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March is Women's History Month!

Sex And The Greater 'Good Wife': Archie Panjabi On Keeping That Big Secret

Archie Panjabi plays Kalinda Sharma on CBS's <em>The Good Wife</em>.
Jeffrey Neira
/
CBS
Archie Panjabi plays Kalinda Sharma on CBS's The Good Wife.

Archie Panjabi is part of the cast of CBS's The Good Wife, which has spent much of this week hearing an earful about a major plot development on last Sunday's episode. (They discuss her feelings about the reaction, but do not specify what the development was.)

But on Saturday's Weekend Edition, she has time to talk to Scott Simon about her own character, Kalinda Sharma, a crafty woman who's not quite like any other on TV. "When was the last time on television you saw a bisexual investigator who's Indian, living in America, and who's respected by her superiors?"

Panjabi talks about not only what makes Kalinda unique, but also what connects her to other characters. Does she use her sexuality for her own gain? Yes. Is her relationship with people like Will genuine, born of a true bond? Yes.

That brings us back, of course, to that twist, and to the chatter that followed. "It just reinforces," Panjabi points outs, "how much fans and the critics are deeply invested in each of the characters on that show."

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Linda Holmes is a pop culture correspondent for NPR and the host of Pop Culture Happy Hour. She began her professional life as an attorney. In time, however, her affection for writing, popular culture, and the online universe eclipsed her legal ambitions. She shoved her law degree in the back of the closet, gave its living room space to DVD sets of The Wire, and never looked back.