Source: Entertainment Weekly

In the case of Bosch actor Jerry O’Donnell, art doesn’t just imitate life, it presages it.

The 65-year-old actor, who has also appeared on series like Mad Men and The Young and the Restless, has taken his numerous law enforcement roles to heart to become a real-life cop.

Now relocated to North Carolina, O’Donnell has officially become a trainee with the Asheville Police Department, pending full-fledged officer status after completing Basic Law Enforcement Training, passing a state test, and months of field training.

“I feel blessed and grateful to still have some ability, so you know, that’s like a sense of purpose — to be of service,” O’Donnell told the Asheville Watchdog last month.

65-year-old Dexter actor Jerry O’Donnell is a police trainee in real-life Rookie story

“When we do PT, we go on these runs in the parking garage — you run up, run down, run the parking garage,” O’Donnell shared, reflecting on his training in progress. “And then you do exercises — 15 air squats, run up another level. Do 50 push-ups, run up another level. Do 50 burpees.”

Despite enjoying a full, decades-long career in show business, O’Donnell said the career he’s currently preparing to segue into at retirement age has given him a deeper sense of fulfillment.

“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.”

O’Donnell may be new to the police force, but he isn’t new to combat training, according to the Asheville Watchdog. He previously spent four years in the U.S. Army’s 82nd Airborne Division, but caught the acting bug after landing the lead role in a college play. O’Donnell then caught the attention of famed acting teacher Uta Hagen, with whom he studied, and then a West Coast talent agent, with whom he signed, and moved to Hollywood to pursue acting.

The former actor’s big break came in 1998, when he landed a role spanning 18 episodes across three seasons of The Young and the Restless. A part on the soap’s sister series, The Bold and the Beautiful, followed over a decade later, and in the meantime, O’Donnell crafted a specialty in playing tough yet righteous law enforcement officers.

Some of O’Donnell’s notable screen roles include an appearance on a season 4 episode of Dexter in which he delivers a flash drive containing information on a victim of the so-called “Vacation Murderers” to Davis Zayas’ Sgt. Angel Batista. He also appeared as an officer of the law on three of the most beloved procedurals of the past two decades: NYPD Blue, JAG, and its spinoff, NCIS. On four episodes of Mad Men, O’Donnell played star Elisabeth Moss’ brother-in-law, Gerry Respola.

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