Military TV, Television - Military Times

Messing’s starting over in ‘Starter Wife’

NEW YORK — Last spring, Debra Messing endured a searing breakup, one that flattened her for two full days.

“I was devastated. I was numb and confused,” the actress says over tea at the Mercer Hotel in Manhattan. “It was just such an emotionally overwhelming thing.”

She’s talking about her last day playing ditzy, droll interior decorator Grace Adler on NBC’s groundbreaking hit “Will & Grace,” which ended its eight-season run last May. But Messing could just as easily be referring to her latest character, plucky divorcie Molly in the six-hour telefilm “The Starter Wife,” premiering tonight (USA, 9 ET/PT).

Like Messing, Molly grapples with momentous changes. Messing went from being one of NBC’s Emmy-winning shining stars to unemployed actress. Molly learns, via a phone call, that her Hollywood-studio-head husband is dumping her.

“Change is scary. You see that in “The Starter Wife,” and I experienced it with “Will & Grace.” It’s interesting to me that Molly doesn’t crawl into bed,” Messing says. “I didn’t get out of bed for two days. I slept. I didn’t do anything.”

And although Messing, 38, is happily married to screenwriter Daniel Zelman and is the mother of son Roman, 3, she can relate to Molly’s turmoil.

“Molly and I were going through an incredibly similar experience,” Messing says. “Will & Grace” was an eight-year marriage, and it ended. I didn’t know what I should do next, what I could do next or what I wanted to do next. For eight years, I wasn’t allowed to ask those questions.”

Don’t expect Grace Adler’s madcap energy and zany sensibility from the actress, who in person is crisp, businesslike and focused. She’s well-read, and to maximize her time, she devours books, such as Orhan Pamuk’s “Snow,” “that have a seal on the cover that either says Nobel Prize or the Booker Prize,” she says. About the only goofiness on display comes courtesy of her cellphone ringtones: the themes from “Taxi” and “The Price Is Right.”

“I’ve spent my life trying to be cool and realizing that I’ve been a 95-year-old nerd since I was 12,” she says, cracking one of just a few smiles.

Now that she’s not sharing a spacious pad with Will Truman on the Upper West Side, Messing calls herself “a dancing monkey. I’m an actress for hire. I’m not a writer. I’m just waiting for the person to say, ‘Debra, you’re the person to do this.’ ”

Despite recent supporting turns in feature films (Curtis Hanson’s” Lucky You” and Ed Burns’ “Purple Violets”), she’s not angling to go back to work right away.

“I have a very full personal life that fulfills me in a way that nothing else can,” Messing says. “Having flexibility right now is something I’m enjoying. For eight years, I had a very structured life. Now, I can go wherever I want, whenever I want.”

On a typical day, she wakes up with her son, puts him down for a nap, takes him to the park, makes dinner and gives him a bath.

“We get into pajamas and snuggle and watch ‘Mary Poppins,’ ” she says. “The only thing I would add to my day to make it better is more hours, so I could spend an hour reading by myself and an extra hour to sleep. And some more dates with my husband.”