By Variety | Created at 2025-03-21 17:20:44 | Updated at 2025-03-21 22:38:51
5 hours ago
Just one year ago, French Stewart was riding high. The actor, best known for playing the squinty-eyed, lovably clueless alien Harry Solomon for six seasons on “3rd Rock from the Sun” was at the SXSW Film Festival, earning raves for his turn as an emotionally abusive father in the Tracie Laymon’s debut feature “Bob Trevino Likes It.” The film showed Stewart, usually cast as likable characters, in a whole new light. It closed out the festival by winning both the Jury Prize and the Audience Award.
Cut to a year later, after the film has won more than 25 awards on the fest circuit and Stewart is back to hitting red carpets for its upcoming premiere. But at the same time, the actor reveals there’s been a struggle – he hadn’t worked in a year and was concerned he might lose his SAG insurance for the first time in his decades-long career. Fortunately, relief came in a guest spot on the series “Chicago Med,” which he’s just returned from shooting. “That was a close one,” he admits from his home in Atlanta. “I consider myself a journeyman actor and I know there are ups and downs in this business, but that was closer than I’d like to admit.”
Such is the life of a jobbing actor – and Stewart’s situation was further complicated by such industry blows as the COVID-19 pandemic or the dual strikes. But this week, “Bob Trevino Likes It” will at last hit theaters in limited release on March 21 before expanding, introducing his range to a wider audience.
Full disclosure: Stewart is a friend of mine. Not in that Hollywood way where we catch up at red carpets and events or slip into each other’s social media DMs. He’s been married to one of my closest friends for more than a decade, we spent years in the same theater company and, in the truest test of friendship, we have shown up to support each other at countless readings and performances, no matter how abysmal the material. (Admittedly, this has been harder on him than me.) I’ve long known what he’s capable of as a dramatic actor – but even I was caught off guard by his complex, affecting turn in “Bob Trevino.”
Inspired by Laymon’s own personal experiences, the film stars Barbie Ferreira as Lily, a young woman who longs for a relationship with her biological father Robert/Bob Trevino (Stewart) despite the fact he’s completely self-centered and manipulative. After he cuts her off, she reaches out to a different Bob Trevino (played by John Leguizamo) on Facebook and starts a tentative friendship. Leguizamo’s kind and lonely Trevino embraces the wounded soul and ends up becoming more of a father to Lily than her genetic father ever was.
Laymon belongs to a writing group with Stewart’s wife Vanessa, and one night the actor offered his services as they were reading pages. Recalls Laymon: “I remember thinking, ‘This is awesome, but what do I have for French Stewart to read?’ I had ten or so pages of an early draft of ‘Bob Trevino Likes It’ and French actually read both roles. I was blown away by his readings – I mean, these were cold readings of a rough draft, and he was beyond incredible.”
Upon hearing the plot, one might first assume the affable Stewart would be cast as the “Good Bob,” not the adversary. It’s an assumption the actor made himself. “Tracie told me she wanted me to play Bob in the film and I thought, ‘Oh, nice, the good Bob is great.’ Then she corrected me and said, ‘No, I want you to be the bad Bob.’” The actor didn’t hesitate. “I immediately thought it was cool because you don’t get these scripts and these parts that often.”
Laymon admits she enjoys casting actors against type, but she went to bat to hire Stewart, despite some pushback. “In a way, French had been put in his own kind of box,” she notes. “However, I had seen him on stage and in my writing group and was blown away by his versatility and nuance. Some people wanted to go for low hanging fruit and cast the most ‘obvious’ choices rather than seeing something new and fresh in giving this incredible veteran actor a much-deserved chance to shine in a new way.” And it’s paid off; Laymon notes that several people are surprised to see his name in the end credits and even more shocked to realize that the grizzled man sporting scruffy stubble is Stewart.
