Not too long ago, you experienced a soap hunk milestone: your first love scene. “I’m just glad you didn’t call it ‘lovemaking’ [laughs]. Every script says lovemaking or post-lovemaking and I’m like, ‘Oh, God, stop saying lovemaking! Please!’ ”
Well, how did it go? Were you nervous? “I wasn’t; I tried to reframe it in my head so that I wasn’t nervous, like, ‘It’s just another day at the office.’ And luckily, Eden [McCoy, Josslyn] is such a pro, she made me feel very comfortable with all this stuff because it is all very new to me. So, being able to do it with somebody that I’ve spent so much time around, that I’ve gotten to know and have gotten so comfortable with, made it a lot easier than it would have been if we didn’t get along as well as we do. And we had a wonderful intimacy coordinator who made sure we were both very comfortable with everything. So, yeah, I think it went well. It all went smoothly, without a hitch.”
How did you understand Dex giving in to his attraction to Josslyn, given that she had a boyfriend at the time in Cameron and all the complicated dynamics with Sonny and Michael? “I think the logic that guides him so much and that he normally follows told him not to, but obviously, he started falling for this girl a while ago, and that night, he almost loses her [to The Hook]. And to feel like he could have lost her, I think he just threw logic out the window. He’s like, ‘I can’t live without this girl.’ It was like, ‘All that matters right now is that I am here with this girl that I’m falling for, she almost lost her life tonight because I never got to make clear how I felt about that, and I don’t think I could live with that.’ He felt like he can live with the consequences [of sleeping with her] but he couldn’t live with losing her.”
A lot of viewers are really digging what’s building between Joss and Dex, but there are some fans online questioning why Dex would be so drawn to Joss, specifically because of how much time she spends lecturing him! What is your take on that? “I think he likes that she gives it back to him, that she stands up for what she believes in. He really admires that she’s not afraid to say what’s on her mind. He loves her honesty. I think that’s a really important thing in a partner, that even if it’s not what you want to hear, they are willing to tell you hard truths when they need to be told.”
And yet, Dex is not being honest with Josslyn; he’s hiding not only his true agenda where Sonny is concerned but also his alliance with Michael. “I think he battles with that pretty constantly because he does really care about Joss and really does want to explore the attraction that they both have [without secrets between them]. He wants the best of both worlds; he wants to be able to take Sonny down and take this dangerous man off the streets, but he also wants to explore whatever this relationship could be with Josslyn, so he’s trying to find a way to manage all of that. He’s battling in his brain because he’s like, ‘She’d be down for [Michael and Dex’s mission] and I wouldn’t have to lie anymore and that would further our relationship.’ But he also knows it’s safer for her not to be involved.”
