Warning: SPOILERS for Perry Mason Season 2, Episode 5, a.k.a. “Chapter Thirteen” are ahead!
Perry Mason Season 1 saw Gayle Rankin’s Emily Dodson being put on trial for the death of her infant son, Charlie, and while viewers ultimately knew that she didn’t have anything to do with the crime, her story nonetheless had a tragic ending. For Season 2, it’s brothers Rafael and Mateo Gallardo, respectively played by Fabrizio Guido and Peter Mendoza, who the HBO show’s title character is defending, except unlike Emily, the Gallardos committed the crime for which they’re on trial: murdering philanthropist Brooks McCutcheon. The brothers’ actors have now shared their reactions about this big twist to CinemaBlend, as well reflected on shooting the Gallardos-focused flashbacks in Season 2’s fifth episode.
I had the pleasure of speaking with Fabrizio Guido and Peter Mendoza ahead of tonight’s Perry Mason episode, but before asking them about how “Chapter Thirteen” progressed their characters’ arcs, I wanted to learn how they reacted when they learned that Rafael and Mateo shot Brooks McCutcheon. They voiced their thoughts thusly:
“Peter Mendoza: It felt like for a while, it was kept under lock and key. We knew some specifics of someone died and one of us maybe holds a responsibility, but we don’t know. And so it was very much Casablanca; like every episode was a new embellishing of the history of how we got here, so maybe that was why they did that, to create this truthfulness from us so that we didn’t give away any specifics about how we got here... All these ideas were being thrown around, so we just didn’t know which area we were going. It was like a big, whole jigsaw puzzle, but at the end, it was exciting, it was shocking, it was surprising, and it was like, ‘Oh, but what do we do with this now? Where do we go? How does that influence our performance going on?’
Fabrizio Guido: I was shocked, I was excited for the series, I was excited to watch how the storyline would play knowing that I knew it was going to take us into a direction that fueled more excitement for us. We got something bigger to chew on, something bigger to bite on with the series. But obviously as soon as I head that, I was like, ‘Ok, I will see you guys, I am gonna go do some character work and try to figure this out, because I know it’s about to be a huge undertaking.’”
So we know for a fact that Rafael and Mateo shot Brooks McCutcheon, but what hasn’t been revealed is why. While the Gallardo Brothers initially claimed they did so because their attempt to rob Brooks went wrong, it was revealed at the end of “Chapter Twelve” that Mateo had hidden $2000, i.e. the amount of money he and Rafael were paid to carry out the killing. Matthew Rhys’ Perry Mason now has that money for safekeeping, and he, Della Street and Paul Drake also learned in “Chapter Thirteen” that the brothers were paid to for the hit by Ozzie Jackson, a middleman for an unknown man who has a drug-addicted wife. So while a few more pieces of this puzzle have fallen into place, we’re still a ways off from seeing the completed image.
“Chapter Thirteen” was also notable for providing some tastes of what Rafael and Mateo’s lives were like before they killed Brooks McCutcheon, starting with a flashback to when Mateo proposed to his girlfriend Sofia on the construction site for McCutcheon Stadium as Rafael watched. Here’s what Peter Mendoza and Fabrizio Guido had to say about their experience shooting this uplifting moment:
“Peter Mendoza: It felt like we were just kids in a playground, and everybody was just shooting us. For so long, we had either been working at the jail or in the courtroom with Matthew Rhys and Chris Chalk and Juliet [Rylance], but here was a chance for us to have fun, play, let go, show more about our characters that maybe we are also discovering at the same time. So it was like we were playing tag and running and hiding, and it was just so exciting that we had the whole coliseum to ourselves, and how it was so big and overwhelming, and yet so awe-inspiring. I felt to much gratitude because that whole night was so much fun, it didn’t feel like work. So just the chance to touch on different aspects of the humanities, this family that’s just trying to do what they can to survive, making promises that maybe they can’t keep because they know that they need each other. So here was a moment when as much of the chaos of the world is starting to come down on them, they can enjoy little moments of respite, of faith that’s promised for the future, something to look forward to. I was lovely just to be able to share that.
Fabrizio Guido: What stuck with me was really that joy that we found in that moment, and this feeling of, like, things are bad, but I felt like there was this moment of… well, life goes on. You address the way you feel, but for them, life goes on, and we’re going to find the joy in this moment and make the best out of it. Because that’s what these people do, they’re resilient, and they found that joy in that moment. Mateo had the intention to propose, and I knew that. We knew it was a special night.”
But with the good comes the bad, as McCutcheon Stadium was being built where the Gallardos used to live, and Perry Mason Season 2, Episode 5 showed how the family and their neighbors were forcibly driven out of their homes. This flashback ended with Rafael and Mateo’s little sister dying in the fire that burned their community to the ground and left Rafael with the scar on his neck from his attempt to rescue the girl. The actors said the following about what it was like shooting this intense sequence:
“Fabrizio Guido: It was a very important moment because… that moment is my emotional justification to go ahead and take part in this murder. That’s something that we feel justifies why we do what we do. It was also the moment where I have the scar that stays with me forever, the moment where I lose my little sister. It was such a big scene and just being there, you just feel the history and how these things have actually happened throughout history. You’re living this moment and you just know it’s important and you want to do the best job. In scope, it was so grand. I’ve been saying before that being able to watch Peter, the police, the fire, my mother screaming, knowing I have to run back for my little sister, this is all happening at the same time, it’s not something that was done very isolated. This scene just unfolded so it was this beautiful, almost like a wide moment where you’re in this moment and you get to soak in and experience everything, as opposed to just being tight and just acting, but no, this was all actually happening.
Peter Mendoza: I think the chaos of all of it was insane. There was so much happening, there was a lot of buildup because we didn’t shoot this until the evening as the sun was going down. So we had a lot of time to just gestate and sit with what was about to happen. And I think in our own way, we were all trying to prepare for what this called for, and yet when you were there, it felt so easy to just fall into the desperation, the sacrifice. Here I am focusing on my future wife, and yet I neglect my sister and my duty as the older brother. Our mom and dad, they are looking at us to be able to take care of the family, and I drop the ball. Then my little brother goes in to run after her, and I realize and then I go in too late, and the only one that I can save is him, but I cannot save him from the scar that both reminds me of my inability and his lack of protection. To know that we’re now in the jail always confronted with that truth that we cannot let go, we failed. I failed, I failed all of them, I didn’t do my duty because I was focusing on what I thought was important to me [and] Sofia, but yet I neglected my family that now I’m almost having to make up for it because of what happened that day.”
Peter Mendoza added that Perry Mason’s depiction of the Gallardos and their neighbors being “ripped” from their homes is an accurate reflection of how Latino Americans were treated during the Great Depression, especially in Los Angeles. Fabrizio Guido then noted how all the freeways that are present in LA were a result of communities being “torn apart” during this period in history, so there was a “huge responsibility” for the people working on the HBO series to properly show such a moment. So now viewers have more context behind why Rafael and Mateo agreed to kill Brooks McCutcheon, and there are three episodes left to go for the rest of this mystery to be solved.
New episodes of Perry Mason premiere Mondays at 9 pm ET on HBO and can be streamed afterwards with an HBO Max subscription. Keep track of other current small screen programming with our 2023 TV schedule.
