Busking with ‘Bull’: Michael Weatherly goes underground

On a sweltering September morning, Michael Weatherly, former “NCIS” star, pauses near the entrance of the Bedford Avenue L train station and explains that the hardest part of playing guitar on the subway is opening up the case to accept tips from passing commuters.

“It’s the admission that you are, in fact, about to play guitar.” (And that you hope riders might toss you some spare change.)

Weatherly should know. As an aspiring actor in New York in the early ’90s, he turned to busking after getting fired in quick succession from two restaurant jobs — once because he failed to open an expensive bottle of wine at the table and a second time because he tried to pass off a drip coffee with whipped cream as a cappuccino.

Boyishly handsome at 48, Weatherly doesn’t currently look like a man who recently left the most-watched drama on network television; he’s more like your average Brooklyn Cool Dad in a vintage Police T-shirt, jeans and gray New Balances.

The new shows you’ll be watching this fall »

Beginning Tuesday, viewers can see a more buttoned-up version of the actor as the title character in “Bull,” a CBS legal drama very loosely inspired by Dr. Phil McGraw’s pre-talk show career.

But reminiscing about his ill-fated waiter days, he jokes, “I think a notice went out to all restaurants: Do not hire this man. My only recourse was to go play guitar in the subway.”

Back then, he’d perform for three hours or so, usually at stations in downtown Manhattan, like W. 4th Street or Christopher St., during the evening rush hour. (He discovered quickly that people didn’t really want to hear music in the morning.) It gave him a chance to make a few dollars and sing as loudly as he wanted — something he couldn’t do in his apartment.

Weatherly tailored his set list to the city’s prevailing mood. “If everyone seemed a little bummed out, maybe the Dow dropped, maybe [the Police’s] ‘Message In a Bottle’ was appropriate. Something upbeat if it was a Thursday or a Friday, heading into the weekend, maybe [Paul Simon’s] ‘Me And Julio Down By the Schoolyard.’ If it was a lot of couples on a weekend, I’d sing Joe Jackson’s ‘Is She Really Going Out With Him’ and that would get a laugh.”

Though he surely doesn’t need the spare change these days, Weatherly has gamely agreed to try busking once again, a quarter of a century after his first major career break, a guest spot on “The Cosby Show,” helped eliminate the need for a day job.

His life has changed considerably in the intervening years, 13 of which were spent playing wisecracking Special Agent Tony DiNozzo on “NCIS.”

The Connecticut native’s grueling production schedule means he can’t be too selective about when or where he chooses to perform. And so he’s landed at the Bedford Avenue stop, a short van ride away from the Mexican restaurant where “Bull” is filming this morning, where the locals are known more for cool indifference than exuberant displays of generosity.

×

“Don’t worry, I don’t know what I’m doing,” jokes Weatherly, guitar case slung over his shoulder as he passed tentatively through the turnstile. “It’s only been 25 years.”

Descending the stairs, he sets up shop near a security booth on the single, narrow platform.

The last stop before Manhattan, Bedford Avenue is one of the most congested stations in the borough. Even during the late-morning lull, foot traffic is brisk. As commuters breeze past, Weatherly leans over, removes the laces from his sneakers, then ties them together to create an improvised guitar strap.

“This is the vintage experience, where you’re so broke you can’t afford … ,” he trails off mid-sentence, distracted by the sounds of another musician strumming away on his guitar just down the platform.

At the actor’s suggestion, a publicist slips the man a $20 bill in exchange for a few minutes of silence.

Back in his day, Weatherly managed to avoid getting mugged or otherwise harassed, but he did have an “extraordinary experience” with a homeless man who approached him with an idea. Together, they sang “Free Fallin’” by Tom Petty from opposite ends of the platform to create a stereo effect. “We started doing this little act we would do together for a few months, then he disappeared,” he remembers.

Weatherly is just about to start playing when he’s delayed yet again, by the arrival of a train on the Manhattan-bound track. Ever the seasoned professional, he waits patiently for the train to depart before he begins banging out the jangly, staccato opening notes to “Psycho Killer,” by Talking Heads. From there he moves on to something a little more cheerful, the aforementioned “Me And Julio Down By the Schoolyard.”

“Well, I’m on my way, I don’t know where I’m goin’,” Weatherly belts out, his pleasantly raspy voice reverberating throughout the station as middle-aged women on opposite sides of the platform record him on their iPhones. One woman in a red T-shirt nods her head bashfully when asked if she’s an “NCIS” fan. Others, perhaps too distracted by the stifling subterranean humidity, walk by without so much as turning their heads.

In fact, no one approaches Weatherly during his set — but then again, Williamsburg isn’t exactly a hotbed of “NCIS” fandom.

Michael Weatherly goes from ‘NCIS’ into the world of Dr. Phil on ‘Bull’ »

Pausing once again for an incoming train, Weatherly plays a few verses of “Is She Really Going Out With Him” and “Message In a Bottle.” To conclude the impromptu gig, Weatherly opts for a slightly lesser-known gem, Michael Penn’s “No Myth,” a hit from his original busking era.

Weatherly’s haul for the day? A grand total of 25 cents, 1/12th the cost of a single subway ride. “I’m glad the acting thing worked out,” he says.

Luckily, he doesn’t have to rely on his busking income, at least not as long as “Bull,” which has been given the plum time slot following “NCIS,” stays on the air and DiNozzo lives on in syndication around the world.

Back above ground, the actor finds a shady place to wait for the van that will take him back to set. “It’s a little like Rip Van Winkle. I left for L.A. 20 years ago to go on an audition and 20 years later I’m back in New York. So it’s very weird,” he says.

A few minutes later, he’s back in his air-conditioned trailer, listening to Talking Heads as he talks about “Bull,” in which he plays a New York trial consultant with a near-psychic ability to understand the psychology of prospective jurors.

The series is executive produced by McGraw, who founded a trial-consulting firm and famously advised Oprah Winfrey when she was sued by a group of Texas cattle ranchers in the ’90s. But Weatherly is not playing a young Dr. Phil, a misconception he’s had to dispel — more than once.

“I told my niece I was doing the pilot. And she said, ‘Oh, the Dr. Phil thing?’ That’s what everybody thinks it is. Or they just think it’s ‘NCIS’ without guns.”

“Bull” marks his first lead role in a drama after years spent as “a professional No. 2.”

Weatherly, who is married with three kids — including two under the age of 5 — felt he’d simply outgrown DiNozzo. “How many more years did I have of running around saying, ‘Alright boss!’? Then suddenly it’s like you’re Bob Denver on ‘Gilligan’s Island’ with silver hair.”

Having spent so long as the goofball DiNozzo, Weatherly was ready to play “someone who had an interior world that was rich and dark and unknowable,” he says. Still, he clearly shares his former counterpart’s propensity for a pithy quip.

Case in point: Weatherly notes that his “NCIS” swan song easily beat Megyn Kelly’s much-hyped interview with Donald Trump “because every Republican in the country was watching ‘NCIS’” and “you don’t release ‘Star Wars’ and ‘Avatar’ on the same day.”

He also likens the move from “NCIS” to “Bull” to Harrison Ford’s transition from Han Solo to Indiana Jones in a way that comes off as much more modest than it might seem.

While on “NCIS,” Weatherly recorded songs for the show’s soundtrack, a feat he’s not likely to repeat soon on “Bull.” Between his long hours on set and weekend trips to California to see his family, Weatherly doesn’t have much free time for playing music.

Then again, the next jam session is only as far as the next subway station.

‘Bull’

Where: CBS

When: 9 p.m. Tuesday

Follow me @MeredithBlake