Steve Howey has finally made his long-awaited debut on High Potential, which included a cowboy chic moment and some light flirting with star Kaitlin Olson.
During the Tuesday, October 7, episode of the hit ABC series, Soto (Judy Reyes) was waiting to see if she got promoted to captain at Major Crimes. Morgan (Olson), Karadec (Daniel Sunjata), Daphne (Javicia Leslie) and Oz (Deniz Akdeniz) were preparing to adjust to the shakeup, but ultimately Soto was passed over for the position.
Morgan consoled Soto and headed for the elevator, which is where she crossed paths with an attractive stranger.
“All I want is to enter my house justified. It’s just a line from an old Western I love,” Howey’s character Nick Wagner said before Morgan corrected that it was “a line from the Bible,” to which he replied, “It’s my clumsy way of saying you look like somebody who is proud of a good day’s work.”
Morgan questioned whether Wagner was at the police precinct to try to “make that mustache” to make sense. Wagner, however, found Morgan entertaining and revealed he was hoping to cross paths with her.
“I’ve heard about you. Morgan Gilroy, right? Major Crimes’ secret weapon?” he asked. “I didn’t mean to freak you out, I was just looking forward to meeting you.”
After realizing that Wagner was headed to the command floor, she connected the dots that the stranger was her new captain. The episode ended on a surprising note, but Howey, 48, previously teased what viewers can expect as the show features Wagner more.
“Nick comes in and does ruffle some feathers. But his motives and his intentions are not to do that. He wants to help and we start seeing that in different episodes,” Howey exclusively told Us Weekly during an August set visit. “That was my fear and my concern. When you have such a lightning in the bottle strong dynamic of these characters, throwing in another character can potentially thrown that off. I’m still working on not doing that.”
He continued: “This is going to evolve into something really cool. We don’t know about the chemistry with Nick and Morgan. Obviously there is [something]. But as he’s incrementally gaining more trust with the department, hopefully it gets better and better.”
Howey was thrilled at the chance to join one of his favorite shows.
“The first season was amazing. It is not your usual procedure. I love the insert shots and I love their style. But I have friends in real life that are police officers and are part of the sheriff’s department. So I talked to them and they definitely made fun of me because that’s what they do,” he noted. “I’m taking my own leeway a little bit about who this guy is and that comes from the writers about who his family is and how they were in law enforcement and now in politics. So he has something to prove to the department and to himself. So it’s fun to work on it and see what comes out of it.”
When asked about the best part of getting to play Wagner, Howey joked, “The badge. I was like, ‘Does he get a badge?’ So I’m walking around like a little boy that has a new fireman’s hat on. I have the badge on my hip and I am flipping up my jacket. I’m in the mirror showing off for myself.”
High Potential airs on ABC Tuesdays at 10 p.m. ET before streaming the next day on Hulu.
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