The Irrational continues to be a fan favorite. With new and intriguing storylines, it’s always a pleasure to see what’s next for Alec and the team. We take on weddings, plagiarism, and a grizzly new case this week. Here is the synopsis for tonight’s episode, and a little sneak peek:
Alec and Marisa attend a wedding of the daughter of a mutual friend that’s located inside a foreign embassy, where the father of the bride has been ensconced for diplomatic reasons. Their night off quickly turns into a murder investigation. 204 “Formal Ties”
To preview tonight’s episode, we spoke with Molly Kunz, aka Phoebe. When we last saw Phoebe, she was adjusting back to her life and working as an RA for a different professor, who, I might add, is not so ethical. I mean, for all the professors complaining about students plagiarizing work, it is rich to see it be the other way around. Anyway, we asked Molly all about Phoebe’s current predicament. Read below!
Your character has had quite the journey from the beginning of the show till now. Can you walk us through your process when approaching the duality of Phoebe wanting to be a stellar RA but also realizing that succeeding at work and being almost giddy about being right means solving some gruesome mysteries?
Molly Kunz: I guess it’s interesting to see how she is trying to figure out what is right for her and how she can best do her job and be the happiest because I think she loves her work. So, she gets excited about solving, you know, solving the mystery and getting the right answer, but at what point does she have to acknowledge that she ignores her inner voice and maybe her mental health, and how much of herself is she shutting down to only focus on work? And where’s where’s the balance there? And I’ve loved exploring that storyline because I think it applies to all of us.
Speaking on that, I asked your co-star Arash this: What’s the process like in terms of understanding the psychological lingo and grittiness of the show?
MK: Now and again, I do have to look something up, but I think what’s cool is we’ve learned a lot as we go. So many of these terms now, like I do know what they mean. And, um, I’ve picked up a lot of that information. So, yeah, it’s not the challenge that you might expect it to be, I guess.
Do you feel like you could go to a university and pose as a real RA for a little bit?
MK: *laughs* Maybe not an RA, but I mean, I studied psychology in college as well. So, I have taken a lot of the courses that the show is teaching.
As someone doing a psych minor right now, the show feels like sitting in class – a good class, of course!
MK: Yeah, I had like a lot of developmental psych classes that I loved.
Luckily, I went the social psychology route, not Neuroscience, regarding my minor.
MK: Uh, because you are avoiding organic chemistry?
Like, I don’t have to take it, and I’ve heard horrible things about organic chemistry. I think I would cry. Anyway, right now, Phoebe is taking a mental health break, which, in this profession, I feel should be STRONGLY encouraged. What can you tell us about this new drama with the not-so-ethical professor and what’s coming for her in episode 4?
MK: I think that Phoebe is now confronted really directly with the dilemma of, like, again, how to do what’s right? Her whole life, she’s believed that what’s right is listening to authority, and if someone, you know, if your teacher tells you to do something, you do it, and in Phoebe’s case, you do it exceptionally well. Um, I think that this is an interesting internal battle for Phoebe – to figure out how to actually listen to her intuition and her gut when it isn’t what she’s been told is the right thing to do her whole life. So, if her gut is saying, this is wrong, and I should stand up against this person and, or out them, you know, that would also be like sabotage for herself and her own career, too. Is she willing to take that hit when her career means so much to her? So, I think we see her wrestle with, you know, what she should do in the next episode.
With the professor storyline, do you think we will see Phoebe gravitate back toward Alec and the team throughout this season? We know she has been keeping in touch with Rizwan.
MK: I think she misses the team, um, and we even see her find little ways to kind of, you know, mosey on back to Alec’s office. You know she wanders in, “Oh, hey Rizwan. What are you up to? Yeah, I’m just… oh, do you need help with those papers? I have nothing to do, you know?” I think she’s finding excuses to get back there because I think she does miss it, and she misses Rizwan, she misses Alec. Um, I think there’s a good chance she continues to try to find ways to not let that part of her life go.
Is there anything into this season that you are hoping happens, maybe sharing screen time with somebody you haven’t had very much screen time with or, you know, something for your character, for something for the show in general? Any hopes?
MK: I’m excited for the show. We have a really fun season ahead of us with our format. There are almost a lot of themed episodes, and I think it feels like a psychology class in that way this season, maybe more so than it did last season. Where, like, every episode is a class, and you are studying one particular phenomenon or psychological concept. So It’s good. I think that’s fun.
Just a final thought: give me one word you would use to describe your character’s journey so far.
MK: Hmmm, questioning.
The Irrational airs Tuesdays at 10/9c on NBC.
