Pauley Perrette: Goth go-to gal on drama ‘NCIS’

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Pauley Perrette stars as a forensic specialist on the hit “NCIS.”

Updated: February 4, 2012 11:29AM

NEW YORK — It figures that Pauley Perrette would excel playing forensic scientist Abby Sciuto, the Goth lab rat on CBS’ crime procedural, “NCIS.”

On the job in her high-tech lair, Abby is an information magnet and a bloodhound for clues to help crack the latest case with a link to the Navy or Marine Corps. And in the process, she’s brainy, beautiful, charmingly quirky and totally gung-ho — which is to say, a lot like Pauley Perrette.

In its ninth season, “NCIS” (which airs at 7 p.m. Tuesdays on WBBM-Channel 2) remains a smash hit, averaging 20 million viewers a week. And even among its popular ensemble (including Mark Harmon, Michael Weatherly, Cote de Pablo, Sean Murray, David McCallum and Rocky Carroll), Perrette is a standout, having landed at the top of a recent Q Score roster measuring TV stars’ fame and likability among viewers.

But in person, as herself, Perrette can even upstage her performance as Abby.

She recounts her scramble in New York, where she moved to study at John Jay School of Criminal Science but worked several jobs at once to make ends meet. She reports how, along the way, when she was a bartender she broke into show biz: “A kid in coat-check told me, ‘I know this director who would really like you.’ I started booking commercials like craaazy.”

Then she moved to Los Angeles, landing roles in shows such as “Murder One,” “Frasier,” “Time of Your Life” and “JAG,” where a guest shot led to “NCIS” with its premiere in 2003.

Perrette is an unapologetic cheerleader for her show — and her character.

“I’m the biggest Abby Sciuto fan on planet Earth,” she announces. “I mean, I didn’t invent her. I just have the honor of playing her. She fascinates me.”

Perrette looks a decade younger than her 42 years, dressed in jeans and a green T-shirt that echoes her luminous green eyes. Her raven hair (dyed for the role of Abby from her natural blond) is in pigtails. She found her lifelong interest in crime a big help in her newfound acting pursuit — and not just for playing a crime-buster such as Abby.

“Even without having any acting training whatsoever, I spent my time studying human behavior through psychology, sociology and criminal science,” she says. “I was a voracious student, and I ended up with the best background to be an actor ever, because I’d been studying human behavior in science for years and years.”

That said, a question naturally arises: What drew Perrette to criminal science in the first place?

“I feel like life on planet Earth is incredibly hard,” she begins. “There are things we just can’t stop: floods and fires and earthquakes and tsunamis — crushing events for people to deal with. But I DON’T understand someone making the world more difficult on purpose, to harm people with no empathy whatsoever, saying, ‘I’m going to make things even worse. Watch me!’ That’s the motivation for me wanting to be a crime fighter.”

As Abby, she is.

AP