By his own admission, Paul William Davies never really wanted to practice law. He wanted to be a writer.

Nevertheless, Davies spent a decade at O'Melveny & Myers before making the jump from Big Law to the entertainment industry, where he now serves as executive producer, alongside Shonda Rhimes of “Scandal” fame, for ABC's newest televised drama “For The People.”

Set in the federal Southern District of New York, the show, which made its debut on March 13, follows newly minted federal prosecutors and public defenders as they tackle current hot-button legal issues such as entrapment and over-charging and mandatory minimum sentences in criminal cases.

“It was very important to me in designing the show that we would have the ability to talk about real issues in the law and culture,” Davies said.

But in addition to those issues, the other goal of “For The People” is to show how lawyers on both sides handle certain matters and the personal and professional struggles they endure in approaching various things, added Davies, whether its figuring out how to talk to a client or deciding to charge someone.

The path from large firm lawyer to television show creator and producer wasn't always so clear for Davies.

He said he originally aspired to teach legal history, having received his Ph.D. in history from the University of California, Berkley, and his J.D. from Stanford Law School in 2001. But after years of graduate school and an ever-increasing line of student debt, Davies decided to plunge into the legal profession and landed a position as a federal court clerk in Los Angeles.

While he had written a novel, a movie script and other things while in school, Davies hadn't written anything for television until he started his clerkship.

“A part of being in [Los Angles] and the reason I clerked here was because I really wanted to make a go of it as a writer,” Davies said. “And I don't know that I was totally committed to admitting that to myself, but I knew that in the background, that it really was part of it.”

After a summer spent clerking, Davies joined O'Melveny & Myers. During his first year or so at the firm, he wrote his first half-hour television comedy along with a dark satire about a group of lawyers working in Big Law. Soon enough, Davies was writing “spec pilots,” Hollywood jargon for honing his skills, and hustling to get an agent. He was essentially “doing all the things one does as a struggling writer in L.A.,” he recalled, while maintaining the workload of large firm litigator.

“It was kind of a bizarre life and slightly exhausting,” said Davies, who would develop half-hour shows for 20th Century Fox Television, NBCUniversal Media LLC and Sony Entertainment Inc. “I would write on the weekends and at night and somehow I continued to do relatively good work at O'Melveny.”

After nearly a decade at the firm, where he rose the level of counsel, Davies took a leave of absence in 2013 after landing a writing job on the ABC series “Betrayal.” But after the show failed to get picked up for a second season after 13 episodes, Davies returned to O'Melveny & Myers with every intention of resuming his legal career.

But less than a month in, Davies got a call from Craig Turk, a former lawyer at O'Melveny & Myers who went on to become executive producer of hit CBS show “The Good Wife,” who asked him if he would be interested in a short-term assignment working on ABC's “Scandal.”

“I quit the firm basically on 24 hours' notice,” Davies said.

Over the next few years, Davies wrote for the series, all the while working to develop his own material. The idea of “For The People” had been something Davies had been working around for a while, he said.

“I was trying to hopefully do something more organic,” said Davies, rather than other slightly more formulaic depictions of the legal practice. “You would basically have the perspective of the lawyers on both sides and then marrying that [with] the Southern District.”

In 2016, Davies pitched the idea to Rhimes, who promptly asked him to develop it. In late 2017, ABC Studios signed a deal with Davies and “For The People” debuted earlier this month.

Prior to its premiere, Davies joined three cast members earlier this month for a screening of “For The People” at Pepperdine University School of Law in Malibu, California, as noted by sibling publication The Recorder.

“I was prepared to be both annoyed but also sympathetic,” said Davies about preparing for questions on accuracy by law school students, professors and lawyers. “But I've been kind of amazed [and] people have been really receptive to it,” he added. “A lot of lawyers who I've talked to who have watched the show are like, '[I'm] amazed at how accurate that is.”

With “For The People” successfully making it to air, a return to Big Law doesn't seem imminent for Davies. But that doesn't mean that he's forgotten about his time at O'Melveny & Myers—where other former lawyers at the firm have also embarked on interesting new careers—as there is still that dark satire sitting in his back pocket.

“I would love nothing more than to do that show,” Davies said.

“For The People” airs Tuesday nights on ABC at 10 p.m. EDT.