‘Turn’ gears up for final Revolutionary battle
AMC’s historical drama marches toward its end
Last season on Turn: Washing
ton’s Spies, Gen. George Washington and his Continental Army won the battle (and regained some of their pride) when they captured and executed the British officer who orchestrated the defection of Benedict Arnold. The man who would become known as America’s greatest traitor fled behind British lines before he could surrender West Point.
But the war is not yet over — at least not until later this summer, when the rebels and redcoats meet in 1781’s decisive Battle of Yorktown near the end of the AMC drama’s fourth and final season. And Washington is still feeling the pressure as the season gets underway Saturday (9 ET/PT).
“It was an absolute heartbreak to lose (Arnold) from a professional but also a personal standpoint,” says Ian Kahn, who plays Washington. “Things are tough for him right now. He’s lost his best general and doesn’t know who to trust.”
Making matters worse, his best general, Arnold (Owain Yeoman), is the new head of intelligence for the Brits and hell-bent on proving himself by rounding up Continental spies. And he has a dangerous new partner: Capt. John Graves Simcoe (Samuel Roukin), a sociopath with a talent for military strategy who has a personal ax to grind with several of those rebel spies.
“Historically, Arnold and Simcoe did join forces,” says Roukin. “Both these characters are somewhat disgraced (in the eyes of ) their superiors. So they’re both kind of in need of somewhere to be and something to do. The problem is that they’re both alpha males. There’s this really interesting power struggle that develops. I think Simcoe knows he’s working with a guy who can be manipulated.”
Even as Simcoe is learning how to pull Arnold’s strings, the general is becoming immune to the charms of his wife Peggy (Ksenia Solo), a loyalist who was instru- mental in wooing Arnold to the British side.
“She’s slowly losing her grip on him and it’s a very unpleasant and terrifying thing, because that’s all she had in this relationship,” says Solo.
For Roukin and the writers, a big challenge of Season 4 has been transitioning Simcoe from a sociopath whom viewers love to hate into a statesman who served as a member of Parliament and lieutenant governor in Canada after the war.
“For Canadians, Simcoe is a national hero,” he says. “So initially, they’re like, ‘ How are you the same guy that’s revered over here?’ And what’s been really exciting about this final season, and finishing the show on our own terms, is that hopefully we show how that gap is bridged.”
“We established that Simcoe had a code, a warrior’s code that valued strength over mercy,” executive producer Craig Silverstein adds. “And then we began little by little to show Simcoe the value of mercy throughout the season.”
That’s not to say Roukin hasn’t relished playing a sort of 18thcentury Hannibal Lecter. Though the character hasn’t engaged in cannibalism, he concedes, “Stabbing someone in the jugular at the dinner table means there’s definitely something wrong with you.”