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RELATED LINKS

• Mr. Chavira's official site
• Lifetime TV's Anti-Violence Programming
• The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation
• Desperate Housewives
• Article on Mr. Chavira

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Tavis: Ricardo Antonio Chavira may have the best job in television. I'm jealous. He's on one of television's most watched shows, of course, "Desperate Housewives," and gets to play Eva Longoria's husband. This weekend, though, he's hosting a special lineup of programming on Lifetime aimed at raising awareness about domestic violence. More on that in a moment. First a scene from "Desperate Housewives."

Tavis: Ouch (laughter). Ricardo, nice to have you here.

Ricardo Antonio Chavira: Thank you very much.

Tavis: It's a pleasure to meet you. Did I overstate that or do you really have the best job in television?

Chavira: It's a pretty good job. You know, she and I get along very well. We're both from south Texas and the chemistry just kind of existed naturally. You know, I just feel very blessed.

Tavis: Take me back to when you first got a script, heard about this program, thought you might get a chance to play this role. Take me back a few months, back a couple of years now, I guess.

Chavira: Yeah. Well, we're in our second season. Yeah, almost two years, I guess. I had just gotten back from doing regional theater up in Seattle, Washington. I'd been back for like maybe about a week and a half, two weeks. A buddy of mine had actually gone in and auditioned for the role of Carlos. He told me, "It was like, yeah, I didn't get it, but, you know, you're perfect for this." I read the scenes and the scenes where Carlos was being a real jerk to Gabrielle and I'm like, okay, so I'm perfect for being a jerk is what you're saying (laughter). But I understood it because, for some reason, I can do those kinds of roles kind of well.

So I called my agents, my manager and the people that were upbringing me at the time got me in on the last day of auditions, on a Saturday morning, at like 10:30 in the morning and I was the last person that they saw.

Tavis: You come in on the last day.

Chavira: Last day, last person.

Tavis: And the last person they see.

Chavira: I went in, performed the two scenes and afterwards I kind of looked up and Marc Cherry was in the room sitting right there and he just had this look on his face like "Where have you been for the past three weeks?" I was like, okay, I think I might have a chance at this. Then I did the studio test on the following Monday and Tuesday, did the network test Wednesday morning and got the call on my cell phone that I had the job before I even got back home.

Tavis: All right. So there are two obvious questions here. You know the first one. Did you hook your boy up (laughter)?

Chavira: (Laughter) Yeah, I did.

Tavis: You and I would not be boys anymore. I said, "Antonio, what's up? I can't get a check, I can't get a gift."

Chavira: No, I'm taking good care of my boy, Lombardo, for sure, for sure.

Tavis: There you go. First, did your boy get taken care of? And second of all, it must have been a huge change. I love theater, but you go from not even Broadway, but regional theater in Seattle to like the hottest show on television like that.

Chavira: Yeah, yeah. You know, I'd worked in television before doing some different guest star spots in the years prior to even doing that regional theater gig up in Seattle. I had an idea that this show was going to do well, given the names that were attached and the kind of shade that went with those names. But after we shot the pilot and I guess about the month before we aired, they just did this huge kind of advertising campaign for our show.

You know, I'm driving around Los Angeles and we're on the sides of buses and bus stops and all over the place. I'm looking at this stuff going like, "Okay, we're either going to be really, really good or we're going to be really, really bad." There is no middle ground there. Fortunately, I think that it was just timing, you know. "Sex in the City" had gotten off the air and there were just a lot of different things that really kind of helped us secure that spot for Sunday night.

Tavis: How cool to be a person of color to have this opportunity in prime time. Over the last few years, it's like we're starting to really get a chance to, I think, appreciate, to embrace and to understand what your culture offers us even in prime time in some places.

Chavira: And not only that, but to play a Latino character that is not that stereotypical Latino character and to let the world know that, in fact, there are Latinos out there that are educated and they do want to kind of assimilate into a white neighborhood and that don't necessarily go around pushing their Latino-ness all over the place on everyone, you know?

You know, my background is both my parents - I'm actually half. My father is Mexicano and my mother was German-Irish, an extremely educated family. My father has a PhD in Medical Sociology, went back and got his law degree and is a judge. My mother, before she passed away, had three Masters Degrees in Public Health, Anthropology and Theology. So that's not the typical Latino household that we supposedly hear about all the time in the newspapers, in the press and in the media. You know what I mean?

Tavis: And not that you're not a smart guy, but what do they make of their son being an actor after all those degrees (laughter)?

Chavira: Well, my dad was like, you know, "I love that "Desperate Housewives" (laughter).

Tavis: (Laughter) Don't you love that about Hollywood? It speaks to the whole nature of the way we value or devalue things in our country. Your parents go to school, they study, they get degrees, they do all of this, and you come out with a television show and make more money per episode than -

Chavira: - but thankfully too, my father is also aware that I did go and get my Masters degree from a professional actor training program, so he's very thankful that I at least have that degree backing me up as well, you know. But it's like, if "Desperate Housewives" finally goes away and you don't get anything else, at least you can go and teach or do something like that.

Tavis: Your mother, speaking of your mother, passed away when you were young.

Chavira: Yeah.

Tavis: I assume, then, that allowed you and your father to have a pretty special kind of relationship.

Chavira: Actually, when my mom had passed away, they had divorced. They'd been divorced for a while. My dad and my relationship was actually very tempestuous for a long time. Actually, there was a time there for, God, I guess about two years when we were living together, but not speaking. We would speak through my sisters because we just did not get along at all. I was very volatile and just really kind of full of angst and angry at everything and everybody.

