Actor and comedian Denis Leary donated a mobile command center to the FDNY Monday. Leary raised the half million dollars for the vehicle through his charity, Leary Firefighters Foundation (founded after firefighters from his hometown of Worcester, MA died, including his cousin and good friend), which donates equipment for equipment and training facilities in firehouses, and said, "Basically, people give me money because I am a celebrity. Then I turn around and say the fire department, in this case the Fire Department of New York City, Hey, what do you guys need, what do you want?" According to NY1, the mobile command center will be used for the first time during the Republican National Convention - and Gothamist hopes it's just to monitor, not to really be used in a crisis.
Leary is also premiering his new TV show about life in the FDNY, Rescue Me, which tomorrow night on FX. Naturally, there's been a lot of NYC press coverage of it, with a fat feature in the Daily News and Leary told the NY Times in an interview:
There's a backlash in New York right now with firefighters getting arrested for drunk driving and testing positive for drugs. The spotlight was shone on these guys and we thought they were so heroic. But they're just human beings and the tendency for them is to self-medicate rather than go see a psychiatrist so that they can keep going into these buildings and saving people. This is something we're going to deal with in the course of the show.
The New Yorker's Nancy Franklin says in a review, Leary "has found a way to honor New Yorks Bravest" with Rescue Me. Leary also played a hardened New York cop in the shortlived ABC series, The Job. Gothamist has to admit, there is something very believable about Denis Leary playing a cop or firefighter, because of his gruff and brash demeanor, but our favorite Leary movie is The Ref, because Kevin Spacey and Judy Davis really hold their own.
