‘Law & Order: SVU’: J. Smith-Cameron on Benson’s Choice & What to Know About Gwen

“We don’t stop anything. We don’t prevent a crime from happening. We just pick up the pieces afterwards.” Benson’s (Mariska Hargitay) feeling a bit disillusioned about the system in the Law & Order: SVU Season 28 premiere, and after a conversation with jury consultant Gwen (J. Smith-Cameron), she chooses to change how she’s fighting when it comes to the episode’s case (three men raped a young woman, but there’s a question about consent since she was voluntarily drunk). TV Insider spoke with J. Smith-Cameron about that and more. Warning: Spoilers for the Law & Order: SVU Season 28 premiere ahead!

While Benson thinks they have a strong enough case, Gwen warns her to prepare herself — and she’s right to. The judge declares a mistrial when the jury is hopelessly deadlocked. Carisi (Peter Scanavino) immediately makes it clear that he wants to retry the case. As the victim, Emily (Lizzy Declement), points out to Benson, it’s messed up that the truth doesn’t always matter.

Right after that, Benson runs into Gwen, who came to see if she wanted to drown her sorrows. At the bar, Gwen points out that she chose SVU, not anti-crime, when Benson speaks about only being able to pick up the pieces after a crime — and the fact that even 30 years in, the jury still gets to decide that if a woman drinks too much, she deserves to be raped. When Gwen asks how she deals with it, Benson brings up how her old partner used violence, which took a toll on him, too. Gwen admits she has a personal history with the type of crime Benson investigates (but doesn’t share more) and, after the captain assures her she’s not ready to quit, advises her to fight differently.

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And so that’s what Benson does, getting one of the men to flip on the others by arresting his mother for tampering, obstruction of justice, and conspiracy to commit rape — and by going through the new ADA Hawkins (Jelani Alladin), who Carisi’s not exactly a fan of. (It works, and the other two men are found guilty of rape in the first degree; the one who testifies agrees to a plea of guilty of rape in the second degree.) The man takes the deal. Carisi, however, is not happy with Benson.

“You think you’re the only person who cares about these victims and so you push and you push and you push until you get what you think is justice,” he says. She argues that someone has to. The two remain at odds when the episode ends.

Below, J. Smith-Cameron introduces Gwen, discusses her dynamic with Benson, and more.

We know how Benson feels about the system, especially when it comes to cases like what we saw in the premiere. She says they just pick up the pieces, they don’t prevent crime. But how does Gwen feel about this system and what she sees as a jury consultant?

Smith-Cameron: She doesn’t have as much faith in the system as I think Benson feels she should because she’s throwing all of herself into it and it’s an all-consuming job. I’m speaking of Benson. And I think Gwen is a little more self-protective and has put herself in a kind of job where she can pick and choose what she wants to work on. She is a jury consultant some of the time, and we come to find out she does some pro bono things. She’s able to make choices that she can live with herself over. So she doesn’t maybe feel quite as battered as Benson has come to feel by it.

And I think all of us feel it’s such an imperfect thing, the justice system. It’s very tricky. It’s very punishing. All of us, even people who don’t work in that line of work. So I think that the two women really can relate to each other. They’ve chosen slightly different paths and Gwen is a little older and has a different temperament for facing these things because she is able to just… I think what I understand from Michele [Fazekas, showrunner] as we go along, we’ve now shot a couple of other episodes, that she’s able to pick and choose ways to contribute that she feels she will be successful at, which is a different situation than the kind of public servant that a police captain is.

What makes Gwen approach Benson? How much does she know about her before she does?

Well, I don’t want to share any spoilers because we find out more and more about her as the season goes on. So she is a jury consultant, but she does some other things and she does have a kind of ulterior motive beyond what we learn in the first episode. It’s interesting.

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Michele told me that Gwen is a peer for Benson, someone she can talk to when she’s feeling disillusioned. And I was going to ask what Benson is to Gwen then, but does that factor in what you were just talking about, the motive she has to approach her?

When I shot this episode that we’re speaking of, I hadn’t read the episode where I found out more about her either. So I don’t know. I feel like they, as kind of corny as this may seem, I think they just had unexpected chemistry. They really hit it off and I think from what I gather from what Mariska said is I think she was feeling the need for a kind of confidant, mentor-type character who she could unload on and be advised or compare notes with who wasn’t her partner, wasn’t working with her. And so I think that must feel like a kind of respite for her.

And as for what Gwen is getting out of it, I mean, Benson’s a very, very fascinating character and I think she learns in their scene in the bar, that Benson’s a very deep feeling person. She’s not just a hard-boiled detective and she really cares. And I think Gwen finds that she has a lot in common with her that maybe she didn’t expect. I think they both do is what I’m saying.

What about Gwen’s opinion of the rest of the squad and Carisi? How much are we going to see of her with them?

I think that she has in her career come up with some conflict from police in the past. And so I think she’s a little wary and she wants to see what kind of human being Olivia is and whether she’s going to be just defensive about things or whether she’s going to be open to thinking about things another time around and that kind of thing. I have another television job that I had prior, so I’m not sure how many more episodes I’ll get to begin, but I hope plenty because it’s an interesting character that’s beginning to prove to have many applications. So I think it’ll be really interesting because she is a jury consultant, but she has some other tricks up her sleeve, too. So that will be revealed in the fullness of time.

