Hudson Cooper: An Actor’s Profile in Career Courage

When Hudson Cooper entered college, he majored in biology, intending to prepare for a career in medicine. But medicine wasn’t for him, so he went to law school. The practice of law wasn’t for him either, except for a diverting stint as an administrative law judge for the New York Taxi & Limousine Commission. Instead, Hudson decided to embark on a career taking on a series of job challenges with the equivalent risk somewhere between hang-gliding and bungee-jumping. In today’s episode, Hudson recounts how he launched his writing career with exactly one published article to his name, landing a job writing a book about baseball for young adults that went into 10 printings and led to another book about football, and eventually 11 other books. Then another leap of courage and confidence—as a stand-up comic. Serendipitously, an agent in the audience one night approached him an offered him a role in the Matthew Broderick version of Godzilla. From there he went on to a series of roles on TV shows like “Law and Order,” “Madame Secretary” and “Bull.” And once again in his latest chapter, he's returned to writing, landing a job as a weekly newspaper columnist, through his usual combination of persistence, resilience, risk-taking and readiness to act when unexpected opportunities arise.