SPOILERS: This post contains details about the Poker Face, Season 2 episode ‘One Last Job’
With her Poker Face character continuing on the road after solving another murder, Natasha Lyonne is thriving on the upped stakes of her Rian Johnson mystery-of-the-week series.
Ahead of this week’s Season 2 episode ‘One Last Job’, now available to stream on Peacock, the 2x Golden Globe nominee explained to Deadline that Charlie Cale finds “some hope that gets stripped away” when she sparks a romance with Bill (Corey Hawkins) shortly before his dead body is found.
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“It’s just a really well-crafted story in the first place, and Corey Hawkins does such a gorgeous job of playing it,” she said. “I knew him a little bit, but never had a chance to work with him. But it’s really embedded into the DNA of that script, just this idea of sort of wanting to find a place to call home.”
Lyonne continued, “I guess the sadness maybe for Charlie is realizing sometimes that home is in another person, which is maybe its own kind of a sickness, a faulty belief system we have as a people, or maybe it’s actually the truth. I’ve often found that in this life. I take a look at this guy [Johnson], I like him. Whenever he’s around, that feels safe.”
In ‘One Last Job’, written by Taofik Kolade, Charlie finds chemistry with big box store manager Bill while delivering takeout to him after hours. But when the store is targeted in a Black Friday heist and Bill’s dead body is found dressed as Santa, on display in the showroom, the death comes with a more personal significance than usual.
“So, I think that it’s a really well architected set-up, that friendship between Corey Hawkins and Sam Richardson, it’s so good for this moment of intersection for Charlie to appear and sort of find some hope that gets stripped away,” she explained. “And of course she’s gonna solve that case against all odds. The episodes where there’s this personal stake and driver to tether to like that are really fun.”
Lyonne added, “I think we just went all in. I mean, Corey is such a serious actor, and it does help when they’re kind of friends of friends. But it also gives [Charlie] something to kind of run from. … In a cut scene, it’s kind of like this moment, [Geraldine Viswanathan’s Jenny] saying, ‘Where are you off to now, pal I knew for a day?’ And Charlie’s like, ‘Maybe I’ll send a postcard.’ … But she has that kind of driver in a weird way that she did from Natalie (Dascha Polanco) in the pilot. ‘I guess I’m gonna hit the road for a while until I feel safe to call another person home again,’ is the underbelly of that.”
As Charlie is propelled to move on and continue solving murders, new episodes of Poker Face are available to stream Thursdays on Peacock.
