GAME OF THE NAME - SIPOWICZ GOES TO THE DOGS

New York Police Detective Andy Sipowicz appeared in over 250 episodes of 'NYPD Blue', but the show's creators never saw fit to cross him over into other TV shows that might have benefited from the coat-tails ride.  And yet there are now three other TV series in which Sipowicz has been name-checked.  And I've come up with reasonable splainins for the first two and I'm ready with the third.

First there was the woman who wore a police uniform while having sex with NCIS Agent DiNozzo.  She would insist that he call her Sipowicz....

NYPD BLUE & NCIS

And when Henry Spencer threatened to go postal on some "skel", his son Shawn calmed him down by calling him Sipowicz.

NYPD BLUE & PSYCH

Third time's the charm......

'Rizzoli & Isles'

"If You Can't Stand The Heat"

During this summer's heat wave in TV-Boston, Detective Vince Korsak found a Shi-Tzu wandering around the vicinity of a crime scene.  It was suffering from heat stroke distress and Korsak later learned that it responded to Spanish.  Eventually he was able to reunite the dog with its rightful owners.

But until then, he named it "Sipowicz".

There's no reference point, no mention of 'NYPD Blue'.  So it's pozz'ble, just pozz'ble, that somehow Korsak knew Sipowicz and for some reason this little dustmop of a dog reminded him of the New York cop.

They couldn't have grown up together as Vince was a life-long Beantown boy and Andy grew up in Brooklyn.  There's a six year difference between the ages of Dennis Franz and Bruce McGill, but only a two year difference for their characters Andy Sipowicz and Vince Korsak respectively.  (Sipowicz is four years younger than Franz according to a 1995 episode.) 

They may have met through their professional lives.  Perhaps, as I speculated with the connection between Henry Spencer and Andy Sipowicz, they either teamed up on a case that roots in both their territories or they met at that same police convention I think must have been held in Santa Barbara.

But the skeevy side of me also likes the idea that the two of them became involved with the same woman, as I claimed happened with Sipowicz and Tony DiNozzo.  

We know that Vince Korsak has been married three times.  His first ex-wife was Dana, who left him for another man while Korsak was serving in Viet Nam.  Could Sipowicz have been that other man?

We know about Vince's third wife Melody and her son Josh, but we have no information on his second wife.  Maybe she was the woman that linked the two detectives together?  Either Vince stole her away from Andy, or vice versa.  

That theory of course could change once that particular back story is sketched out on the show.

At any rate, I think Vince Korsak knew Andy Sipowicz at some point earlier in his life.  And something about that little furball made the detective think about his counterpart in the NYPD.  Whether he named it Sipowicz in honor of the 15th Precinct cop or as an insult, we'll probably never know.....

Because his name was dropped three times in other shows as though he actually existed, I think Andy Sipowicz might find himself in the TV Crossover Hall Of Fame as a Birthday Honors inductee some day!

BCnU!