So she wants to get a feel for Benson completely first before she expands to everyone else kind of because it’s like who Benson is says a lot about the people in her life too?

Yes, I think you could say that.

That scene in the bar is so great. And Gwen mentioned she has a personal history with the type of crimes that Benson investigates, but it’s a story for another time. So at this point though, does she feel like Benson is someone she would open up to about that or is she waiting to get to know her before she decides?

I pick B, I think. I mean, I don’t know either because when you work on television, these things are revealed to the performers gradually, too. And I think the writers are going, “Oh, you know what? We have kind of unexpected chemistry between these two actors. Maybe we go further in this direction, or vice versa.” So I think that remains to be seen. But I think that yes, I think she’s definitely testing the waters to see if Benson and she are people who can trust each other and relate to each other before she gets involved with the whole outfit over there.

And it sounds like whatever it is is going to be something big.

Yeah. And just to go there to talking about it again, whatever it is. I mean, I have my imagination, but I don’t know yet if we are going to hear about that at least anytime soon. So yeah, I think that she’s a very private person, too. She says that thing about, “I couldn’t do this kind of work you do day in and day out.” So she’s very self-protective and I’m sure that whatever happened is a big part of why she’s protective in general.

Gwen advises Benson to fight differently, and we see how Benson decides to do that in this case when she arrests one of the men’s moms to get him to flip on the others. Do you think that’s what Gwen meant for her to go do? How would she feel about Benson’s choice there?

Well, I can only say how I felt as the actor. I do think she was saying, “Pull the stops out.” And I don’t know how many details of the… We see this scene after it started, in a way. I think we have to take some of that for granted. I don’t know how explicitly she’s saying do exactly that move, but I think she’s saying you play by the book, not just the laws, but the house rules of the NYPD. And maybe you need to, I don’t know if ruthless is the right word, but just be willing to be a little messier.

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Because in a way, Benson has more experience in the SVU cases, but I feel like Gwen has a very different perspective of the justice system and the idea of things that work, things that don’t. And because Benson to bring up like, “Oh, my old partner used to do this.” But it seems like Gwen’s like, “You can go somewhere near there, but in your own way.” And that kind of seems the way that Benson is going, right?

Yes. Yes. That’s well put.

Yeah, because Gwen is so good at reading people because she has to be as a jury consultant, right?

Yeah. I think she’s maybe that kind of person. Michele told me that she based this on a real person that she had come in contact with in her own life that was just very singular. And she could have been a therapist or an author. She was intuitive and very sensitive, just very ultra-sensitive about people. So there’s a lot of leeway for how interesting the character might turn out to be, I think. It’s quite an opportunity because you don’t think of… Police are kind of going by the book. They have to scrutinize about what they can use that will hold up in court, all the things that are true in procedurals that are so fascinating, why we like to watch them. But to have someone who’s also maybe thinking of it as a novelist would, or a screenwriter would, or a therapist would, or I don’t know, an actor would, not thinking in terms of being bound by the same rules, but just thinking in terms of like, “Yes, but never mind that. Let’s just shut our eyes and concentrate. What could have been this motive or what do you think that felt like to have that job for that person?” I mean, the mind reels. There’s all kinds of opportunities to think that way. And I don’t think police detectives really are supposed to think that way. I think they’re very much like just the facts, ma’am. And I think it’s kind of a good opportunity for Benson. They’re a little bit yin and yang, the two women. So I think that’s an interesting possible friendship.

When you brought up the therapist part, that made me think, because during that conversation in the bar, at one point I was saying, I was like, “Gwen could have been a therapist.”

Yeah.

So far with this episode, it does feel like Benson and Gwen are on the same page mostly. Can you say if we’re going to see any moments of them clashing? Is anything like that? Or are we really seeing just this friendship developing?

I think we see some clashing, or clashing might be too strong a word. I think we see some pressing each other about what they’re doing, which is good. I think that conflict makes drama. So I’m glad it’s that way or it seems to be going that way.

Oh, and I can’t wait to see that because you and Mariska are so good together on screen.

Oh, thank you. I’m just crazy about her. I admire her so much. I really do.

What can you tease about what we’re going to see from Gwen going forward?

I hope so. I think that we’re going to find out she’s not simply a jury consultant, that she does a variety of work and perhaps works for pro bono cases like Innocence Project type situations. She’s in a position in life. You could just tell by her wardrobe that she makes money. She doesn’t feel like she has to dress for court. She dresses to please herself and just everything’s very though out with this character so far, I think. Michele and our costume designers and the whole thing is quite interesting, it seems to me, especially for a procedural-type show. And I think it’s just going to be refreshing to see someone from a whole different world, but who has a lot of common territory, a lot of crossover territory. I think it’s going to be interesting to see them interact.

Have you stepped foot on the squad room set yet?

Yes, I have. I can tease that. … There’s, I think, more and more applications for who Gwen is, what their relationship is, how they can help each other, how it can be mutually beneficial. But I think it’s not mutually beneficial without some demands made on each other.

Law & Order: SVU, Thursdays, 9/8c, NBC