Paley Center 2013 Red Carpet: Suits

We had the pleasure of chatting with USA Networks’ Suits stars Rick Hoffman (“Louis Litt”), Sarah Rafferty (“Donna Paulsen”), Patrick J. Adams (“Mike Ross”) and Gabriel Macht (“Harvey Specter”) at the Paley Center for the Media in Beverly Hills. The show, in its sophomore season, is ready to launch the back half of the season starting this week. Fans can expect to pick up where we left off and take more high stakes trips down the halls of the Pearson Hardman law offices.

RICK HOFFMAN

If you know Louis Litt, you know he’s the main antagonist of the show – driven, sometimes jealous and often devious; but don’t let that fool you! Rick Hoffman is as nice a guy as the cast and crew say he is. Here he tells us that when he gets his scripts, he’s often pleased with what’s on the page for Louis. It seems that the entire cast is often impressed, and he recounts that when they had an adult mock trial (first half of S2), everyone was licking their lips in anticipation of their lines. When the writers write great stuff, it’s challenging for all of them and they don’t want to mess up. Having played Louis now for almost 2 years, there’s a fair bit of leeway (without being disrespectful of the writers) where the creators let the actors find things in the scene that might not be there. Appreciating that Whedonopolis is interested in all things Joss-related, he made a proud note that his first job was working with Firefly’s Sean Maher in a series called “The $treet”! (Thanks for thinking of us, Rick!). Another fun fact, Rick’s real parents portrayed Louis’ parents in the show during a VOIP call (and he’s proud of them, of course). And speaking of family and private matters, Rick was recently speaking with Aaron Korsh (Exec Producer/Creator) and something interesting came up relating to Louis’ life that they decided to add– sooner or later. We’ll need to watch to find out.

SARAH RAFFERTY

Sarah Rafferty plays the beautiful, smart and well informed Donna Paulsen, Harvey’s assistant cum live newsfeed: If it’s going on at Pearson Hardman, chances are Donna knows about it already, even if she hasn’t told anyone else, not even Harvey. IN a word, she’s awesome (and she’d agree!). Sarah told us that she’s as baffled as we are as to why Donna doesn’t have a love interest. We’re going to hold Aaron to a reply (unless he’s already got something up his sleeves!).

She’s real life BFF with costar Gabriel Macht, and confides that the make-up trailer is the collective hangout for everyone, every day, and they happily spend a lot of time with each other. Considering everyone is displaced filming in Toronto (they all live in LA), it’s an extended family for sure. Reaching back into an episode from the first half, when Donna was fired by Jessica, the on screen reactions were so real and so raw, how did Sarah bring that to the table? Well, she admits she really just thought on behalf of Donna, and how Donna would honestly feel. She had Donna remember all the milestones with Harvey and how much was being lost, and also knew that Donna had let down Jessica. All of those immediate thoughts helped bring that emotional scene to life. One thing we know about Suits, is that half of the main cast are strong, beautiful women. Sure, Donna is technically Harvey’s Assistant, but she’s really so much more than that. And that’s what she loves about how Donna is written; she’s so secure and knows that she’s indispensable to them. When we asked if there will be any more scenes of Donna and Rachel hanging out together outside of the office, she admits not in the back half of S2, but we can perhaps look forward to that in S3. (And we’d love it of course if Jessica somehow managed to join in – we can imagine the interesting time the 3 of them would have off the clock!)

Patrick J Adams and Gabriel Macht were gracious interviewees and gave us a few moments of their time in a quick round table session. We asked them if they could give the fans a heads up as to which particular scene we should watch for in the back half, any that specifically had an impact on them filming.

Patrick hopes we watch out for the last scene of the entire season (ep 216), and that it was amazing to shoot. It had all the elements of Suits that he loves – humor, drama, and an intimacy that hasn’t been explored on the show before. We can’t wait!