Why Donald Westfield From Special Ops: Lioness Looks Familiar

Taylor Sheridan is one of the most sought-after television showrunners today, thanks in large part to the runaway success of "Yellowstone" and its spin-off shows, as well as the Sylvester Stallone-led "Tulsa King." You can now find another of his projects on Paramount+, "Special Ops: Lioness," which stars a few well-known names like Zoe Saldana and Nicole Kidman. You will almost definitely notice Michael Kelly popping up here and there as CIA Deputy Director Donald Westfield, and he's someone you may recognize from myriad other works.

"Special Ops: Lioness" follows Joe (Saldana), a CIA agent tasked with training and handling undercover operators overseas. She recruits Force Recon Marine Cruz Manuelos (Laysla De Oliveira) and embeds her into a social group to befriend an asset, all while dealing with the fallout of her previously failed mission and her family, which is falling apart. Kidman plays her boss in the Lioness program, Kaitlyn Meade. And they are both overseen and often reprimanded by Westfield.

Kelly feels pretty familiar with the role, and there is a good reason for it. Over the last three decades, he has played similar roles in TV shows and movies. If you are trying to figure out where you have seen the actor behind Donald Westfield before, here are some of his most prominent roles.

There is no shortage of gangster movies and TV shows to quench our thirst for the life of made men. From "The Godfather" to "The Irishman" and "Casino" to "GoodFellas," we just can't seem to get enough of the fantasy. One of the projects that was instrumental in creating that fantasy for an entire generation of people was the HBO series "The Sopranos."

The series follows Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) as he rules over his Soprano crime family and defines what it meant for viewers to root for the bad guy. In many ways, the series introduced the idea of the anti-hero to television, as the idea of a flawed protagonist leading his own series was nowhere as commonplace as it is today. Gandolfini found a way to be the bad guy, but in a way that we couldn't help but root for him.

Michael Kelly showed up in six episodes of Season 6 as he portrayed Ron Goddard, the partner for FBI Agent Dwight Harris (Matt Servitto). The two were assigned to Soprano's case but became quasi-allies with the mafia boss due to his enthusiastic cooperation to help thwart terrorist threats in their neighborhood. Tony's patriotism and the FBI's desire to save lives put their mafia-police rivalry on hold.

Speaking of cultural impact, it is hard not to think of some of the most impactful shows in the past 20 years and not name "Criminal Minds." The police procedural that follows the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit used a similar approach as other cop shows — the crime-a-week format. What made it different was the ability to visit different towns across the country and see new and different police precincts that kept the series fresh for a decade and a half.

Of course, like all great shows, spin-offs were inevitable. Michael Kelly appeared in one episode of "Criminal Minds" as Jonathan "Prophet" Simms before starring in the spin-off, "Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior." Simms is a former convict who spent time in prison for killing a child molester; it was there that he found God and earned the nickname Prophet. He uses his time with the fictional "Red Cell" to atone for his sins.

Kelly sat down with TV Insider to discuss the short-lived role and still looks back on it fondly. "Getting to work with the actors that I worked with there, that was crazy. It wasn't my first show, but it was definitely early in my career," he said. "That was a lot of fun. Forest Whitaker, getting to work with that guy every day was pretty damn cool. I've been blessed." He also confessed that he got the chance to rewrite the character to be from Georgia so he could wear his Atlanta Braves baseball cap.

The now all-but-defunct DC Extended Universe had a rocky time in the 10 years it spent bringing some of our favorite DC characters to life. While the casting of many of the characters was loved by fans, most notably Henry Cavill's Superman, Gal Gadot's Wonder Woman, and Jason Momoa's Aquaman, the movies they appeared in failed to do them justice. However, the beginning of the franchise, 2013's "Man of Steel," is one of the more appreciated installments.

Following the origins of Kal-El and his human persona of Clark Kent as he struggles to find his place in the world, the story culminates in the near-complete destruction of Metropolis when General Zod (Michael Shannon) attempts to take over the Earth and create a new Krypton, forcing Superman to learn his identity. Michael Kelly appears in the film as Steve Lombard, a former NFL player that leverages his experience to land him a gig as a sports journalist at the Daily Planet.

