Tim Reid is having a good time working on "That '70s Show," going back in time to when he first became famous on "WKRP in Cincinnati."

"This show really stays anchored in the '70s and its attention to detail," says Reid, who played DJ Venus Flytrap on "WKRP" and has since become a writer, director and Emmy-nominated producer. "On the sets, I see little, small things -- I look around and I'm seeing things, I'm going 'That's interesting. I remember that.'"

There's just one thing that bugs him, though.

"I'm back in the Venus clothes all the sudden. They're a little more upscale, but nonetheless -- I'm afraid I'm going to get polyester poisoning," he says.

Reid, and that wardrobe, begin a multi-episode stint on the FOX series Wednesday (Sept. 15), when his character, a record-store owner named William Barnett, shows up in Point Place and announces he's Hyde's (Danny Masterson) biological father. (Robert Hays played the man Hyde thought was his dad in the show's third season.) The character is excited to meet the son he just learned about, and Reid is enjoying playing a role he's not sure would have been written 25 years ago.

"I'm playing a character from the '70s, and it's interesting, because if we were in the '70s television wouldn't have put this character on," Reid says, alluding to the idea that Hyde is the offspring of an interracial relationship. The fact that he can do the character now, he says, is the "genius" of "That '70s Show."

"They're able to do sort of a back-to-the-future thing, and examine [issues] without having to be politically correct of frightened," he says. "If this had been done back in the '70s, it would play more on the racial frustration -- it would be a differently written introduction. Now, because we're looking sort of back to the future, the comedy is different. It's lighter -- there's not the feeling of 'Oh God, something's gonna happen.' It's more about these human beings, and more realistic, I think."

Reid's time on "That '70s Show" -- he's set to film six episodes -- is actually something of a break for him. He runs a studio operation called New Millennium in his native Virginia and has produced, written or directed a number of projects over they years, including the Emmy-nominated "Frank's Place," the Showtime series "Linc's" and the feature film "Once Upon a Time ... When We Were Colored."

This is his first series work in several years, though, where his job is just, as he puts it, "come in and try not to bump into the furniture."

"I'm not the guy who says what is," Reid says with a laugh. "Usually I'm the guy who says, 'Do this, do that, yeah, that's working.' Now I'm the guy who has to take orders and do my job as an actor. It's a good experience for me. ...

"It's almost like a vacation for me, because I'm struggling to try to make these little independent films and keep the studio up and running and meeting with bankers and all that crap. Then suddenly I'm an actor; that's my job. It's been good to be there these past few weeks."