Take Your Kid to Work Day! Bill Paxton Talks Working with Son James on Training Day

Bill Paxton is making his new CBS drama a family affair.

“I was thrilled to have my son [James, 22,] guest-star on the eighth episode of Training Day,” Paxton, 61, says in the current issue of PEOPLE.

Paxton stars with Justin Cornwell in the new CBS cop drama Training Day, which picks up 15 years after the 2001 Denzel Washington and Ethan Hawke film of the same name.

PEOPLE has an exclusive sneak peek clip from the first episode of the new series, which premieres Thursday, and Paxton is particularly excited for fans to see him work with James, who recently costarred on the USA thriller Eye Witness.

James “plays the son in a father-son robbery team,” says Paxton, who also has a daughter Lydia, 19, with his wife Louise. “And my character, whose dad was also a criminal, tells him, ‘We’re both our father’s sons, but that doesn’t have to define us.’ It was surreal saying that to him.”

Training Day premieres Thursday at 10 p.m. ET on CBS.