Michael J. Fox goes legal in return to ABC

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Actor Michael J. Fox, who gave up
the TV sitcom “Spin City” five years ago to focus his battle on
Parkinson’s disease, will return to ABC later this season as a
guest star on the courtroom drama “Boston Legal.”

Fox will play a corporate executive who suffers from lung
cancer and is represented by the show’s fictional law firm of
Crane, Poole and Schmidt in a court case involving a promising
cancer-fighting drug, ABC said.

During the course of Fox’s three-episode stint on the show,
his character will become involved with attorney Denise Bauer,
played by series regular Julie Bowen.

“Boston Legal,” from veteran TV producer David E. Kelley,
stars James Spader and William Shatner as a couple of
unorthodox trial lawyers. Both won Emmy awards last month for
their performances on the show.

Fox, 44, who sprang to fame in the 1980s sitcom “Family
Ties” and the time-travel adventure film “Back to the Future,”
was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease while starring as Deputy
Mayor Michael Flaherty on the ABC comedy “Spin City.”

He left the show at the end of its fourth season in May of
2000 but returned for a handful of guest appearances in the
fall of 2001. He also did a couple of guest spots on the NBC
hospital comedy “Scrubs” last year.

Fox is not the only TV veteran coming out of
semi-retirement for a brief return to prime time.

Adam West, who starred as the Caped Crusader on ABC’s 1960s
“Batman” series, will guest star as himself on an upcoming
superhero-themed episode of the CBS sitcom “The King of
Queens.”

And in another odd bit of TV casting, former U.S. Secretary
of State Madeleine Albright will appear next Tuesday (October
25) on an episode of the WB comedy “Gilmore Girls.”

Meanwhile, on daytime television, actor-musician Rick
Springfield will return to the ABC soap opera “General
Hospital” as Dr. Noah Drake, the role he originated 25 years
ago.

Reuters/VNU