Fans of USA Network's hit CIA caper, "Covert Affairs," have been waiting two seasons for Annie Walker and Auggie Anderson to finally get together, but as star Christopher Gorham explained to The Huffington Post, it's a catch-22.
"If you tease something too much or too long, people get tired of it in the same way that they might get tired of it if you get there too quickly," Gorham said. "It's a balancing act, but so far, I think that we're on the right track."
Gorham can confirm, however, that fans will not want to miss the emotional Season 2 finale, as Annie and Auggie are getting closer than ever. Hint: Physical contact is included.
In Tuesday night's finale, Annie is in Sweden on vacation, bringing along sister Danielle, who's mistaken for a spy during what's supposed to be a routine info drop. As usual, it's Auggie to the long-distance rescue, but he gets a little sidetracked by some impending medical news. Not to mention, he's still dealing with Parker's departure.
Gorham filled us in on what to expect from the finale, the subtle connection between Auggie and Annie, and why he has the best on-set office ever.
Auggie had an emotional episode last week, having to deal with his relationship with Parker. What's coming up for him in the finale?
The show really is about Annie and secondarily, about Annie and Auggie's relationship, so you don't get to see every step along the way when Auggie is going through something. You just get to see these big milestones, so it's a tricky thing to play sometimes because you have to earn these moments within the scene, because you haven't had a lot of the connecting fiber in between these episodes. There's a lot going on. In the finale he's going to be dealing with the aftermath of this relationship between him and Parker. For the first time, we saw Auggie be very vulnerable, and this whole relationship has sparked something in him that's been laying dormant for awhile. It's something very personal that he has to confront.
You said that his relationship with Parker has sparked something dormant in Auggie. What do you think that is? We've definitely seen a softer side of him lately.
Yeah, absolutely. You just haven't had the opportunity to see what kind of boyfriend he is, and to see how he behaves with someone that he cares about behind closed doors in those private, intimate moments. There's a very private, emotional moment coming up for Auggie, where he has to deal with his feelings all on his own. Parker is gone, and he has to figure things out. He doesn't have anyone to share his thoughts with. He's always been an intensely private person. which is why we don't see him dealing with a lot of this stuff on a week-to-week basis, but he's going to have to deal with it now. It's a very powerful scene for him.
And of course, there's also a very poignant scene between Auggie and Annie coming up.
That relationship is definitely the central relationship in the show. Piper [Perabo] and I had a lot of conversations about that last scene and what to do. Her and I are very deliberate about how we move this relationship along, or don't, including when they have physical contact and when they don't. We're never casual about it.
In this episode, there is physical contact between the two of them that Piper and I worked out. It's funny because sometimes the stuff that we do is really subtle, and this is one of those moments when it's so subtle that we have to make sure we let the director and the camera department know what we're going to do so that they can catch it because that moment almost wasn't on film. We were getting toward the end of shooting the scene, and we went over there and said, "Listen, we just want to let you know that we're doing this, so that you can catch it," and everyone went, "Oh my god!"
I feel like, as a viewer, it's like, "Come on! Just get together already!"
[Laughs] That's the great thing about it! There's always that tension, and it makes their relationship interesting. At the same time, it's also something that you have to be careful with. If you tease something too much or too long, people get tired of it in the same way that they might get tired of it if you get there too quickly. It's a balancing act, but so far, I think that we're on the right track.
There's a lot of exciting stuff coming up for Season 3, but what's this I hear about an on set ab-off?
I can certainly see the appeal to a certain segment of our audience for something like that, but that idea sounds exhausting to me personally [laughs]. I'm not sure if it's something that I want to participate in. Listen, I am under no illusion that I will win any competition of looks with Sendhil Ramamurthy. He may be the prettiest man that I've ever met. I'll just hand in the title right now. But Peter Gallagher is the dark horse in this competition. You got to watch out for him.
Yes! You should never underestimate Sandy Cohen.
He's the best. When we were shooting in Berlin, "The OC" is huge over there, and we couldn't go anywhere. Doug Liman, Peter and I kind of ditched everybody and took off on the subway to get dinner. We were an hour late for dinner because we could not get anywhere underground without having to stop and have Peter take pictures with fans.
Can we expect more field missions for Auggie in Season 3?
I think so. The episodes where Auggie gets out of the office have been some of the highest rated episodes that we've done and just some of the best. They also give Piper some time off, which is also nice for her because she works as hard as anyone that I've ever seen. So yeah, I think in the past two seasons there's been basically one big Auggie field mission episode, and we may do one or two next year. It's a lot of fun.
Auggie does look pretty cool when he's in the office though. You have a great set.
It's the best set. They personally designed my office to make me look good in there. I have no problem sitting at that desk. It's incredibly well-lit in that spot [laughs].
You also have some pretty cool props, like those stylish headphones. Do you ever play music through them?
I tried! And that's when I found out that they had taken the insides out of my headphones. The prop guys on the pilot -- for what reason, I couldn't tell you -- took out the guts, so they don't actually work. I thought I had it made! I had my iPhone at work, and I had them get an adapter, and I was going to plug it in and jam out during the scenes, but it was a no-go.
You also have a really cool infrared cane, so tell me, have you ever pretended that it was a lightsaber?
Once or twice on purpose, absolutely [laughs]. It's the prop that keeps on giving. I get endless amounts of fun from shining it into things on set and seeing what happens. One of the coolest things that I've found is that if you shine it into Kari's [Matchett] hair, it creates a three-dimensional shape. It's the coolest thing. It's just the color of her blonde. It works better on her hair than it does on Piper's for some reason.
So it looks like you have a lot of fun on set.
Oh, absolutely. I get all of the cool stuff, and I have a lot of blind friends now, so they're always emailing me all of the newest gadgets, and I'll pass them along to our props department. Some of it makes it onto the show. A buddy of mine, he got a document reader that he was really excited about because with this reader, it's the first time since he could see that he can go into a bookstore and read any book on the shelf. He can put it down in front of this document reader, and it will start reading aloud to him in 10 seconds. It's just a life-changing device for the blind, so we got one of those for Auggie's desk.
The explosive Season 2 finale of "Covert Affairs" airs Tuesday, Dec. 6 at 10 p.m. ET on USA. Watch this exclusive sneak peek of the finale below.