26 Nov 2014 2:52 PM PT
by Tonya Papanikolas on Nov 26, 2014
As “The Mentalist” prepares to debut its final season on CBS beginning this Sunday, the team behind its success is revealing what viewers can expect to see over the next few months. Creator Bruno Heller says being gifted with one last “encore” season allows them to give fans the strongest sendoff possible. Viewers will be treated to a lighter, happier season seven with an underlying focus on Jane and Lisbon’s relationship.
We got a chance to talk with Heller, along with stars Simon Baker and Robin Tunney. They dished on everything from season seven spoilers to the type of relationship we will see from Jane and Lisbon to favorite memories working together. And we can tell you this: These three clearly enjoy each other’s company. Throughout the interview they laughed a lot and joked back and forth. Baker continuously teased Heller while he tried to answer questions. Several times Heller apologized for taking his time to answer, saying Baker was razzing him in the background or whispering in his ear or even giving Heller nuts. And at one point Baker finished Tunney’s thoughts. Chemistry like this is undeniable. It’s one of the reasons the show has been such a success. And it’s a big reason fans can’t wait to see what lies ahead. So let’s get started. Here’s the scoop on season seven.
WHAT IS SEASON 7 ALL ABOUT?
Heller: Essentially this season is about what happens when life turns out the way you’d hoped. What happens when you do have a happy ending – what happens after that? Jane and Lisbon have been engaged in this epic journey for six years, trying to capture Red John, and now they’ve done that. How do you live again after that? How do you re-create a different kind of life? And leading on from the end of season six, how do you create a different relationship out of a relationship that was born in the kind of trauma that theirs was? This season is very much about the reconfiguring of that relationship that has been based on a mission, on a shared desire. That mission is now over and they have to find out: As much as they love each other, how can they live together? And what will they do with their lives?
Tunney: There’s also an aspect to Simon’s character that is really authentic the way they’ve explored it. Up until he caught Red John, that’s why he was there [working in law enforcement]. He wasn’t fighting crime because it was something he was born to do or wanted to do. He didn’t want to work in law enforcement. It was settling this personal score. And now he’s there and I think he’s wondering why he is there. And I think that’s a really interesting thing to explore because it’s honest to the character.
Heller: It’s also about a modern woman with a career that she loves that she has a great talent for. And now she’s being confronted with a potentially different life path. How do you give up that career if that’s the way you want to go? Or how do you combine love and work in this particularly intense form of work? It’s difficult.
Tunney: Because it defines you. It’s so much of your life. I think that Lisbon definitely feels like it defines her as a human being – what she does and not who she is.
WHAT KIND OF ROMANCE WILL WE SEE FROM JANE AND LISBON? ANY PUBLIC DISPLAYS OF AFFECTION?
Heller: These two are never going to be “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf” because that’s not who they are. Both Jane and Lisbon are private, self-contained, protective people. So it’s a love story – but it’s not a very conventional love story. It’s a love story that is consonant with the relationship they’ve had, which is the interesting thing about it. When we started, it was very much… brother/sister is the wrong way to describe it, but it’s that kind of familial affection that over time has turned into something more. That, to a degree, makes the romance harder for both characters to negotiate because they’re not fiery, passionate, crazy people. They’re people who need to work their way towards seeing how this will play out in the future. It’s a very sort of Jane Austen type of romance – the good ones in Jane Austen. The ones you devoutly wish to be consummated [are] between two people who have known each other for years, and you can see that they’re made for each other – not in a fiery, kind of crazy way. But just in a human, gentle, correct way.
Tunney: Yeah, season seven is not “50 Shades of Grey” done by “The Mentalist.” It’s sort of interesting because they are two people who don’t know how to be in a relationship. They’ve both been alone for such a long time. And [we’re] sort of exploring two people who are adults, who’ve only been responsible for themselves and haven’t really shared their life with anybody in a very long time – what it feels like to sort of explore that intimacy, [including] that it’s uncomfortable.