Bell Curve: Coby Bell talks The Game, Burn Notice and a few of his favorite things

By April MacIntyre Jul 2, 2011, 20:10 GMT

Bell\'s lucky number is "5" this year as his work on the 5th season of USA Network’s “Burn Notice” (premiered June 23, 2011 - Thursday 9/8C) has him returning as Jesse Porter, the smooth operator counter intelligence expert playing opposite Jeffrey Donovan (Michael), Bruce Campbell (Sam) and Gabrielle Anwar (Fiona).

One of my favorites on the smallscreen is Coby Bell, the wildcard on "Burn Notice," and the charismatic cad of "The Game."

Bell is as well-rounded as they get: Doting dad and family man, athletic and an accomplished musician, actor and comedy player to boot. 

Bell's lucky number is "5" this year as his work on the 5th season of USA Network’s “Burn Notice” (premiered June 23, 2011 - Thursday 9/8C)  has him returning as Jesse Porter, the smooth operator counter intelligence expert playing opposite Jeffrey Donovan (Michael), Bruce Campbell (Sam) and Gabrielle Anwar (Fiona).

Bell is also “Jason Pitts”, an NFL player and unfaithful husband to blonde trophy wife Brittany Daniels on BET's 5th season of “The Game” which debuted last 4th season to 7.7 million viewers to become the cable network's biggest audience.

In addition to acting in “The Game,” Bell co-wrote and performed a song/dance called “Dip & Pitts” a track complete with silly lyrics and dance that premiered on the show in January.  The song quickly became a viral sensation.

Bell is from an entertainment family, his dad is Broadway veteran, Michel Bell.

When not in Miami or Atlanta filming 'Burn Notice' or 'The Game', Bell has a busy home life in California with two sets of twins; 7-year-old girls and a 2-year-old boy and girl.  The busy dad of four is also putting his creative efforts into writing and producing music. A total SoCal dude, Coby enjoys surfing, basketball and serves as a mentor to underprivileged youths with the Big Brothers of America.

I spoke to Coby this week about his work on USA's 'Burn Notice' and BET's 'The Game':

Monsters & Critics: Are you in Miami right now with Burn Notice?

Coby Bell: I am in Miami right now, yeah. And I actually have my family out here this week visiting so it's awesome.

M&C: How much fun is that? The beaches are so gorgeous there. Your kids going cuckoo?

CB: Yeah, yeah, we're having a lot of fun, a lot of fun.
We have a bit of a rough time getting out here. We had some miscommunication with the ticketing and we showed up on Sunday to come here and the flight was Saturday.

It was bad. It was really bad. But I had to get here the next morning to work. So I have four kids, I have two two-year olds and two eight-year olds and so we had to redeye, we had to get on the 11:30, and as you can imagine, that was loads of fun.
But yeah I mean, We're having a blast.

M&C: This is going to be an interesting season for your character. The fans kind of went nuts when your character on Burn Notice sort of had designs on Gabriel Anwar's character because nobody can mess with the Jeffrey Donovan-Gabrielle Anwar love dynamic on that show.

CB: Right, right.

M&C: I'm wondering if you can give fans of the show just a little taste of what we can expect for Season 5? And gosh, any great anecdotes, I'm sure with Bruce Campbell on set, you got a million of them.

CB: You know what's funny on the set because Jesse and Sam are going to have a love scene this season.

[laughter]

CB: See how the fans like that.

[laughter]

M&C: Oh, okay. Well this is going to be fun.

[laughter]

M&C: Any insight as to what your character Jesse is going to be up to, this season? What we can look forward to.

CB: Well, I'm actually having a lot of fun this season. Last season was great but last season was more... Jesse's life being ruined and then him trying to figure out how his life got ruined and he's getting kind of grumpy a lot and brooding.

And then finally he figures out that it was Michael Westen who did it on accident and so he's pissed off with him for a little while.

And in this season... So he finally makes peace with that, and in this season, he got his job back with the government but he decided he just couldn't do it anymore because he really enjoyed this kind of cutting off the middle man and cut right to the chase and just busting the bad guys with no red tape, with the way Michael Westen does it.

So he comes back to Miami and he's... In this season the audience kind of really get to know who Jesse is. He is a lot happier, joking around more, just lighter. And it's great. The writers are giving me some serious stuff to do and some bad-ass stuff to do but also some funny stuff to do so I'm having a lot fun.

M&C : Oh, intriguing. Now let me ask you something. Sharon Gless' character, Maddy, are you going to have any interactions with her this season?

CB: Not as much. This far, not as much because Jesse doesn't live in Maddy's garage anymore. Because Jesse has an actual job this season.

He works for this private security firm. So he's actually like the best-paid person on the show now. He has a Porsche... I think he's the only one that actually makes money, that has a job that makes money.

He doesn't want to just kind of live off Michael's yogurt. So yeah it's Jesse's... He's looking kind of fancy this season. He got his suits and his Porsche and the whole thing.

M&C: Sam, Bruce Campbell's character, does anything interesting happen between your character and his this season?

CB: No, I mean, we're just working together. We have a scene where we get to fight... We had a fight scene with The Big Show, the wrestler from WWE. And the guy's like 7 feet tall, I don't know how much he weighs, he's got to be close to 500 pounds.

And yeah, he whooped us up pretty good. I mean he whooped the stuntman pretty good. The stuntman made it look really good. But that was a lot of fun. He was a good dude. Big Show is a really good dude.