It is a small role for Kelly and actually feels much different than the rest of the parts on this list because he fancies himself a ladies' man. He is seen making passes as the younger women at the Daily Planet, albeit unsuccessfully, and shows a charm that doesn't often get displayed in his usual roles. He did, however, get the opportunity to be heroic as he tried to save his co-workers during the fight between the Kryptonians.

Netflix led the way by turning from a simple streaming service into a full-fledged studio when it began creating original content. While they are now one of the most well-known for their big-budget originals like "Red Notice" and "Extraction," one of their first successes came with the Kevin Spacey-led political hit, "House of Cards."

Following Frank Underwood (Spacey) and his wife Claire (Robin Wright), the series gives audiences a glimpse into some of the worst possible things that may or may not happen behind the political curtain in Washington, D.C. While everyone does some pretty despicable things in the name of advancement, Michael Kelly's Doug Stamper is arguably one of the worst. He is Underwood's chief of staff, and his steadfast loyalty sees him doing the worst things imaginable to protect the then-president and his wife. While we see him commit murder for personal reasons, the majority of what he does is robotic and cold. Kelly, however, has a controversial take on Stamper.

"He is a very complicated man who's done some really bad s***, but I don't think of him as a villain for a second," Kelly told Deadline. "I think that everything he's doing is for what he considers to be the greater good. He feels that that was what was best for the country — it's a terrible thing. I wouldn't do most of what Doug Stamper does, but I understand." Out of all the roles Kelly has brought to life, this one is arguably his most well-known and definitely his darkest.

Thanks to the world-changing success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it seems that in today's Hollywood, everything needs to have a shared universe big enough to dominate the box office for a decade. Some franchises have succeeded, like "The Conjuring" and "Rocky," while others have failed to keep up, like the Dark Universe and the DCEU. One of the latest to be introduced is the new shared universe between "Transformers" and "G.I. Joe."

At the end of "Transformers: Rise of the Beasts," Michael Kelly's Agent Burke interviews Noah Diaz (Anthony Ramos) for a job and presses him about his past, only to eventually reveal that he knows all about his exploits alongside the Transformers. He then attempts to recruit him to fight a bigger war behind the scenes by telling him that his brother's medical bills are paid for. He hands Diaz a business card with the G.I. Joe logo before disappearing into a bunker.

Kelly talked about the experience he had with the scene and even expressed excitement that his inner child and his real-life son will both love seeing their toys come to life. He told Collider, "I was like, 'This is gonna be cool when [my son] sees it!' And I thought it would be fun to jump into one of those franchise worlds, especially one that I grew up on, 'Transformers,' 'G.I. Joe.' You know, I'm 54; I grew up with both of those. So for me to be a part of that, it was just, it was thrilling, man. It was really cool."

Amazon has become the go-to place for any beloved dad-novel franchise to get turned into a series. Alan Ritchson's "Reacher" and Chris Pratt's "The Terminal List" showed that the streamer is finding a lot of content within the pages of military and spy thrillers. However, they perfected this process long before either of those shows as they started it off with the John Krasinski-led "Jack Ryan," based on the Tom Clancy novels.

The series ran for four seasons, and while it didn't follow any of the novels directly, it captured the character's essence in a way that others couldn't. Michael Kelly appeared as Mike November, an original to the show and a CIA agent that goes off the reservation with Jack and is loyal to the end. Kelly has spoken fondly about his time on the show, and he credits Krasinski for most of it.

"I often say I'm so fortunate to have a job where I get to go work and laugh so hard that I cry every day," Kelly told The Hollywood Reporter. "And, it's the truth! Most days, if we're on set together, we're crying because we are laughing so hard!" He also shared what he felt set the series apart from the rest of the franchise — the presence of Krasinski, who he said was the best version of Jack Ryan we've seen so far. Kelly also credited the long-form format with making the series so good.