Chris Saunders/Netflix
Warning: This article contains spoilers for all episodes ofThe Beast in Me.
Did Nile Jarvis (Matthew Rhys) do it? That was the question that haunted author Aggie Wiggs (Claire Danes) for much ofThe Beast in Me. Did Nile kill his first wife?
The answer, as audiences discovered across the episodes, was yes. But for much of filming, star Matthew Rhys didn't know that to be true. "They were still figuring out the end," Rhys tellsEntertainment Weekly. "But I didn't need to know actually, because those moments, you're playing for real anyway. Whether you did it or not, it's kind of the same play. It's not like I'm some spider luring her into a web.
"I didn't mind that," Rhys continues. "I kind of liked it in a way because it takes away any preemptive cliché."
Chris Saunders/Netflix
Plus, for much of those first episodes, Rhys was far more focused on Nile's present bond with Aggie than he was with the real estate mogul's past.
"You need to believe that a friendship is forged in a real way where two people who, although they may not admit it, are incredibly similar," he says. "They have great similarities and have endured tragedy, and that pushes them together. If you don't believe that they can be friends, then I don't think the show works."
Rhys says he did eventually find out about Nile's guilt while they were still "early on" in filming, but it didn't change much for the actor. "He's never clean cut," he says of Nile. "I enjoyed the mess of it, because it's so human."
In the end, when Aggie sits across from Nile for the final time, she has to face the idea that she and this killer might not be so incredibly different.
"They really do connect," showrunner Howard Gordon says. "And I think when he says at the very end, 'I really liked you,' you believe it. You'll kind of feel for this guy even when he is turning the screw at the end."
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Rhys adds, "It's interesting. They find each other shaped by a number of circumstances. They both endured these enormous moments in their lives and it's [about] how the universe seemingly puts those people together."
Even if one of them is a sociopath.
The Beast in Meis streaming now on Netflix.
Read the original article onEntertainment Weekly
