Sedgwick Is No Miss Congeniality

Kyra Sedgwick is best known for her work on stage and screen. Now she brings her talents to series television, playing a quirky deputy police chief adjusting to her new job in the new TNT drama series "The Closer."

On The Early Show, Sedgwick describes her character, Brenda Leigh Johnson, as a fish out of water; very good at her job but not so great at managing her personal life.

"I'm having the time of my life. She's a fantastic character," Sedgwick says, "I guess a Lucille Ball and Al Pacino and everything. She can encompass so many different characters."

Johnson is an Atlanta police detective who transfers to Los Angeles to head up a special task force of the LAPD. Her job is to handle high-profile murder cases. But the southern-trained cop has a tough personality that often rubs her predominantly male colleagues the wrong way.

"She's trying to manage it all. I think it's hard to be a woman in America now," Sedgwick notes, "I think we struggle. We have a lot that's expected of us. We're supposed to be beautiful and yet we're supposed to be strong. We're supposed to somehow manage our personal life as well as work environment. And I think you're supposed to look a certain way. Be a certain weight. Have everything sort of together. It is impossible."

Sedgwick says that, as far as she's concerned, it is important that women relate to Brenda who is "struggling with all of these things that are falling apart in the midst of it, yet really being good at her job."

As for her own personal life, the native New Yorker says her husband, Kevin Bacon, is very supportive. He takes the role of stay-at-home dad while she works in L.A. They have two children, Travis and Sosie Ruth.

The season premiere of "The Closer" is Monday, June 13 at 9 p.m. ET/8 p.m. Central on TNT.

Fast Facts about Kyra Sedgwick:

• Born in New York, N. Y., Aug. 19, 1965
• Sedgwick attended Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, N.Y. She left after one semester there. She then finished up at University of Southern California in Los Angeles, where she earned a degree in theater
• Sedgwick began her career at 15 on stage and then on the NBC daytime drama "Another World."
• In 1985, Sedgwick made her Hollywood debut as a Polish woman whose romance is interrupted by World War II in "War and Love" She also starred in "Cindy Eller: a Modern Fairy Tale" television movie
• the year 1988 was a big one for Sedgwick. Not only did she marry actor Kevin Bacon, she also starred opposite Matt Dillon in "Kansas." Sedgwick's big break also came in 1988 as well, while performing in a revival of Eugene O'Neill's "Ah Wilderness" which was an award-winning Broadway performance.
• The year 1989 held another breakthrough performance for Sedgwick, as Donna, Tom Cruise's girlfriend who undergoes a radical transformation, in Stone's "Born on the Fourth of July."
• In 1990, Sedgwick played the rebellious daughter of Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward in James Ivory's "Mr. & Mrs. Bridges." Two years later, Sedgwick starred in "Miss Rose White," which was that years "Hallmark Hall of Fame" presentation.
• In 1995, Sedgwick performed in Lasse Hallstroms's "Something to Talk About," opposite Julia Roberts, as her tart-tongued sister.
• In 1998, Sedgwick served as associate producer and star of "Montana."
• In 2002, Sedgwick had her next big role in "Just a Kiss," a romantic comedy about people in their 30s struggling with relationships. Sedgwick also starred in "Behind the Red Door," opposite Keifer Sutherland, as angry sister of an AIDS-infected designer.
• In 2003, Sedgwick starred in CBS judicial drama "Queens Supreme."
• In 2004, she co-starred with her husband in "The Woodsman."