Gabriel Basso refused to give in to pressure for The Night Agent S2 after show became one of Netflix's all-time biggest
The star of one of Netflix's biggest shows of all time was determined not to let the success of the first season impact his performance as he came back for round two.
Picture the scene: it's March 2023, and you're on the hunt for a gripping new series to sink your teeth in to. You spot a new arrival: a conspiracy thriller about a low-level FBI agent tasked with manning a phone that never rings.
Until one night, it does.
Advert
By the time the first episode of The Night Agent comes to an end, you're hooked. You and millions of others.
According to Netflix's Tudum, the series starring Gabriel Basso and Luciane Buchanan racked up 98,200,000 views and 803,200,000 hours of viewing, earning it a place in the top ten most popular shows ever on Netflix.
Looking back, Basso remembers hoping that people would like the show, but he had no idea just how big it would be.
"On season one, specifically, we had so many hiccups along the way of, 'what is this show?'," he told LADbible. "We were trying to figure out what it was as we were making it, so it was a little stressful.
"It was a big, sort of 'proud dad' moment for me to see how much the crew went through, see how much the cast went through, the writers and [creator] Shawn [Ryan], and then see how well it did. It was just a really cool moment for me to appreciate it, but you don't know that it's going to be big, you know?"
The Night Agent went on to be nominated at the People's Choice Awards, among others, but Basso tried not to let the excitement surrounding the return of his character, Peter Sutherland, get to him.
When asked if he felt any added pressure about coming back for series two of the TV show, Basso said: "I'm pretty good about prioritising narrative and the show. No matter how I feel about it, Peter is going to be Peter.
"So I wasn't going into it like, 'oh, I need to spend an extra hour in the hair and makeup trailer because more people are going to be watching this show'."
If anything, Basso said, the excitement around series two added 'extra kindling' for the cast and crew, saying: "It was a positive, because we knew that regardless of the tough nights, the brutal night shoots in winter, that people were going to enjoy the show and that it was going to be worth it."
Series two of The Night Agent sees Peter once again thrown into the thick of a conspiracy while working in a government agency completely shrouded in secrecy.
To help prepare for the role, Basso worked with technical advisors and people with knowledge of life in the surveillance industry, as well as undergoing weapons handling and fighting lessons.
The training helped Basso take on his own stunts in the show, though he admitted he was surprised by one thing he learned while researching the job.
The actor admitted he was 'shocked' by 'how boring it is'.
"It's just sitting there," he said. "Talking to these guys in real life - obviously I knew it wasn't [like], the 'President's life is at stake every single mission', but there is a certain amount of activity that you assume they get. And you'd be shocked talking to some of these guys."
That being said, however, Basso admitted: "They could be lying to me, and it could be classified."
Though the job might not be quite as exciting as Basso expected, he certainly gets his fair share of action in The Night Agent, and with a third series already confirmed, he's clearly not planning on slowing down any time soon.
The Night Agent series two is available to stream now on Netflix.
Topics: Netflix, TV and Film, Entertainment
Emily Brown