The Early Show

John Goodman - Off Center

By Chris Hawke

October 19, 2004 / 3:36 PM EDT / CBS

He charmed his way into our living rooms as the loving husband in the hit sitcom "Roseanne."

Now, John Goodman takes on the role of a "normal" father surrounded by a not-so-normal family in the new CBS comedy "Center of the Universe," which premieres Wednesday night.

In "Center of the Universe," Goodman and Emmy Award-winner Jean Smart play a couple still very much in love after 20 years of marriage. However, they are plagued by both Goodman's sex-obsessed father, played by Ed Asner, and wacky mother, played by Academy Award-winner Olympia Dukakis.

"We got a Murderers Row - a great lineup, and that alone makes it worth going to work everyday," Goodman tells The Early Show co-anchor Harry Smith. "I'm out there without my family, so I just love to go to work. Go to bed at 7:30 at night. When can I go work?"

He adds, "I'm sad."

Goodman says the most fun he's ever had was making "The Big Lebowski" with Joel and Nathan Coen. "That's one people yell at me the most about. They'll yell out obscure lines from the movie."

The movie is a cult classic. Males of a certain age watch it over and over "with certain ingestible substances, I guess. I don't know anything about that," quips Goodman.

The movie is celebrated every year with Lebowski Fests across the country.

Some Facts About John Goodman

He was born in 1952 in Missouri

He won seven Emmy nominations and a Golden Globe Award for his eight-year run as Dan Conner on "Roseanne"

He received two more Emmy nominations for his roles in the television movies "Kingfish: A Story of Huey P. Long" and "A Streetcar named Desire"

He plays a disturbed Vietnam veteran who draws a handgun in a bowling alley in the Coen brothers movie "The Big Lebowski," which has become a cult favorite

He also appeared in the Coen brothers movies "Raising Arizona," "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" and "Barton Fink," for which he earned a Golden Globe nomination

Other film credits include "Masked and Anonymous," "Storytelling," "Coyote Ugly," "Fallen," "Blues Brothers 2000," "The Flintstones," "Arachnophobia," "The Babe," "Revenge of the Nerds," "The Big Easy" and "The Wrong Guys." Goodman's voice-over credits include "Monsters, Inc.," "The Emperor's New Groove," "The Jungle Book II" and "Father of the Pride."

He has hosted "Saturday Night Live" 11 times and notoriously imitated Linda Tripp during the Monica Lewinsky scandal

His first film appearance was in 1978's "Jailbait Babysitter"

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