After 12 seasons playing Howard Wolowitz on the massive hit sitcom The Big Bang Theory, actor Simon Helberg focused on voice acting work in animation, theater in Los Angeles, and indie films like Leo Carax’s Annette (2021) and Space Oddity (2022).
Helberg didn’t return to television until he was cast in the first season of Peacock’s Poker Face to play a rare, recurring character, FBI Agent Luca Clark. In two episodes, Helberg’s FBI agent crosses paths with Charlie Cale (Natasha Lyonne), and they aid one another in some pretty hairy life or death situations. There’s a frisson of chemistry between the two, but Cale’s life on the lam keeps her free of entanglements.
RELATED: Rian Johnson on the Difference Between “How Catch ‘em” Poker Face & “Whodunnit” Knives Out
In Season 2, the entirety of which is now streaming on Peacock, Clark has returned for three episodes where he yet again stumbles into Cale’s swirl of chaos and remains her advocate from inside the law. In the season-finale two-parter, “Day of the Iguana” and “The End of the Road,” Cale and Clark are swept into the violent machinations of the serial killing assassin known as the Iguana, aka Cale’s faux friend Alex (Patti Harrison). In a harrowing sequence practically ripped from the finale of Thelma and Louise, Clark saves Cale and their destiny’s continue to be intertwined.
NBC Insider sat down with Helberg to discuss the origin of the role, that big moment between Luca and Charlie in the finale, and what he hopes could happen next for them with a Poker Face Season 3 renewal.
Poker Face‘s Simon Helberg on playing Agent Luca Clark
While he knows a fair amount of the many guest cast who have appeared on Poker Face, such as his life-long friend Jason Ritter and his wife Melanie Lynsky, Helberg said he might have gotten on Lyonne’s and creator Rian Johnson’s radar for this role in the art house film, Annette.
“I did run into Natasha at some event right after Annette, and I had seen Rian was a big fan of Annette,” the actor recalled. “Natasha said to me, ‘Oh, hey, you were so good in that movie.’ And I said, ‘Thank you.’ And so I had a moment where that happened. And then not too long after that, I still had to read for [Luca] but I was very excited.”
Helberg said that the character of Agent Luca Clark was immediately exceptional on the page. “It’s such a unique character and I love to force myself into situations that might seem uncomfortable or new, and this was definitely a different kind of role for me,” he said of the sincere but slightly overwhelmed agent.
“The writing was just incredible, so I really wanted to play this kind of character. And early on, he didn’t have as many action sequences or car chases or explosions, but I could see there was like a real earnestness to him,” Helberg said. “Just playing an FBI agent who fumbles his way up that ladder seemed reasonable to me and exciting so that was the appeal. Then [add] Rian and Natasha, just everyone wants to be in their orbit.”
Initially booked for two episodes in Season 1, Helberg said he knew even then that was unusual for a murder mystery series where most of the guest stars end up dead. “I had a sense that there was a lot more to explore with Charlie and Luca and their paths would cross again, given that they have this sort of symbiotic relationship and help each other and get in each other’s way,” he said of their first season connection points.
RELATED: Poker Face Director Adam Arkin Takes Us Inside Season 2’s “Sloppy Joseph” (EXCLUSIVE)
When Season 2 was picked up, Helberg recalls the producers letting him know he would “probably” be back, but it wasn’t until he was formally told that Luca was written into three episodes that he knew the fate of his character.
It isn’t until “Whack-A-Mole” that Agent Clark returns, still working with the witness protection program of the FBI, and specifically Charlie’s nemesis, mob boss Beatrix Hasp (Rhea Perlman). As it turns out, Clark ends up telling Charlie that he has imposter syndrome because of her uncanny knack of touching cases that get him promoted at work.
“It’s an insight into him,” Helberg said of that particular confession. “It allows the audience to connect to him and it allows for him to be real. It takes away the mystique of these people for a moment and that’s the greatest gift as an actor, when you see that in the writing.
