Posted in: Amazon Studios, TV | Tagged: scarpetta

Scarpetta Stars Simon Baker & Hunter Parrish Discuss Benton's Journey

Simon Baker (The Mentalist) and Hunter Parrish (The Other Black Girl) on Benton's journey and working with Scarpetta Showrunner Liz Sarnoff.

Benton Wesley is one of the more important characters in Patricia Cornwell's Scarpetta, brought to life on the screen by Simon Baker (The Mentalist) and Hunter Parrish (The Other Black Girl) as his past counterpart in the Liz Sarnoff Prime Video series adaptation of the same name. The series follows the title character, Kay Scarpetta, the renowned forensic pathologist and medical examiner played by Nicole Kidman in the present day, and Rosy McEwen in the past, as she works with her contacts in law enforcement, including Pete Marino (Bobby Cannavale, Jake Cannavale) and FBI profiler Benton, to crack cases. Both Pete and Benton are also involved with her family: Pete with her older sister, Dorothy (Jamie Lee Curtis, Amanda Righetti), and Benton with Kay and Dorothy's daughter, Lucy (Ariana DeBose, Svannah Lumar). Baker and Parrish spoke to Bleeding Cool about how they came to be involved in the series, working with their respective Kay Scarpetta, and how Sarnoff makes it all work.

Scarpetta Stars Simon Baker and Hunter Parrish on Developing Benton

BC: Before getting cast, how familiar were you with Patricia's work, and what intrigued you about entering her world?

Parrish: I wasn't familiar, so it was really a treat to have so much content to have at our disposal. Originally, I didn't know that the book spanned 20 to 25 years, so that was fascinating. The adaptations continue as they have content, so it's cool. [Patricia's] an incredible writer. I've become a quick fan.

Baker: I was familiar with the book Postmortem, which was the first book that was released, and I think it was released in the early or mid-90s. I didn't realize that she'd gone on and written 24 more books, but my mother had read all of them.

What's it like working with Liz as a creative and coordinating how Benton would work?

Baker: I adore Liz Sarnoff. Creatively, I thought she was fantastic to work with. Benton is a quiet, restrained character, and he wasn't really that…I mean, I only got the first two scripts when I was cast, when I was offered the job. He's not really all that present in those scripts, but my first conversation with Liz was so good that I was like, "I really like the way she thinks." It proved to be a really great experience working with her and feeling a really strong sense of collaboration, like she's into engaging with ideas that I had to flesh the character out more and more as the eight episodes went on.

Parrish: Yeah, she does two things really well: The collaboration part is not something we often get from a showrunner or creator, especially when you're adapting; she's got such a burden already. So, to be able to then filter in our kind of desires or what we want to bring is tricky, and she's done that quite well. I also think in her adaptations, she enhanced the humanity of these characters instead of just the crime-solving part, which is obviously very important and exciting for everybody. She does something great for the actors, which is leaning into their humanity, and that's fun for us to build.

One of the major components of Benton is working with Kay, so can you talk about just working with Nicole and Rosy on your scene work?

Baker: Working with Nicole's great. We have a familiarity. We've worked together before on an episode of a show called Roar, where we played husband and wife, and we have a familiarity that goes back many decades, so it's really good. It's also interesting to walk in as two very different characters to who we are, but… I think a lot of our timeline of the story is well supported by what Hunter and Rosy are doing. They're doing a lot of great foundation work, and it's really nice for me to watch that stuff. Yeah, it's good.

Did you want to talk about Rosy's work in your scenes?

Parrish: The other thing I'll add is that the burden is heavier on them to portray this decades-long relationship. What's fun for Rosy and me, and the thing with Jake [playing Pete] Marino, is we have history that starts before this timeline, so we must have something that we never had before as human beings, as actors. But Rosie and I get to meet, and get to experience in real time all that newness. That's always fun for people to watch and explore. Rosy comes to play ball, and that just makes it all easier.

Blumhouse and Amazon MGM Studios' Scarpetta is available on Prime Video.

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