Mrs. Davis' Jake McDorman on Finding Real Drama in a 'Hyper-Real' Finale

[Warning: The following contains spoilers for the Season 1 finale of Mrs. Davis, "The Final Intercut: So I'm Your Horse." Read at your own risk!]

Nothing says Mrs. Davis like near-death by roller coaster.

Peacock's divinely unpredictable series almost sent Wiley (Jake McDorman) loop-de-looping to his grave in the season finale. "The Final Intercut: So I'm Your Horse," written by co-creators Tara Hernandez and Damon Lindelof and directed by Owen Harris, follows Wiley through the Pyramid Facility, where he's prepared to die in payment for the shortcut he took to earn the algorithm's wings. He talks a good game about how sure he is that Mrs. Davis is just faking him out, but the more Transition Assistant Dani (Sherri Saum) insists he's really dying today, the clearer it becomes that Wiley believes her. By the time he's strapped into "the apparatus" — a roller coaster designed to offer a "pain-free and euphoric death" — the former rodeo cowboy has accepted his fate and is ready to ride the bull.

As Wiley stares death in the face, Simone (Betty Gilpin) is doing the same, bracing herself to drink from the Grail. Their separate adventures in self-sacrifice collide when they both find themselves in Jesus' (Andy McQueen) restaurant, marking Wiley's first meeting with his ex-girlfriend's husband. Wiley and Simone share a loaded goodbye on another plane, each of them aware it could be their last.

But Mrs. Davis is conning Wiley after all: The roller coaster doesn't kill him. The whole experience is designed to shock Wiley, who once stamped himself with an expiration date to deal with his imposter syndrome, into believing his life is worthy, and it works. He ditches his cowboy boots and leaves the Pyramid ready to start fresh. Society will have to do the same: Simone has destroyed the Grail, and Mrs. Davis holds up her end of the bargain by shutting herself off. Wiley satisfies Mrs. Davis' last wish by bringing Simone her horse — also very much not dead — and the pair ride off into the sunset as the world copes with life after the algorithm.

For McDorman, the show's ability to mine that much emotion from a roller coaster is a sign of its unique power. "It's another toy in the Mrs. Davis toy box that's like, 'What the f---?'" the actor said. "But by the time we got to it, it was devastating." McDorman spoke to TV Guide about riding the coaster, asking Jesus about a hashtag, and the way Wiley's signature look almost changed after his near-death experience.

I've had so much fun watching this season. I'm sad it's over.
Jake McDorman: I'm so excited people are able to finally see it, because trying to describe it is so hard.

Especially the finale — even with people who are watching, there's so much you can't say until they've seen the finale.
McDorman: I rode the roller coaster of euthanasia.

What did you think when you found out a roller coaster was going to be the thing that almost killed Wiley?
McDorman: We shot this whole entire season out of order, which isn't uncommon or anything, but for a show like Mrs. Davis, it makes it even crazier. So Tara and Damon, because we were having to do these episodes before we knew what preceded some of them, gave me and Betty a beat sheet. It was basically detailed outlines for a couple of episodes in the middle of the season, and then for the last two, it was just bullet points. Reading "roller coaster of euthanasia" in a bullet point was probably even weirder than reading it in the script in context. Trying to summarize a Mrs. Davis episode with keywords, like "roller coaster of euthanasia," "Holy Grail," "Holy Grail is a skull," "Mary's behind the door" — all of these different plot points were really surreal to read in that format. But it was great. It felt like the spirit of the show somehow. And this is a testament to everybody, certainly Tara and Damon's scripts, but if I were to get that situation out of context, I'd be like, "There's no way you could play real drama here." It's a roller coaster. How would the stakes be grounded in any kind of realism so that you could get emotional for real when it's so hyper-real? And by the time we worked our way to the end of the season, we just cared about these characters so much, and the show did such a good job of leaning into the comedy but not pushing so far that you couldn't oscillate back towards some high stakes that so much of it was heartbreaking. 

Probably one of the things I love about the show the most is that we could put these characters that seem so bananas in these bananas yet life-threatening situations and still feel deeply emotional about it. Betty sets the tone with that. She blew me and everybody else away who worked with her on this, just how easily she could walk that line. Even when I read the script for the first time, I probably thought it leaned more into comedy. And it wasn't until I saw Betty inhabit the role that I realized how deep it could go. Having somebody like her as your lead sets that tone, and I really do think it raised the bar for all the other actors in the show to go, "Oh, we can take this as seriously as we can comedically."

