The Big Picture

Collider’s Steve Weintraub talks with Cross co-stars Alona Tal and Samantha Walkes for the series premiere.
Aldis Hodge stars as Alex Cross, solving cases with equal genius from partner Isaiah Mustafa.
During this interview, Walkes and Tal share personal stories from their careers to prepare for
Cross
and discuss the emotional and psychological weightlifting needed for their roles.

Having been famously portrayed on the silver screen by Morgan Freeman (and infamously played by Tyler Perry), James Patterson’s mastermind hero detective is back with Cross, a brand-new mystery series on Prime Video. This time, he’s brought to life with steely intensity by the Green Lantern himself, Aldis Hodge, keenly solving cases with his partner, Detective John Sampson, played with equal genius by Isaiah Mustafa (It: Chapter Two).

In the latest iteration of James Patterson’s iconic detective, Alex Cross uses forensic psychology to analyze and investigate the minds of killers, delving into victim psychology to identify these lunatics and bring them to justice. At the same time, he must protect his family life and those closest to him. Cross also stars Samantha Walkes as Elle Monterio, an activist and Cross’ love interest, as well as Alona Tal as Kayla Craig, one of Cross’s companion forensic analysts.

Walkes and Tal were gracious enough to sit down with Collider’s Steve Weintraub to discuss Cross and share very personal stories. Together, they discuss the importance and emotional seriousness of the show’s two male leads, their sheer excitement for Season 2’s early greenlight, and the psychological weightlifting it took to prepare for their roles.

When Season 2 Is Greenlit Before Season 1 Premieres
Image via Prime Video

COLLIDER: Let me start by saying congrats on the series. What the hell is it like to be part of a show that has a Season 2 before Season 1 even premieres?

SAMANTHA WALKES: Craziness.

ALONA TAL: Fucking awesome! What do you mean? Also, a little stressful, too. Because, on the one hand, you’re like, “Woohoo!” But on the other, it’s like, “Oh, people better like this.”

WALKES: It’s really funny because we shot Season 1, and I’ve learned to say, “That was amazing,” or, “It wasn’t, and amen,” and release it. Just release it. Because you never know in this industry what’s going to happen. We had a strike — we had a couple of strikes — so, I just released it. Then, when we got greenlit for [Season] 2, which, without it being our story, is very rare in this industry. Especially what we went through. And our industry has still not recovered fully from that. I thought, “Oh, no, it was as good as I thought it was. It wasn’t just me who thought it was as good and had the same thrill in being a part of this project. Oh my gosh!” And so now I couldn’t give it away, and I couldn’t release it. And that actually created more anxiety.

TAL: But in an excited way.

WALKES: In a great way! Good anxiety. Sometimes, anxiety can be good.

TAL: You kind of feel like a racehorse at the gate. You just want to run, and everyone to run with you, and see it. You know what I mean?

12:24 Related This Is the Biggest Difference Between the ‘Cross’ Series and James Patterson’s Books The team behind the Prime Video series discusses collaborating with James Patterson and the major changes from the books.

One of the things about streaming is that it often takes too long between seasons. The fact that it already got a green light means, I’m sure, Ben is working on scripts, and Season 2 will be sooner than had they waited. You know the way it works.

WALKES: Absolutely.

TAL: Hopefully. I don’t know. I don’t know.

Samantha Walkes’ Most Difficult Three Nights On Stage
“In natural life, if you’re not a performer, you never really get the expression of that grief in that way.”
Image via Prime Video

You guys have worked on a number of things. What shot or sequence has been the toughest of your career and why? Maybe it’s because of a camera move, maybe it’s dialogue, maybe it’s because of the extras. Is there one scene or sequence that ended up being the backbreaker?

TAL: Bro! That’s a curveball. You go first.

WALKES: I’m just gonna preface first: this may be sensitive for whoever is watching who has had any sort of fertility journey. I come from the theater world. I’m a theater baby by trade. So professionally, for a lot of years, that’s what I did, and made my bread and butter doing. I had the honor of playing Nettie in The Color Purple, and it was the national premiere in Canada. Our lead lost her voice after opening! As Nettie, I don’t know if you know this, but whoever is cast as Nettie actually has to understudy for Celie because that’s the best track. So, I knew her whole track, of course, and that was part of my contract. When she lost her voice, I’d recently had a miscarriage. If you don’t know the story, there is a scene in that where I have to give up my baby, bury it into the ground, and all of that stuff — metaphorically, but it’s ripped from my arms. She doesn’t get to be a mom. That whole song and the whole scene of doing it, right after something like that, told me a few things. One: we are always stronger than we think we are. We are always stronger than we think we are. I think that we limit ourselves by saying, “This is as much as I can handle. This is the ceiling. That’s as far as I can go.” I’m telling you, the strength and the divine nature of us as people, we have so much more in us.

It gave me a chance to mourn in a way no one is afforded. In natural life, if you’re not a performer, you never really get the expression of that grief in that way. And as much as I didn’t want it public, it could be my intimate story. No one knew. It was my story, but I got to sing it out. I got to play it out for three shows. And then I wanted to sleep for 20 years after that. [Laughs] But that was probably the most difficult thing I’ve ever had to do in my career.