It wasn't until I finished undergrad and I started to go off into graduate school and I went away to San Diego that I realized, you know, here I have this resource in a man who, even after he passes away and even after I pass away, will probably be one of the ten most intellectual men I will ever have the chance to meet in my life, and he's my father. I need to start listening to what he has to say and I need to start respecting that wisdom.

So it really kind of - as I was gone in San Diego, I kept on calling him and really kind of using him as a resource. Then he and I, you know, that bond really kind of came back together. Recently, with the birth of my son, Thomas, it's just even more. We're inseparable, the three of us. We'll do everything together.

Tavis: I was about to ask you about that, so I'm glad you went there right quick. So now you have your own son, so fast-forward down the road and tell me how you avoid, if you think you can, getting to that period. Maybe you can't avoid it. I'm one of eight boys, and maybe a father can't avoid that period of tempestuousness with a boy at a certain age. I don't know.

Chavira: Well, you know, you have to allow that boy to come into is manhood on his own. You can help him and sometimes he doesn't want to know that you're helping him and sometimes he doesn't need to know that you're helping him, but you have to allow him that. Even now, my son is three years old. You know, he's starting to get a lot of independence. He wants to be able to do things on his own. He's like, no, dad, I can do it myself. I'm like, all right, go ahead. You have to allow that, but still guiding them. For me, the biggest thing is, you know, guiding through example. This is how you live your life.

That's why I've been - when I'm not dealing with "Desperate Housewives" or, you know, sitting around at home and changing diapers and trying to get my son to learn how to be potty trained (laughter), I try and go and involve myself in organizations within the community. I know he's young and he doesn't understand it now, but maybe later on, he can look back and go, oh, my dad did this and my dad did that, and this is how a man is supposed to lead his life.

Tavis: My friend, Cornel West, says it's always better to see a sermon than to hear a sermon.

Chavira: That's a great saying.

Tavis: Speaking of your son, looking back on what his daddy did, he'll look back on this coming weekend and see his daddy involved in the issue of domestic violence on Lifetime. Tell me about that.

Chavira: Well, not just his daddy, but also his grandfather as well, yeah. You know, I've had an ongoing relationship with Lifetime even before "Housewives." I did some guest star spots on some of their other shows. With "Housewives," we started a line of communication even more. They came to me and said, "You know, we've got these PSAs on domestic violence and we were wondering if maybe you'd like to do one." The previous year, I'd involved myself with The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation because that was to do something in memory of my mother. But when I was thinking about doing that, I was also thinking about doing something about domestic violence. I was like, wow, here's something that's fell in my lap.

I was like, okay, I'll do it, but on one condition, if I can include and incorporate my father. He's been a Family Court judge for ten years. Prior to that, he was in the D.A.'s office in Bear County, which San Diego is the seat of, for about fifteen years and five of those years he was the chief of the Family Violence Unit dealing with nothing but domestic violence cases and a large majority of the cases that he sees now are nothing but child support, but there is a lot of domestic violence issues within those cases.

I said, you know, here's the opportunity to use my celebrity in a great way, my face in a great way, my name and my voice, but also to incorporate my father's career experience and wisdom on an issue that my family's been involved with as long as he's been a judge and a D.A.

Tavis: I assume that you must really appreciate, then, having a platform like "Desperate Housewives.' To your point, you were involved with Lifetime in issues before you hit "Desperate Housewives," but this must allow you to talk to a much broader number of people and to have a much greater impact on an issue like this.

Chavira: It's not exactly what I wanted to do. It's not like I had a plan. It's not like, okay, now I'm going to become the activist, you know, voice for all these different issues. But with the success of "Housewives,' you know, I was kind of really taken aback with all the attention. I went to my dad and said, "Dad, I don't understand this. This is really kind of weird." He looked at me and was like, "Can I give you a piece of advice?"

I was like, "Okay." And he said, "With success comes responsibility. It's not only responsibility to yourself and to your son and to your family, but also responsibility to your community. You have to make sure that you don't forget where you came from and that you let people know from the community that you came from that you have not forgotten them and it's by being an active participant in that community."

Tavis: So you really are glad you started listening to your father, aren't you (laughter)?

Chavira: I really am.

Tavis: With great advice like that.

Chavira: It took a long time (laughter) to get through this thick head, but I'm glad I did.

Tavis: I'm glad it worked. So we're going to check you out on Lifetime this weekend. But before I let you go, also this weekend, NBA playoffs start. We know that, since you're from San Antonio, Eva ain't the only one who's a Spurs fan.

Chavira: I used to go back to the games when they were the ABA, man. It was George Gervin and the striped ball and Artis Gilmore with that big old "fro," you know?

Tavis: So how does that feel? Eva gets all this publicity for being a Spurs fan and you're like I was a Spurs fan before Eva was born (laughter).

Chavira: You know what? It's all good. It's all gravy. She's a great lady and I'm real happy for her and Tony. You know, if her being a huge Spurs fan gives them a little more attention, well, that's awesome.

Tavis: But Ricardo was there first, Eva.

Chavira: That's right (laughter).

Tavis: And don't get it twisted. Nice to have you here.

Chavira: Hey, man, thank you very much.

Tavis: Glad to have you on the program.

Chavira: All right.

Tavis: That's our show for tonight. You can catch me on the weekends on PRI, Public Radio International. Check your local listings. I'll see you back here next time, though, on PBS. Until then, good night from Los Angeles. Thanks for watching and, as always, keep the faith.