“But it’s all over the show and in all of the parts that I got to do, even in the first episode,” he continued. “We really understand who this guy is just from that one speech that he gives about feeling like he’s never achieved. He’s realizing [in “Time of the Monkey”] that all he had to do was put this old guy in a retirement home, but the guy got killed. You get a sense that this guy’s struggling. He feels like a failure. These are all human qualities and now he feels guilty that he’s got success because he doesn’t feel like he earned it in Season 2.”
Charlie Cale’s meltdown with Luca in Poker Face’s Season 2 season finale
Helberg said shooting Season 2 was particularly interesting because the episodes were shot out of order to accommodate guest director and guest actor schedules.
“It was a lot to actually keep track of as an actor, just technically shooting action and shooting things out of order. Then two weeks later, you’re shooting some moment running into a boathouse that you shot the end of earlier, on a different location on a freezing night,” he chuckled about keeping Luca’s arc straight in his own head. “Then, you’re on a soundstage at three in morning, so different kinds of things to juggle, but exciting.”
In the finale, one of his favorite scenes of Season 2 was when Luca saves Charlie as she’s dangling from a cliff, death almost certain. But when he pulls her to safety, Charlie allows herself a moment to be vulnerable and fall apart in front of this guy who keeps showing up in her life and helping her out.
RELATED: Poker Face’s “Day of the Iguana” Guest Stars Explained: Haley Joel Osment, Taylor Schilling
“It was really spectacular,” he said of the scene. “It feels like they’ve really teed up, in terms of the characters, that they’re in this impossible situation. They’re both sort of attracted and repelled by one another, given who they are and what they need and want. And you feel that in that moment, and you wonder, ‘Oh my God, how are they ever going to cross paths again?’ But of course, how are they not? We want to see that and yet it feels kind of tragic.”
Helberg said he was in awe of Lyonne watching her direct and act that fraught moment for their characters. “That was a crazy day — and it’s a testament to her as an actor and as a director — but that specific day, she had a really bad cold. It was probably 25 degrees outside and we were on the side of a cliff, for real. The [production] insisted on tethering us in with these harnesses, and she’s directing and acting. I was really impressed.
“It was just cool to be in that because you kind of have to surrender,” he said of the emotions that flowed out of Charlie’s emotional meltdown. “There’s just so much happening in that moment when you’re standing there. It felt like, for both of us, that there was nothing to do but surrender so that vulnerability, I think, is probably pretty genuine for what was going on.”
What could be next for Charlie and Luca in Poker Face Season 3?
As of now, Poker Face has yet to be renewed for Season 3, but “The End of the Road” certainly sets up a cliffhanger as Charlie is on the run again, but with serious charges of aiding and abetting hanging over her ginger mop.
Asked if he and Lyonne spitballed future scenarios for the future during the filming of the finale, Helberg said they never got around to that conversation. “I have no sense of whether we’ll be back,” he offered. “Obviously, the show’s tremendous and it’s been a big success so I would hope they get to do more. And I would hope that Luca comes back.”
RELATED: Who Voice’s Charlie’s CB Friend “Good Buddy” in Poker Face Season 2?
When Luca lets Charlie go with his his FBI jacket and a head start from the impending swarm of FBI, the events are seemingly setting up a Season 3 The Fugitive movie vibe, akin to that of Dr. Richard Kimble (Harrison Ford) versus his sympathetic U.S. Marshal pursuer, Sam Gerard (Tommy Lee Jones).
“I agree with The Fugitive analogy,” Helberg appraised. “Or, Catch Me If You Can. And it’s funny because I also have thought multiple times throughout [filming], ‘Oh, Luca is probably a pretty big fan of The Fugitive.’
“It’s just going to become so fraught,” he says of their characters. “I feel like there’s a lot there, especially from Rian’s brain and Natasha and all the writers. And I just selfishly want to see where these two end up.”
All episodes of Poker Face Season 1 and 2 are available on Peacock now.