I appreciate you sharing that story. I have no words. I just appreciate you sharing.

WALKES: We all have stories like that, though. We have stories like that. We’ve all been through things.

Alona Tal Doesn’t Do Well Underwater
“It was very pretty…but also extremely challenging.”
Image via Prime Video

TAL: I’m gonna go very different tone. [Laughs]

WALKES: Good! Lighten it. He asked the question; I was being honest.

TAL: You went emotional difficulty. I’m gonna go physical difficulty. Only because I don’t do well with water and Ben Watkins wrote a scene for me on Hand of God, which was our other Amazon show that came out a few years ago, where I had to be underwater in a dream sequence for a very long time. I had never opened my eyes underwater before because I have contact lenses and the whole thing — How? How? And act? And do the thing? I can’t! It was very challenging.

WALKES: I’m going to go back and watch that scene.

TAL: It was pretty, though. It was like a red gown, and it was very pretty, but also extremely challenging for somebody who doesn’t deal well with water.

This is why I can’t act. I keep hearing about stories. It’s not as glamorous as everyone might think it is. You sometimes physically have to go through the wringer to deliver a scene.

TAL: Sometimes emotionally and physically at the same time, which goes hand in hand.

The Relationship Between Alex Cross and John Sampson
Image via Prime Video

One of the things that I really loved about the first season is the fact that you have these two male characters who happen to be Black, who have this great, loving relationship, who are very supportive. It’s just so rare in both movies and television to see a relationship portrayed like that. Can you talk about, not just that aspect, but just the writing in general?

WALKES: I think that is one of our pillars of strength in this show for a couple reasons. They happen to be Black, sure, but they are brothers, and they treat each other like mirrors. “I’m going to reflect exactly what you give me, and I’m going to make sure you stay on task. I’m going to make sure you are the best, and you are operating at your best.” There is an advocacy for each other. There is a protection and a security in the nature that, “This person knows exactly who I am and when I’m bullshitting.” So, there is a higher standard they each hold for each other. I love the fact that they hold each other to that standard. They say if you’re not good, go find someone who’s going to help you be good and better and healthy.

TAL: Hopefully the people who watch this, other men. I don’t know why, maybe because society teaches men to kind of be numb to those emotional aspects of themselves. Women tend to do that a lot more than they do. It’s nice to see two men holding a mirror to each other on an emotional level, not just a bro-ish love and humorous aspect of things. Somebody who is as smart as the character of Alex Cross, to have someone like Sampson tell him, “You’re smart, but you’re not that smart sometimes.” Even the smartest person in the room needs somebody to pull up a mirror and be like, “Hold on a second. You’re not that perfect. Take a second.”

WALKES: Checking egos. Checking egos so that we can be whole people, healthy people.

How Alona Tal and Samantha Walkes Prepared for ‘Cross’

I’m fascinated by the way actors get ready for a role. So, I am curious, the first day of filming is coming up. What have you both been doing in the weeks leading up to that first day of filming to mentally get that headspace together so you can perform right there on day one?

TAL: Well, mine was a bit complicated because I was four months postpartum before we started Season 1, so my schedule was a bit different than one would normally have before doing something like this. But when I did have the opportunity, I went back and watched and read a lot of the inspirational characters that deal with this subject matter, that maybe are FBI agents or deal with profiling. Thankfully, there’s a plethora of characters that I could draw from just to see the influences. And also speak with people who I know do this on a daily basis. Maybe not so much FBI agents, but people who deal with the human psyche and get a little feedback from them about how to do that.

WALKES: I do a couple of different things, but the short of the long is one of my favorite things is creating what I call “the world” of the person I’m playing. Elle has memories from childhood with Mom and Dad growing up, first time meeting Cross on the playground, because we grew up together, right? Elle And Cross grew up together, so they have this childhood history. But then another thing that we were armed with, which was so amazing from Amazon and Paramount, was we were offered counseling. One of the people who came on board was Dr. Renee Carr. I love her because she’s a political psychologist, but a psychologist nonetheless. I loved having sessions with her because it wasn’t just around the sensitive nature of our content on the show. I also got to ask her questions as Elle.

The cognitive dissonance we have naturally as humans. She is an activist. Elle is an activist, and here she is dating a detective. The social justice issues we deal with, it’s hard. There is such a gray, murky ground that is at the forefront of the relationship. It’s the big elephant in the room. It’s, “How do we make this work? Is this love worth it? Is it worth the work?” So I could ask her questions, even in the psychology of dating someone who’s a detective. What are they bringing home? What are they not telling me? How many walls do I have to break? Are the walls breakable? I mean, there was a whole lot of research I got to do into the minds and hearts of this dynamic on screen. It was really helpful.

Cross is now streaming on Prime Video.

TV series based on James Paterson’s Alex Cross novels. Alex Cross uses forensic psychology to analyze killers’ minds, delving into victims’ psyches to identify murderers and bring them to justice.Cast Aldis Hodge , Jennifer Wigmore , Mercedes de la Zerda , Sharon Taylor , Siobhan Murphy , Stacie Greenwell , Ashley Rios , matthew lillard Creator(s) Ben Watkins Writers Ben Watkins Streaming Service(s) Prime Video Franchise(s) Alex Cross

Watch on Prime