Wiley is right about so many things this season. He really has Mrs. Davis figured out even when he's not sure if he does. How much do you think Wiley believes that he's not going to die, and how much of it is denial?
McDorman: This was a long conversation I had with both Tara and Owen Harris, who did our first two episodes and our last episode, and Episode 5. At the end of Episode 7, Wiley realizes he's been running his whole life. He has this fear of being perceived as a coward, and as far as he thinks he's run in the opposite direction, he's still operating from this place of fear. That really congealed for me in Episode 7. That last scene where he turns himself in to the Pyramid, even in the text, just felt like the first real shift where he realizes Mrs. Davis can't really be beat. She's gotten the better of them. It's the right thing to do to set these guys free. Even in opposition to Mrs. Davis, their lives are still centered around Mrs. Davis. So [he decides] to cut them loose and for the first time actually do something heroic, which is face the music. He made a rash decision out of weakness to go get his wings, and yeah, he got this expiration date that seems unfair for his age. But instead of trying to break the whole system to avoid atoning for that decision, he goes, "No, if I have to die, then I'm not going to run anymore. I'm going to do the thing. Walk in the building and see where this goes." 

So for me as an actor in Episode 8, I don't think he knew [he wasn't going to die]. I think a lot of it was bravado, that he was like, "Oh, this is bullsh--." It's kind of his go-to place when he's scared, to overcompensate by being like, "You're full of sh--. I see you, this is a soundstage." But genuinely deep down, and you can see in the scenes with Dani as they go throughout the Pyramid Facility, his confidence gets worn down, worn down, worn down until he's in the seat, and I think he realizes, "No, I'm not opting out of this. And if it means I have to die, I have to die." But that was really important, because I was worried that if it was done carelessly it could undo the decision that I saw as his first real heroic decision in the series, which is to turn himself in at the end of [Episode] 7. And if he really thought there was no risk of him dying, then it was a lot less heroic.

I wasn't expecting Wiley to meet Jesus. Did you talk at all with the writers about why they wanted that meeting to happen?
McDorman: I knew that it was going to happen for a long time before I knew the context, which was exciting because otherwise I would not get to do any scenes with Andy. I didn't know how he was going to go to falafel — if Simone was going to grab his arm and transport him there through prayer or something crazy — but I thought the way that they keep it really vague and ambiguous was smart. Whether you're experiencing a life-threatening situation or prayer or even an orgasm, you can be transported to this astral plane. I'm not even sure when Wiley comes to if he has any memory of it. We didn't get really into the details of: What does it actually mean? Wiley's not religious, and the whole series, he has thought Simone is out of her mind for thinking she's married to Jesus, but he's going to play along because he loves her. We didn't want to pull on those threads too much. 

When they're in the restaurant, it really feels like Wiley thinks he's never going to see Simone again. Did you and Betty talk about what's going through your characters' heads there?
McDorman: Yeah, that was really important to how we played it. Betty and I talked about that a lot. These are two people who have known each other since being children, and they share a magic liver. This is another property of the show that I think is really cool: You have faith, and then you have an algorithm. Where is any kind of God or any kind of faith system in a world where all your prayers can literally be answered? It's the magic and the mystery of faith in a higher power and then the concrete answers of this algorithm, and the same thing goes for Wiley and Simone's relationship. Almost like a mirror image of Simone's relationship with Jay and her faith, Wiley believes in this pure, pure love for Simone, no matter how he tries to bury it, or how he tries to disguise it as "she's just the love interest of his story." I think he really, deeply, deeply loves her so much. And our show offers another literal explanation, like: How much of it is the mystery of what the heart wants versus "You guys share this Holy Grail liver! That's the connection"? 

So playing with the literal structure of that versus the emotional and irrational structure of that was really important for Betty and I, especially in that last scene, because she's about to do something that she thinks could kill her, which is sip from the Grail. And he's about to get on this roller coaster and do this thing that he believes could kill him. And the last time they saw each other I think they believed genuinely could be the last time they ever see each other, because both of them or one of them could die. The opportunity to be in front of each other in that moment, in this place that isn't on the planet, was an extra opportunity for them to say goodbye.

I laughed at Wiley asking Jesus, "How do you feel about 'hashtag blessed'?" Was that in the script?
McDorman: That was an ad-lib. It was so fun. I think every take, it was something different. You have, like, five seconds before Simone walks in. What would Wiley be talking to Jesus about? And "hashtag blessed" is what made it in. But it was so fun to f--- with Andy with that. It was honestly just free range to be like, "Go on, Jake. What would you ask Jesus Christ for the next five minutes?" "All right. How do you feel about 'hashtag blessed'? It's kind of cringe, right?"

How much of the roller coaster was built on set?
McDorman: Everything inside the Pyramid Facility was built on two sound stages at WB — the lobby, the intake room, and the roller coaster platform. All three were incredible sets. The roller coaster platform itself was this long metal catwalk that Sherri was standing on in the scene. They lit it from underneath the metal grates in the floor, and it was surrounded by these enormous blue screen curtains. The roller coaster cab was locked onto about 30 feet of track that they could pull me down using a cable. They also had one on a gimbal that was maybe 15 feet off the ground. I had to get into it using a ladder. It would pitch forward to simulate going over the first drop. Everything else was created by the VFK team in post.

