‘NCIS: Sydney’: Olivia Swann on That Major Mackey Reveal & Being Vulnerable With JD

[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for the NCIS: Sydney Season 2 premiere “Heart Starter.”]

All it took was Mackey (Olivia Swann) almost losing her job for her to open up on NCIS: Sydney.

Last we saw, it looked like Rankin (Lewis Fitz-Gerald) was involved in the kidnapping of J.D.’s (Todd Lasance) son. But, it turns out, he’s just another piece; his pacemaker was really so someone could listen in and it was hacked, putting him in a coma. He’s the only one who can give them any information, and they’re now stuck waiting for him to wake up (while the world thinks he’s dead). Meanwhile, Mackey reveals to JD while both are on the outs with their agencies that she has an almost 18-year-old son who lives with her mom. In the end, Mackey and JD do keep their jobs; the assassin (Georgina Haig) whom the latter had let go to trade for his son is recaptured, and that’s all anyone will remember.

Below, Swann talks about that major Mackey reveal, the ongoing case with Rankin in a coma, and much more.

This episode is definitely one of those good news, bad news situations. Good news, Ana is caught, but bad news, she’s just one piece of this puzzle that they have to solve. Because of that, how is Mackey feeling at the end of the episode?

Olivia Swann: I think there is a lot of trepidation. She’s just always kind of suspicious and so there’s always something, and it’s like you said, yes, they got the bad guy, but it’s only a bad guy, so there’s more to come. And I think she’s prepping herself for a fight, which I think is another very Mackey trait for sure.

Rankin might be their only possible lead to find whoever was behind everything, but is he a viable path to go down in Mackey’s mind at this point, or does she feel like they need to focus elsewhere and if he comes through, great?

I feel like she’s at a point where it’s like he’s the only option, but annoyingly they can’t talk to him. So I think yes, if other avenues do arise, then fantastic. But ultimately, they’re just kind of sitting around waiting for a man to come out of a coma, which is not ideal.

How does she feel about the Rankin of it given everything that happened in Season 1?

It’s frustrating because she built up an idea of who this man was, right? She trusted him and then in an instant, that trust vanished; when she’s reaching for her gun and his phone is ringing, that’s gone. And with Mackey, you break her trust, ooh, dear, no, no, no, not a good move. But then in Episode 1, the whole thing flips again, and suddenly she’s thinking, “Well, hang on. There’s more to this than we all thought.” So it’s that constant reevaluation of, who is this man? What’s he doing? Whose side is he on? That kind of toying with those thoughts is what we weave through the season and that’s what makes it so exciting.

So what can you tease about what’s ahead with this ongoing case?

Like I said, it weaves throughout the season and in a really kind of compelling way. It’s kind of always in the back of everyone’s minds. It’s always in the back of what the team is doing. And so the payoff, whenever that may happen, is definitely worth the wait, I think, but also just keeps adding to the layers of intensity and drama that we really upped the ante with this season.

Is that a finale reveal? Are we going to get answers along the way?

Maybe a little bit of both.

Mackey and JD joked about it at one point, but what would she have done if she hadn’t gotten her job back?

[Laughs] I think she probably would have probably gone back to Iowa and seen family. And I think that is a big thing for Mackey this season: What is home and what does that mean to her and where is her home? And so maybe there was a part of her that was actually, “Now my job that I love and that I am so committed to has been taken away from me, maybe that means I get to go home and figure that out.”

Speaking of home, we get the reveal about Mackey’s son. What was your reaction to that?

Well, I knew from Season 1 that she had a son, so I’ve kind of had that brewing with how I’ve dealt with her since then. But I really did love the reveal of it in that moment. It’s such a kind of beautiful, simple reveal, I think, and it just shows and highlights where Mackey and JD are at that moment. It’s just a very simple level of vulnerability and all bets are off. They’re kind of at the end of the road, and she’s like, well, I now trust this man enough to share a secret with him that not many people know. And I think that in itself is such a big shift for the two of them.

I loved that scene. It was so good.

Thank you. I loved it, too. Even filming it as well — because essentially it’s quite a long scene that reveals so much and has so much weight to it — I think Todd and I were both just like, yeah, there’s a real lovely level of connection between the two of them and just feeling so grounded and just shifting from the Mackey and JD that we left in Season 1. So it was really cool.

And they were still working together even though both were out of their agencies.

I mean, come on, they’re benched, that doesn’t mean anything. NCIS: Sydney does what they want.