Sometimes Jesse and Sam would be off doing something while Mike and Fi are off doing something else and then they'll switch it up where Jesse with Fi, and then Jesse with Michael, you know they just kind of switch it up.

M&C: You shoot The Game in Atlanta and you shoot Burn Notice show in Miami. You're a West Coast based person, you're a California man. If you had a Sophie's Choice of where you would relocate your family, will it be Atlanta or Miami?

CB: Oh man, that's a tough one.

M&C: Be honest.

CB: That is a tough one. Well, I don't know. I mean, if I had to choose between the two, I would probably do Miami just because I know it better.

I spent six months of the year here and last year, I only did like two, two and a half months in Atlanta, so I don't really know Atlanta that well yet. So I guess right now if I had to choose, yeah, I would choose where I am, Coconut Grove is where I am right now and I really like the Grove.

M&C: So, I want to continue on this little theme. Miami is one of my favorite cities and I'm just wondering, Burn Notice, do you think that the show wouldn't work as well if it wasn't located in the city? To me, the location actually serves as sort of kind a character. Do you think that Burn Notice wouldn't be as successful?

CB: I agree with you. I think Miami is definitely a character on a show. It does so much for setting the tone of the show. Just the colors, the beautiful people walking around, it's always sunny. I would imagine it makes somebody watching the show somewhere in Siberia just go, "Wow," and like, "Miami must be the nicest place on earth."

I mean, I don't know if the show airs in Siberia but if it does.
But yeah, I totally agree with you. Miami, there's no place like it. It is a beautiful city.

M&C: Now, on The Game, you had a viral video that went to crazy huge - that Dip & Pitts thing, where you kind of do these goofy lyrics and you did this dance, and so talk about that and how that came to be.  Could just kind of give a little insight onto how that came to be?

CB: That was insane. It was just one of the jokes early in the season. My character Jason had talked about when he retired, nobody was giving him love and nobody made a big deal, that he didn't have a parade, and no one remembers like everything he is giving to the city.

You know the championship and the one thing that he mentions is the Dip and Pitts or the Pittsy Shuffle which is a song I guess that he came out with when he was like a rookie. You know how some of those football players come out with songs.

So, that was just one of the jokes in one of the episodes, it was kind of like a recurring joke and then there was one episode that was short on time.

It was like three minutes or four minutes short, so one of our executive producers came to me and said, "All right, we're going to add the Dip & Pitts to the end of this episode." [laughter] And I was like, "Hell yes, we are. That's got to be great!"

So, first he wanted to make it... Like he wanted to do like a Dip and Pitts video like from whenever it was, 1997 whenever Jason first came into the league. And then we very quickly found out that would cost too much money so he decided to have Jason make the remix of the song, the 2011 remix, and he wrote the scene and when I read it, I was just laughing out loud and he put me up on that stage with Chris Webber and we just went for it.

I went into the studio like a couple of weeks before we did it. I hooked up with this... Our music producer's name is Tank, so we did the song. And we knew it was funny. We knew it was funny and we were laughing at it and stuff and then the day we did it, we were all laughing and having fun, "Yeah, this is going to be funny," but we had no idea that it would do what it did. But like you said, the YouTube thing. People were playing it in the clubs and on the radio. It was just insane. It was really insane.

Just yesterday, I was walking around with my family at one of these malls here in Miami, and this woman that works in the mall, she's like "Do the Dip & Pitts! Do the Dip & Pitts!" I was like, "Nah, not right now."

[laughter]

CB: Like, "Not while I'm pushing a stroller, please." You know?

[laughter]

M&C: Alright I'm going to CNN John King you here. Just answer the quickest thing that comes to your mind.

CB: I'm so bad at that. I'm so bad at that. Okay, go ahead.

M&C: Favorite football team?

CB: San Diego Sabers.

M&C: Favorite baseball team?

CB: Angels. Sorry, oh sorry. The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim which makes no sense.

[laughter]

Anaheim is not in Los Angeles and angers me that they changed the name.

M&C: Favorite restaurant in Miami?

CB: Oh, it's a tie between Jaguar Café and The Forge.

M&C: Okay, favorite children's programming that you have to watch with your kids?

CB: The Backyardigans hands down, walking away, not even a question about it, the Backyardigans are the best thing ever.

M&C: What about for adult dramas on TV for you and your wife, what do you love? What's your favorite drama?

CB: I don't really watch any drama so I'm going to say Burn Notice.  Seriously, I mean, it's not even a full on drama, it's kind of an action drama... Action dramedy, but yeah, I don't really... There's so much drama in the world that when I go home and turn on the TV I don't really want to watch anybody getting murdered and anything like that.

M&C: I hear you. Okay San Diego, what's the wonderful thing that people need to check out when they visit San Diego from your experience?

CB: Encinitas. Encinitas is in San Diego County and that used to be one of my favorite places to go and surf. Encinitas was great.
Encinitas and the La Costa resort is right there.

M&C: Favorite quality about your wife that attracted you to her?

CB: Oh man, well there's too many to name. I mean, obviously she's beautiful and she's one of the sweetest people I've ever met, but you know what when we were first hanging out we were at the grocery store and the person walking in front of her was like getting some cereal and this person knocked down a couple of cereals and then just kept on walking.

Then my wife, my then girlfriend, picked them up and put them back and I was like, "Alright she is the one. She is the one."