The Safe House - Expositions

Ron Rifkin speaks extemporaneously and expansively. Arvin Sloane does not. That's a sharp distinction between the actor and the master spy he portrays on Alias. "He's totally not like me. I'm a fall-apart person, very open," says Rifkin. "Everything Sloane says is carefully thought out."

But even Rifkin exercises caution when discussing plot lines and character development on the stylish, high-tech drama, now in its second season on ABC and CTV Sundays, at 9 p.m. ET. "Can't tell you that," he says several times when asked about the real nature and ambitions of the icy Sloane, the head of SD-6, a division of the evil enemy agency called the Alliance.

Rifkin doesn't necessarily view Sloane as a villain. Neither do the show's fans. The actor says they often tell him, "We don't believe you killed your wife." They also suggest he's really the father of Sydney Bristow, the show's glamorous double agent, played by Jennifer Garner.

A seasoned theatre actor, Rifkin admits to being a little startled by the wider fame Alias has brought. It used to be that "people would see my face and think I'm Joel Grey or Bob Balaban."

Now the minutiae of his career are listed on fan Web sites - things like his role as the evil Prince John in the Robin Hood spoof When Things Were Rotten, Mel Brooks' 1975 TV series.

Rifkin, who won a 1998 Tony for playing Herr Schultz in Cabaret, has been all over the big screen in recent years, with supporting roles in films ranging from L.A. Confidential to Boiler Room to The Sum of All Fears.

Alias creator J. J. Abrams says of Rifkin's work as Sloane: "Although he's wonderful at playing dark and twisted, he also brings a counterpoint that's very likable. As you get to know more about Sloane, you can feel real sympathy."

Rifkin, 63 on Thursday, is amazed that Alias fans lined up for hours to get copies of the official companion book Alias: Declassified, signed by the cast.

He constantly hears "Show me your finger!" - referring to an episode last season in which Sloane ordered that one of his fingers be severed to provide the fingerprint needed to deactivate a device set to destroy SD-6. The finger was later sutured back on.

Rifkin is temporarily living in Los Angeles, where the show is shot. The Brooklyn-born actor and his wife of 36 years, Iva, make their home in New York.

He got the urge to act when he was about four. "I would say to my cousin, 'I'll get behind the curtain. You say my name and I will come out singing and dancing.'"

As an adult, Rifkin worked steadily but became disenchanted in the early '80s when he felt he was in a rut.

"I'd wake up in the morning. I'd be depressed and sometimes I'd be crying," Rifkin confided. "I was playing the same part over and over again - the friend of the friend of the friend ... I was sad about myself. I lost a sense of belief in myself. I just didn't want to be in that world."

He changed careers. His father was a successful furrier, so he drew on that background to establish a retail business of his own. He marketed a line of coats, designed by the Carole Little label, which sold well at high-end stores.

His knowledge of clothing heightens his interest in the role that wardrobe plays in projecting his Alias persona.

"It's not black, it's dark grey," he says of the suit he's wearing as Sloane. He describes Sloane's "very specific ideas about how he presents himself to the world," pointing out such details as the "way I tie the tie - with a very sharp point ... He's just so. You will never see him unbuttoned."

Successful in retail, Rifkin never expected to return to acting. But in 1994, he was persuaded by Austin Pendleton to star in a summer theatre production of Arthur Miller's The American Clock.

Then he met playwright Jon Robin Baitz, who created the lead role in The Substance of Fire specifically for him. He played Isaac Geldhart, an iconoclast publisher and Holocaust survivor, to considerable acclaim both on the stage and in a 1996 movie version.

During this interview, Rifkin was lunching at the table next to Garner at the Disney Studio's commissary. He gestures toward her and stresses that she's "the first reason" for the success of Alias.

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