Exactly. Mackey does say that she wouldn’t have told him if not for this situation, but what do you think? Would she have eventually told him because of the way that relationship has been evolving?

I think she would have. I think maybe that was not to save face, but in the kind of harsh light of day like, oh, I actually maybe did reveal a secret that was a bit unnecessary. Not that she wants to take it back, but I do think, even where we see their relationship go this season and the trust that they build and the kind of friendship that we see, she would’ve told him at some point definitely.

Will we see Mackey’s son this season?

You’ll have to wait and see.

How much will we see Mackey opening up to the others on the team now?

Let’s give her some time. She’s already opened up to JD. And this season, very much, we see their relationship develop and blossom, which was so fun. We see, like I said, the trust between them but also just a real kind of lightness. And we get to see under Mackey’s armor and we see a different side of her come out with JD. There’s more camaraderie, there’s more kind of joking and messing with each other a little bit, which is very, very fun to play, and, again, just adds a whole other level to her and another side of her that we didn’t really see much of in Season 1.

How about what’s coming up between Mackey and DeShawn (Sean Sagar) or Mackey and Evie (Tuuli Narkle)? There’s her JAG history with DeShawn, and that comes up again in the premiere.

I love it, too. And it is something that I do hope that we get to see more of as well, but I think with this season we see so much more of every character but in different scenarios. So it’s kind of less about maybe Mackey and DeShawn, but we learned more about the DeShawn with Evie and how they interact and their relationship. So it’s a lot of character backstory but not necessarily being revealed to everyone.

Is there anything that you got to do this season that you’d really wanted to do after the first season?

The car chase in Episode 1 was very fun and we got to hang upside down, which was awesome. Just anything stunt-related, I’m like, I want to do it always. And I may have been able to do that as well this season.

Talk about filming that chase scene.

Oh, it was great. We were on a road, obviously Todd was driving, so I just got to chill and look intense, but it was very much like, yeah, you’re driving, you’re driving fast. And then when we got to the flip of it, they built a rig with the upside-down ambulance and we had to get in upside down. We’d do a headstand and then flip ourselves up into the seats and they’d strap us in, so we were hanging there for a bit and then they kind of rigged it so it was the last kind of thump of the van, and that was dope. Even just the small things like that really give you a sense of, I don’t have to pretend here, I’m actually living it and it’s real and it just adds to the drama and intensity of it.

What else is coming up for Mackey this season?

I mentioned about seeing a kind of softer side to her and a big theme for her this season being home and what that means. And we see her maybe opinion and view of the team shift a little bit and where she fits within the team and the dynamic and how she feels about them and how she feels about being here. Now that we know she has a son, it’s like there’s a bit more weight to her being so far away from him and where can she find solace and comfort being so far away. It’s something that’s kind of in the back of her mind and we see glimpses of here and there, which I think is really lovely. We’re getting to add layers to this woman who’s already so strong and strong-willed, but getting to see lightness to her and softness, which I think is just so wonderful.

Will we see her talking to JD about the stuff then involves her son since he now knows about him?

She’s already revealed one thing. So I think that’s maybe her done for the time being. Baby steps, baby steps.

Is there anything that’s going to take her out of her comfort zone at work?

Yes, actually, but I can’t say what it is, but you’ll know when you see it. I don’t know how to explain it without giving it away.

Any other action scenes you can tease?

So many. Episode 2, we have a pirate ship and a gunfight in a pirate ship of all the things. So we really swing for the fences this season and it honestly kind of ramps up from there. And we get to go out to the Northern territories in Darwin towards the end of the season and there’s just the next level stuff going on there. So there is so much more action this time round, which is just dope.

Will the season end on a cliffhanger?

I mean, would it be NCIS if it didn’t?

How would you say it compares to Season 1’s?

It’s a pretty hefty, you’re going to want to come back. I want to come back. It’s a good one.

Are you saying a life-or-death situation?

Could be. That’s a good way to put it.

What were some of your favorite scenes to film this season?

So many, but one of them was watching Todd try and find a key in a jacket that he was wearing. I don’t know, he put that jacket on and he just became a comedian, and so I was surprised I did not laugh more than I did. But just having that kind of playfulness and camaraderie with him was always so fun to go into work knowing that we had those scenes coming up. So yeah, definitely all of that yellow jacket comedy nonsense was great.

NCIS: Sydney, Fridays, 8/7c, CBS