Josh Charles makes articulate, competitive men worth watching by leaving some doubt about how decent they are. We rate him most highly when he trusts the part enough to forgo charm, as his bluntly unpleasant work in We Own This City shows.
Fi1m perspective
Daniel Hersl hits people because he can, and Josh Charles plays him as though the habit barely merits his attention. In David Simon and George Pelecanos’s We Own This City (2022), Charles refuses to make the man interesting, which is the right decision. We were repelled by Hersl because the violence seems so routine to the man committing it. Charles does not soften him with charm or ask us to search for hidden depths. It is a disciplined, unshowy performance.
The earlier work offers a less abrasive introduction. Charles plays Knox Overstreet in Peter Weir’s Dead Poets Society (1989), whose young cast helps earn the sentiment even when the moral lessons are too tidy. Television then gave him Dan Rydell, a lead role in Aaron Sorkin’s Sports Night (1998–2000). That role points towards the articulate, competitive professionals who recur in his work, men accustomed to having something to say and expecting to be heard.
Robert and Michelle King’s The Good Wife (2009) makes better use of his charm. As Will Gardner, Charles is Alicia’s law-school friend, who hires her and would like their connection to become something more. His combination of boyish appeal and underlying intensity suits a man whose professional generosity has a personal complication. We can see why Alicia might welcome him without needing to mistake him for someone free of self-interest. It is a good use of Charles’s ability to make a capable, pleasant man slightly harder to take at face value.
Our enthusiasm for The Good Wife rests first on Margulies, and the last two seasons wobble; Charles is part of a well-cast firm rather than its sole attraction. He also directed three episodes of the series. Hersl offers the harsher test of the same interest in men with authority, and Charles’s plainness helps We Own This City even when its timelines tangle and its dialogue becomes speeches. He need not be given a sympathetic role to be worth following. Start with Will Gardner; Daniel Hersl is less suitable company for a restful evening.
Biography
Joshua Aaron Charles (born 15 September 1971) is an American actor. Born in Baltimore, Maryland, he began performing comedy at the age of nine and attended the Baltimore School for the Arts. As a teenager he spent several summers at the Stagedoor Manor Performing Arts Center in New York.
Charles made his screen debut in John Waters' Hairspray (1988). The following year he played Knox Overstreet in Dead Poets Society (1989). He is known for his role as Dan Rydell in the series Sports Night (1998–2000) and as Will Gardner in The Good Wife (2009–2016), for which he received two Primetime Emmy Award nominations.