I noticed that Wiley pulls his necklace out of the robe right before the roller coaster starts and holds on to it. Did you have a backstory for that necklace? 
McDorman: Tara and Damon hid tiny Easter eggs throughout every script of the season. There are beautiful little details that you only catch after a second or maybe even a third viewing, but this was one that I collaborated with the costume designer, Susie Coulthard, about in the weeks leading up to this episode. In fact, it started as we approached the seventh episode. Since the pilot, we had dressed Wiley in a chain necklace. It was actually my personal necklace. We liked it for the character, so I would just wear it to work. Then we got the script for Episode 7, where Wiley strips down to his underwear in the desert with JQ. Up until this point, [the necklace] had always been stuffed under my shirt. But now, we had this opportunity to finally feature what could be hanging from it. Maybe something from his parents, something about the rodeo. Then I thought, it's gotta be about Lizzie. He's always holding a candle for Lizzie. She is his safe place.

Susie and I dove into the internet — Etsy — and found a silver Queen of Hearts pendant. We pitched it to Owen and Tara — they loved it. So, in the last episode on the roller coaster, in what Wiley believes may be his final moments, he reaches down and grabs that pendant. Just to feel close to her one more time.

How the Mrs. Davis Finale Got Its Wings

This episode really hammers home the fact that wardrobe is a big part of Wiley's character. He doesn't want to take off the boots, and he also says he wanted to dress nautical on the boat. He kind of dresses like it's consciously a costume. Why do you think that Wiley's wardrobe is so important to him?
McDorman: I'm so happy you're bringing this up, because we talked about this so much — Susie and Owen and Tara and everybody. I mean, you've got your lead character in a habit almost 100 percent of the time, so it's the other characters that get to shake it up. But with Wiley specifically, it is this patchwork of different identities he's trying out. It's like the same way you act different ways around different groups of friends. Wiley just leans into it and really tries to almost siphon an identity off of each version of himself like that. We even at one point talked about the first time Simone gets the drop on Wiley and the resistance in Episode 2, and he walks her through Hippocampus and shows her the resistance, that somewhere in the background there would be mannequins with like five different versions of his red jacket, like they had tailored it and were working on the perfect thing to show up in to look impressive to your ex on a motorcycle. It was all very calculated. He has such an aversion to looking inward at all that he kind of latches on to whatever he's doing with whoever he's doing it with. 

We just couldn't do it because of the logistics of shooting out of order, but when he came out of the Pyramid Facility, we were talking about having him be clean shaven for the first time. But it was gonna be like, "What, do they have a razor there? Like, how'd that happen?" So logistically, it might have not made any sense. But he's this blank slate and is going to move forward from the end, finally, as someone who's at peace with who he is, instead of trying to try on all these different costumes. 

Do you think that Wiley reaches peace with Mrs. Davis in the end?
McDorman: I don't know. I think he's less concerned and has found a peace within himself. Whether he feels that he owes that to Mrs. Davis or whether he feels empowered and gets to take ownership of that himself is less clear. For the first time, he has the evidence that he needed that he can be whole and not constantly running. It feels like it traces back to that boardroom when he was about to go away with Lizzie and found out that this part of his whole identity was a fraud. He's never stopped trying to fight against that, and after the roller coaster and thinking he was going to die, he's really at peace with himself for the first time. Betty and I talked a lot, too, about two people's different independence in a relationship. They both really needed to break from each other and go on a quest, separate, to even begin to come back together and suss out what they are, or what they could be — if anything at all, if anything romantic or just friends. He goes through his crucible and she goes through hers. And on the other side of it, it feels like for the first time they can approach each other without the baggage from their past. 

Mrs. Davis is such a ubiquitous force in the world of Mrs. Davis that I really liked that the characters kind of hijack the story. Everything that she's capable of and everything that it, I guess I should say, has done and controls and claims to do, it kind of falls into the scenery in a good way. If the resistance really thought she was bringing people into the Pyramid to incinerate them, it's clearly not exactly what's going on. We don't really get, at least in this season, any reconciliation on that. Simone still thinks it's best to shut her down, and a deal's a deal. So that's where we end it, but what effect that will have on people, what effect that will have on the world, whether that was a good thing to do or a bad thing to do — we don't really know.

It ended at a point that opened up a lot of questions but also felt moving on its own.
McDorman: Damon and Tara were really clear on that from the jump, that this is a very contained story that has a clear beginning, middle, and end. But obviously, the world is huge, and the implications of what the characters do in this season of TV — albeit their personal journeys, all those loose ends are tied up — it opens up a whole entire world of possibilities for these characters or other characters in that world.

Mrs. Davis Season 1 is available on Peacock. For more on Mrs. Davis, head here for TV Guide's finale interview with co-creators Tara Hernandez and Damon Lindelof, star Betty Gilpin, and director Owen Harris.