[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for the Law & Order and SVU crossover, “Play With Fire.”]
Law & Order and SVU team up to track down a serial rapist and murderer in a crossover event.
It’s personal for both Benson (Mariska Hargitay) and Brady (Maura Tierney): One of the victims is the young girl the former rescued who then became a cop, Maria, and another is an unsolved case of the latter’s. It soon becomes clear that the man responsible is none other than Maria’s lieutenant (Reinaldo Faberlle) — who then sends someone to Benson’s son’s school and approaches him. Benson, of course, is pissed; Stabler (Christopher Meloni) appears in one scene to make sure the man who went to Noah knows never to go anywhere near her or him again. In the end, Price (Hugh Dancy) and Carisi (Peter Scanavino) successfully team up in court to get a guilty verdict.
Below, Dancy unpacks the crossover and teases what’s ahead in the Law & Order season finale.
When Cassie doesn’t want to testify, Baxter (Tony Goldwyn) says they’ll subpoena her if they have to. How does Price feel about that?
Hugh Dancy: I think he feels pretty unconflicted about it. For Benson, in this storyline in particular, everything is very personal and she’s seen one person who she had mentored go out and lose their life, and she doesn’t want there to be another collateral victim in this case, even if it’s not literally losing her life. This is a woman who stands to lose all the lifestyle that she’s built up and the new life that she’s made for herself. But that doesn’t stand up legally. It’s collateral damage, but it’s against the needs to put away somebody who needs to go away for a very long time. So I don’t think Price is conflicted about that.
And also just at this point in his career, he can fully understand all of that.
Yeah, we moved through that fairly quickly, but I think other points in this season, for example, we’ve had the time to dwell on that kind of thing longer. That, for me, is when the show gets interesting, in those gray areas. You don’t want the characters to be just exceedingly gung-ho all the time, but they’re not bleeding hearts either, right? It’s a constant evaluation of what’s required.
And those scenes are always good with Price, Sam (Odelya Halevi), and Baxter, when it comes to the conflicts.
Yeah, I like it when the show gets very dry and legal, honestly. But I like that you need the counterpoint to that, which is people weighing up the human cost.
Virginia Sherwood / NBC
When Price suggests that Benson recuse herself after Gomez sends someone after her son, does any part of him actually think she would?
[Laughs] I mean, are you asking Price the character or Hugh the actor because on both levels? No, it seems very unlikely.
Asking about both, really. That’s such a good scene.
Oh, good. Yeah, I mean, I think you know how it’s going to go down, right? It’d be kind of surprising if Benson just vanished the second half of the episode. No. But no, I think as a suggestion, it’s a real one and he’s not doing it out of concern for her or propriety. He’s saying it out of concern for their case. She’s getting roped into it in an ever more personal way, deliberately by the defendant. He knows the buttons that he’s pressing and he knows that that’s going to make trouble for us down the line in the courtroom. So that’s what Price is getting at.
And I like that Price is someone who can go toe to toe with Benson because not many people can.
Yeah, I like that, too. I kind of think in a way [that’s] because we don’t work together all the time and as I say to her at the end of that scene, we’re both coming at this from exactly the same place on an emotional level. The goal is the same, but I’m not going to tread lightly around her feelings for that exact reason.
What was your favorite scene to film from the crossover?
I think it might have been that scene because I do like it when it bleeds over into, I suppose, the personal dynamic between them.
What else is coming up for Price after this crossover?
A well-deserved break. [Laughs] We certainly filmed two more — I can’t remember now if it was two or three more episodes subsequently. We just filmed the season finale, which I think will have people on their toes. It’s kind of interesting. And in fact, I was speaking to Martha Mitchell, who directed the penultimate episode, the other night, and she was very excited about that. So I think we will go out strongly.
What can you preview about that finale?
It involves one of the characters in a much more personal way than they had originally anticipated, and ultimately, in a way that has me questioning whether I know that person or not.
What else can you preview specifically for Price and how the season leaves him?
Price is left in place of not knowing whether he really knows his colleagues the way he thought he did. I suppose on another level, he is forced to balance up his commitment to the specifics of the law versus a more general sense of getting the right outcome, especially when one of the people concerned is somebody that he knows and cares for.
We had the great stuff with his family earlier this season. Is there anything else coming up with that this season or is that for next season?
No, not family-wise. I hope that we might down the line get another chance to dip into that.
What are your hopes for Price in a Season 25?
I still feel like we’re feeling out the shape of the show in 2025, what is our iteration of this show? Obviously Law & Order is always going to be Law & Order, but I think there’s space, and in this season we’ve taken up that space a little bit, for the show to involve the characters on a more personal level rather than just like, here’s another case. I think that only helps the show, and I think it’d be interesting to lean a little bit more into that. I wonder if the show could sustain storylines that stretched beyond one episode. I have no interest in killing off that structure that works so beautifully and so well. But I think we’ve also maybe earned the chance to play a little.
Are we going to see you on SVU or Organized Crime at all going forward after this crossover?
Not this season, no. It’s quite a big logistical thing, having the two shows cross over like this. So that was that for this season. But should we find ourselves shooting another season? Yes, fingers crossed. I would love to.
Yeah, I would love to see Price and Stabler interacting in a significant way.
I know, we had one little brief moment a couple of years back, but not since then. Me, too.
Law & Order, Thursdays, 8/7c, NBC
Law & Order: SVU, Thursdays, 9/8c, NBC
This story originally appeared on TV Insider
