Patrick J. Adams and Sarah Rafferty look back!
PEOPLE has an exclusive first look at Rafferty and Adams Suits auditions — and their reactions to the footage — as they watch alongside casting director Bonnie Zane on their SiriusXM podcast, Sidebar: The Suits Watch Podcast. In the clip, Adams, who played Mike Ross, surprises Rafferty by first playing at her audition for Donna Paulsen.
“Bonnie brought with her, dear listener, our auditions,” he begins. “Sarah, I don’t know if you’re ready for this, mentally or emotionally. I’ve never seen him. She texted us earlier this week, we both didn’t watch, which is funny, we both independently said, ‘Thanks a lot’, and we didn’t watch. And then we thought this might be, if deeply uncomfortable, a cathartic, cool thing to do together.”
As they played the video, Rafferty immediately reacted to the way she looked, saying: “Oh my God! Look at my hair!”
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After watching her read a short scene, Adams praised Rafferty’s performance and asked what it was like to watch.
“I’m frozen, I’m frozen,” she says. “Oh, God, my heart aches a little. God, I was young—I was young once! This is like the only time I’m going to say, ‘Yeah, I’d give that girl that part.'”
“Nice, yeah, 100%,” Adams replies. “I’m glad that’s your reaction because that’s how I feel.”
She then questions what Zane’s reaction was in the casting room to Rafferty’s audition, telling her to “be honest”.
“I loved the non-verbal,” explains Zane. “You just created a whole backstory and a cover story, and there wasn’t much to do for Donna in that audition because there wasn’t much in the pilot for Donna, and you took that. And the mistake actors make is, ‘Okay, I’ve only got five pages, I’ve only got three pages, I’ve got to make a meal,’ and you just laid it out for what it was: simple, great. And that’s probably what sparked the initial interest.”
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Reflecting on that period in her life, Rafferty reveals that she was considering quitting acting before she was cast suits, but she decided to give it another chance.
“I thought, ‘Yeah, I’ll just go, I’ll fly to New York by myself, I’ll take an Airbnb, let me try,'” she remembers. “‘It doesn’t work the usual way with testing, put it up on the flagpole, the pilots don’t pick up, you know, the thing happens, so let’s try this.'”
“I’m glad you tried,” Adams interjects.
Sarah Rafferty and Patrick J. Adams.
Shiloni village
Rafferty also says that at that audition, she could sense there was “something more to this character” that went beyond the script, and after she got the part, she was able to explore more deeply who Donna thought she was.
“[It’s] actually one of those things that, in an audition, is useful, because it shows that there’s more story to be told here,” notes Adams. “Then you go into a shade like, ‘Well, now we have a whole show.'”
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He then pulls out his own tape, joking that they ran out of time to play it. Looking at himself more than ten years ago, he recalled preparing for the audition.
“I bought this suit just for this audition — I still have it,” Adams says. “It doesn’t fit, not even close, but I remember going and spending a fair amount of money on a suit and not having any money to spend. But I said, ‘I need a really, really grown-up suit.'”
The scene was longer than Rafferty’s and featured Mike trying to get hired by Harvey Specter, who ended up being played by Gabriel Macht. When he finishes, Rafferty and Zane applaud Adams as he exclaims, “Woah. Woof.”
“I’m kind of speechless,” he says. “I’m so proud of that little guy… I’m so nervous. And you said you don’t see it, and I see you don’t see it, I know how nervous I am. I know I’m in that room and I know that part of the gig doesn’t look nervous when you’re actually super terrified.”
“It’s fun to watch,” he adds before Rafferty says, “But also, it fuels your auditions, it fuels your performance. You use it.”
“Yeah, I use it rather than trying to deny it,” he agrees. “I accept that he would be nervous too, but he is also determined to get this job. And I’ve talked about it before, I see this thing that I do where I’m like, ‘I can just ask this room full of people for this job the same way Mike is asking Harvey for a job.’ ”
Zane then revealed that he “was cast straight away” and that they weren’t looking for anyone else to take on the role.
“Oh my God, that’s great,” Adams says.
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Suits is available to stream on Netflix.
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Source: HIS Education