
Gless, 67, has become the quirky, sentimental heart at one of cable TV's most unlikely hits. But I didn't realize how many things we blow up." "When I saw it, it wasn't as painful as I thought it would be. "The older I get, the less I can look," said the star, who fears she'll see only her shortcomings.

"Some people say it's a mistake, but I just try to live in the moment that I'm playing," said Gless, who broke her longtime rule just last month during a promotional event for Burn Notice that featured a screening of the third season finale. Or much of anything she has acted in over her decades-long career, from her role as a quirky mom on Showtime's gay-centered 2000-era drama Queer as Folk to her last Emmy-winning performance as NYPD Detective Christine Cagney in the classic '80s cop show. And her honor came despite a curious habit she has broken only once in the show's history. This month, she became the first actor on the show to be nominated for a major Emmy, midway through its fourth season.

"I love using this cigarette, because it says volumes." "I've seen some of those other shows, like Mad Men, and you can tell they're not smokers," said Gless, who preps her scenes with an acting coach, choreographing exactly how she'll deploy her cancer sticks in each scene. When Gless heard her character was a smoker, the one thing she knew was that Maddy was going to be puffing the real thing while helping her superspy son dodge bullets in the Magic City. Let those wimps on Mad Men swagger through scenes with clove-stuffed fabrications in hand.
