Roz Returns! Marsha Warfield Talks Surprise ‘Night Court’ Appearance
[Warning: The following contains MAJOR spoilers for the Night Court Season 1 finale.]
Roz is back! Outside of John Larroquette‘s series regular role, fans of the original Night Court have been wanting to see one of the original stars appear on the popular NBC reboot. Their wish was granted in the Night Court Season 1 finale when Marsha Warfield returned as Roz. But this time, she ditched the bailiff uniform and instead was the one facing the judge! That judge, to her chagrin, was Dan Fielding, with whom she shared many a memory at Manhattan’s night court.
Warfield showed up in the final moments of Season 1 Episode 16, “The Honorable Dan Fielding Part 2” (see the moment above). You can tell by the title that Larroquette’s curmudgeonly lawyer was promoted to the judge’s bench. The job took him away from the newly reinstated Abby Stone’s (Melissa Rauch) court and to New Orleans, where Roz was arrested for getting rowdy at a bachelorette party.
The cameo happened so fast that there wasn’t any time to resolve Roz’s case. She preferred being taken back to jail over dealing with Judge Fielding, which set the stage for Warfield possibly returning in Season 2 (the reboot was renewed shortly after its premiere).
TV Insider caught up with Warfield to talk about her surprise appearance in the Tuesday, May 9 finale and what it could mean for Night Court Season 2. The first thing she said about the episode? “Finally!”
Jordin Althaus/NBC/Warner Bros.
“We did this months ago,” she says. “I’ve been sitting on this, with people bombarding me with questions. ‘When are you gonna be on there? Are you gonna be on it? When are you gonna do the thing?’ I’m like, ‘I don’t know. They’re doing their own thing!’ And so I finally get to talk about it.”
Don’t ask her how the audience responded when she walked on stage that day. “You know, I have no idea” how they reacted, she admits. “I was so nervous. I don’t know. It was fun and exhilarating, and all that kind of good stuff, to be back, and rehearsals were great, but when the audience was there, the butterflies came back. I remember it being OK with everybody. Everybody was OK with the way it went, but in my head, all I could hear was my own heartbeat.”
“There’s no guarantee they’re going to recognize me out of uniform, years later as Roz,” she adds. “And so when they did, that was a relief. And when they laughed, that was a relief. But the pounding in my ears when I came out kind of precluded [it] and then drowned out the sound of the audience applause.”
Her surprise cameo came when the show simply “called and asked” her to appear. “I was fully on board as a cheerleader and a supporter of the show. It was fine with me to see what they did and how they did it and the direction that the show was gonna go in its own way,” Warfield explains. “And it still is. I think it has to and has found its own identity that audiences have picked up on, and new audiences embraced for what it is, not what it was.”
Seeing Larroquette again — and as a judge, no less — was a delight. “I thought he looked good” on the bench. “I thought he looked good, period! It was fun to see him smiling and happy. The only time I had seen him in the past few years was at the memorial [for their late Night Court co-star Harry Anderson], so it was nice to see him working again and being John, the John I’ve known.”
Warner Bros. Television / Courtesy: Everett Collection
Appearing out of uniform as this older Roz wasn’t weird for the actor, who’s still doing standup comedy outside of acting roles. “I was very comfortable with Roz being who she is now,” Warfield shares. “It would be kind of creepy if you went by your grandmother’s house and she had on hot pants [laughs] … I’m very happy that we get to catch up with her and get to rediscover her as she is now and not who she was back in the day.”
The key question: will Roz be returning in Season 2? “Absolutely,” Warfield confirms. “Yes, indeed. All questions will be answered. All will become clear. We’ll get to know who she is now, what she’s up to now, and get to enjoy that part. I did! I enjoyed the way they wrote the show that I got to perform in.”
Reconnecting with Dan is certainly an interesting prospect for future episodes (she first appeared in Season 4 of the original series and remained through Season 9). “We get to revisit the old relationship,” Warfield teases. “Dan and Roz had a very interesting, rather intimate relationship.”
“One of my first scenes I got to do on the [original] show was with Dan in the escalator with two sumo wrestlers, and he’s terrified. He’s so claustrophobic. I get to comfort him and tell him, ‘It’s gonna be OK. Just imagine yourself on a desert island, you’re drinking tropical drinks, and you’re naked.’ And he smiles and relaxes. That was pretty much the beginning of our relationship,” she continues. “He saved my life on a roof. I mean, we almost had an affair, so coming back into that intimate relationship comfortable, old, it’s like an ex that you just weren’t ready for back in the day. But now, when you see ’em, you really want to know how they’re doing. ‘You OK? Everything all right? Well, you, if you need a friend, give me a call.’ That kind of relationship was fun to do.”
In this reboot, LaCretta‘s Gurgs is the sole bailiff (the OG had Roz and Bull, played by Richard Moll). While LaCretta previously told TV Insider that she sees Gurgs as a combination of Roz and Bull, Warfield has been loving watching the actor create her own character.
“I thought she was doing her thing the way she sees fit, and I’m all for that,” Warfield shares. “I’m a big fan. I hope that — and I’ve told her I hope — this show does for her what it did for me, because it was life-changing. And I hope the audience accepts her for who she is and what she brings to the table. She’s very funny, and she’s very much not Roz. And that’s great. I’m happy for her. And like I said, I hope that she gets to enjoy the ride as much as I did.”
Catch up on Night Court Season 1 when the finale drops on Wednesday, May 10, on Peacock.