Stewart, who has been acting in film and TV since 1992’s “The New WKRP in Cincinnati,” has a healthy outlook on having to prove himself again and again. He began his career in dramatic films like “Leaving Las Vegas” and “Stargate” – though he says it was a little-seen indie film called “Glory Daze” where he first learned to act in front of a camera, thanks to his co-star Alyssa Milano. “She was so smart and asked such good questions. She really took the time to explain to me how everything works on a set and what each term meant and who did what job,” he notes. “I owe a lot to Alyssa Milano, she gave me a skill set that still stands up.”
But it was his comedic work in “3rd Rock” that turned him into a household name. A true sign he’d made it – he was regularly portrayed by Jimmy Fallon in “Celebrity Jeopardy” sketches on “Saturday Night Live.” (This parody became so ingrained that when real “Jeopardy” host Alex Trebek passed away, Stewart was flooded with condolences.) But when the show came to an end in 2001, he was prepared for a down shift in his career. Or, as he bluntly puts it: “I had to go to TV jail for a while.”
Stewart wasn’t caught off guard. He had asked an agent what he could expect after the show came to an end. “I was told, ‘If you’re in a big movie, you can play a smaller supporting idiot. And if you’re in a small movie, you can play a lead idiot,’” Stewart recalls. “‘And if you go to stage, you can be King Lear.’ And that proved to be true for a while.”
Stewart didn’t play Lear, but he did portray his idol in “Stoneface: The Rise and Fall and Rise of Buster Keaton,” an award-winning play penned by his wife as a gift. Other notable roles included a lengthy run in L.A. and Chicago opposite Laurie Metcalfe in Justin Tanner’s raucous comedy “Voice Lessons” and dramatic turns in in shows like “Tesla: A Radio Play for the Stage.”
He was still able to show his range on the big screen: after playing the titular hero in 2003’s “Inspector Gadget 2,” he portrayed a corrupt cop in Jennifer Lynch’s 2008 thriller “Surveillance.” He came close on booking some big roles – and again, took it all in stride. Of finding out Stanely Tucci had won a role over him, he says, “Look, I get it. If I was casting ‘The French Stewart Story’ and I had a choice between me and Stanely Tucci, I’d pick Stanley Tucci.”
He also began to break out of typecasting in television, with roles like the sadistic Chef Rudy in the sitcom “Mom.” More recently, he’s been seen in some unsavory parts: the abusive foster father in “Will Trent,” a psychotic teacher on “Deadly Class,” a Hannibal Lecter-esque serial killer on “NCIS.” Jokes the actor, “If it’s a comedy, I play vice principals. If it’s a drama, I play pedophiles. Either way, it’s the same sweater vest.”
Bob Trevino is a different kind of villain, made all the more real by the fact that he believes he’s the victim. “The tricky thing is playing him as a person who is the hero of his own story,” Stewart observes. He drew from several people for the part, including his real-life father, but soon realized how universal the character was. “The more you play a part like this, the more you realize there’s an abundance of fathers like this. And Tracie and I wanted to go out of our way not to judge him.”
The film shot quickly on an indie budget in Kentucky in 2023 but despite the tight schedule, Stewart says it was a joy. The most challenging part, he says, was being cruel to his onscreen daughter. “Barbie Ferreira is a magical human being,” he says. “And once you get to know her and you have to say these horrible things to this wonderful person, it’s the hardest thing.” And though they don’t share scenes, he has similar kind words about Leguizamo as the other Bob Trevino, comparing him to his “3rd Rock” co-star. “I’m a big believer that the star sets the tone for everyone, and I’ve been lucky that way,” he notes. “John Lithgow was so magnanimous and level and nice. And everything is easy because if John Lithgow was okay, what are you going to complain about?”
As for the future, Stewart has already filmed a role in the upcoming film “Killing Mary Sue” and there’s potential for his character to return to “Chicago Med.” But he’s not worrying about the future, choosing to enjoy the present and showing “Bob Trevino” to the world. “I love this movie. It doesn’t have superheroes, it doesn’t have wizards. It’s just a quiet little movie about found family that’s so positive and redemptive,” he raves. “And I love that for a few weeks you can see it in an actual theater and share that experience with others.”
