8 ‘Good Wife’ & ‘Good Fight’ Characters Who Could Show up on ‘Elsbeth’
Elsbeth marks the return of a fan-favorite lawyer from The Good Wife and The Good Fight, with Carrie Preston’s Elsbeth Tascioni moving from Chicago to New York City to join the ranks of the NYPD as an outside observer. But so far, no series regular from either of those preceding shows have guest-starred on Elsbeth, and we think it’s time one of them did.
To be fair, Elsbeth showrunner Jonathan Tolins told TV Insider he “would love” to bring Good Wife and Good Fight characters to the show — but there are complicating factors. “I always think TV fans sometimes think of characters as crayons that you can just pick up and use,” he said. “But it’s like, there’s budget, there’s schedule, there’s lots of things going on. So it’s tricky.”
So if money and time weren’t an issue, here are the crayons, um, actors we’d love Elsbeth to reuse when it returns for the next season.
Alicia Florrick (Julianna Margulies)
The Good Fight practically set up The Good Wife’s lead character to pop up on Elsbeth, revealing that Alicia has her own law firm in New York City. After Elsbeth found herself in legal peril following the death of Judge Milton Crawford (Michael Emerson), our hero could certainly use a high-powered attorney on speed dial.
Cary Agos (Matt Czuchry)
Elsbeth mentioned Cary, another Lockhart/Gardner lawyer, as an also-ran for Elsbeth’s post as the Department of Justice’s consent decree observer at the NYPD. Should that responsibility ever be revoked — a distinct possibility considering her recent situation — Cary could be her interim replacement.
Kalinda Sharma (Archie Panjabi)
What happens when the NYPD’s investigations can only go so far? Elsbeth can use a burner phone to contact Kalinda, the Good Wife in-house investigator last seen fleeing Chicago after running afoul of drug lord Lemond Bishop (Mike Colter). Kalinda’s probably off the radar, but someone as dogged as Elsbeth could find her.
Diane Lockhart (Christine Baranski)
Lockhart, a supporting Good Wife character who became a Good Fight lead, left Chicago to run an all-female firm in D.C. in the latter show’s finale. Perhaps if Wagner (Wendell Pierce) has to go to the capital to answer to federal corruption charges, Diane could be the litigator on his side.
Eli Gold (Alan Cumming)
Or perhaps Wagner is able to get out from under the shadow of suspicion entirely and run for office. In that event, what more effective (and high-strung) campaign manager is there than Eli? And if a reappearance of Eli also means a reappearance of daughter Marissa (Sarah Steele), so much the better.
Lucca Quinn (Cush Jumbo)
OK, picture this: Elsbeth investigates when cosmetics billionaire Bianca Skye (Chasten Harmon) goes missing from her penthouse NYC apartment. And for reasons the Elsbeth writers can figure out, all fingers point to her CFO, whom we know from The Good Fight Season 5 is former lawyer Lucca!
Jay Dipersia (Nyambi Nyambi)
We know Nyambi has been very busy on Night Court nowadays, but we hope he can slot in a guest spot on Elsbeth to reprise his role as investigator-turned-activist Jay. Maybe the Collective, the secretive group that recruited Jay in The Good Fight, could swing into action when the NYPD wades into a police-brutality scandal.
Liz Reddick (Audra McDonald)
The Good Fight left Liz, one of Diane’s closest colleagues, running an expanded law firm that also includes STR Laurie’s offices in Dubai and London. We doubt that Liz has since become an 11-time Tony nominee like McDonald, but maybe we could see Elsbeth join Liz for a brainstorm session at an STR office in New York… which happens to be above a piano bar!
Watchlist Easy access to only the shows you care about — all in one simple place
Alerts Only important notifications — when a show is returning, when it becomes available to stream, and more.
Special Offers Exclusive products we release related to your favorite shows and streaming services