From TV Detective to Real-Life Rookie: 65-Year-Old Bosch Star Joins the Force
At 65, Bosch and Mad Men alum Jerry O’Donnell is swapping sets for squad cars, entering police training in North Carolina as he trades scripts for service.
File this under career pivots you do not see every day: Jerry O'Donnell, 65, who you might know from Bosch, Mad Men, and The Young and the Restless, is putting down scripts and picking up a badge. He is now an official trainee with the Asheville Police Department in North Carolina.
From playing one on TV to actually doing it
O'Donnell has joined the Asheville Police Department as a recruit and is working through the real deal: Basic Law Enforcement Training, then the state exam, and months of fieldwork before he can pin on a badge. He told local outlet Asheville Watchdog he is grateful to still have the ability to serve and that the job gives him purpose. In other words, this is not a publicity stunt; he is doing the full grind.
The training is no joke
He is not easing into it either. The workouts are the kind that chew you up: stairwells and parking garages, running up and down levels with bodyweight drills in between. Think 15 air squats at one level, 50 push-ups at the next, and 50 burpees after that. Rinse, repeat, gasp. Sounds miserable. Also sounds like he is all-in.
"I always think when you slide into home at the end of your life, you want to be all used up... You know - dirty, scarred up, a little bloody, and spent."
Why this actually tracks
O'Donnell is not starting from zero. He spent four years in the Army's 82nd Airborne, which does a lot of the physical and mental prep for this line of work. And on screen, he has basically been auditioning for this for decades: nearly 50 credits since 1991, with a lot of cops and military types in the mix. Along with Bosch, Mad Men, and The Young and the Restless, he has popped up on SEAL Team, The Bold and the Beautiful, NYPD Blue, JAG, and NCIS. In hindsight, it kind of feels like he has been building to this.
So that is where he is now: trading call sheets for roll call. If he clears Basic Law Enforcement Training, passes the North Carolina state exam, and makes it through the months of field training, he graduates from TV cop to real rookie cop. And yes, at 65. Honestly, I did not see that coming either.