheimer legal drama The Whole Truth. Costarring Rob Morrow and Maura Tierney, the show takes an in-depth look at the legal process, from the points of view of both the prosecution and the defense.

Ruivivar says he’s thrilled at the chance to play such a high-profile gay character who is also an ethnic minority, but even more excited that Salazar doesn’t wear his sexuality on his sleeve. Even so, his personal life, the actor assures, won’t be left on the cutting room floor.

The Advocate: The Whole Truth is a legal drama, but with a twist, kind of like The Good Wife turned the genre on its ear last season. Is that what drew you to the project?

Anthony Ruivivar: Yeah – I think The Whole Truth is just comfort food enough that people understand the formula, but we tweak it enough that it starts to feel different. Unlike, let’s say, a Law & Order, we’re law 24/7. We really dive into the law and the workings of it, kind of like ER did with medicine. Our tech advisers are spot-on. Our scripts are spot-on. We painstakingly prep as actors to understand what we’re saying and what it means and what the ramifications are, so I think you’re going to get a full helping of what goes on in a trial, the whole nine yards. If you’re interested in law at all, it’s going to be a wild ride.

So Alejo is a partner at a law firm, he’s openly gay, and a workaholic, from what I gather. What else can you tell me about your character?

He’s basically Jimmy’s [Rob Morrow] right-hand man; they run the firm together. He’s openly gay, his partner is high up in D.C. politics, so it gives him an opening into that world, which inevitably will help them with their cases. Alejo is the nuts and bolts of Jimmy’s operation. Jimmy and Alejo met when Alejo was fresh out of college. Jimmy saw a lot of prospect in Alejo — the day Alejo graduated, he showed up for work, and the two became best friends. Alejo is kind of like a genius with law briefs and is Robin to Jimmy’s Batman.

What drew you to the role? We’ve had many gay characters on TV, but an openly gay political figure and his partner is pretty groundbreaking.

You know, being an ethnic minority, my first things were ... I’ll just be taking what’s behind the register and shut up. So I’m definitely aware — look, we’ve come a long way, we’re not out of the woods yet. But I’m really proud to play an ethnic minority gay character on network television. We’re definitely going somewhere. The thing I really like about the character is that he just is gay. It’s not like they put it on a pedestal and make a big deal out of it. It felt to me like, this is the world we live in, get used to it. His sexuality is his sexuality, it’s not something that precedes who he is as a human being.

In press notes for the show, they refer to your partner as your husband. Are they indeed married?

[Laughs] You know, I’m not really sure. I think Noah Wyle on ER said it best. He said, “I didn’t know I had a brother until episode 10, and I didn’t know my brother was dead until episode 20.”