“24″ is resetting its clock again for Gregory Itzin. Having returned once before as seemingly weak-willed but actually scheming — and ultimately born-again — former President Charles Logan on the Fox suspense series, the veteran stage and screen actor rejoins the show Monday, April 12.
“It did rather take me by surprise,” Itzin admits of being invited back. “Howard (Gordon, a ’24′ executive producer) and I are friends and have kept in touch. I had made my case (about returning to the series) numerous times, because wherever I go, I’m ‘that guy.’
“Everybody asks about Logan, ‘He’s not dead, is he?’ And I would write Howard periodically and say, ‘I think we should resurrect this guy,’ but I’d given it up. Then all of a sudden, it came out of the blue.”
Logan is brought back in to assist current President Allison Taylor (Emmy winner Cherry Jones) in trying to resolve the show’s latest terrorism crisis. “He wants to be back in the game,” Itzin explains. “That’s sort of his overarching objective. He’s reinvented himself, but maybe he’s just become more of who he really is.
“He’s always been paranoid, but now he’s very aware of how people look at him and deal with him,” adds Itzin. “This is a chance for him to burnish his image and come back into the public view as a winner.”
To do “24″ again, Itzin has been logging lots of miles cross-country, since he’s also starting Broadway previews of the play “Enron.” Cast as the now-defunct energy firm’s president, Kenneth Lay, he says, “(British playwright) Lucy Prebble, who wrote it, says she’s so excited to have American actors bring this American story to life.”
