An old case haunts and a new case beckons for ‘Perry Mason’ in Season 2
As HBO’S reimagining of “Perry Mason” returns for Season 2, the titular barrister played by Matthew Rhys finds himself haunted by an old trial while embarking on a high-profile murder case involving a powerful family.
Premiering Monday, March 6, the eight-episode sophomore round picks up in months after the Dodson murder trial of Season 1, when a mistrial was declared and Mason’s client was allowed to go free.
As he continues to grapple with that case’s unsettling conclusion, he takes on a case involving the murder of the scion of a powerful oil family. While the DA goes to Los Angeles’ Depression-era shantytowns to pinpoint the most obvious suspect, Perry, Della (Juliet Rylance) and Paul (Chris Chalk) find themselves at the center of a case that will uncover far-reaching conspiracies and force them to come to grips with what it truly means to be guilty.
The new season, according to Rhys, will also point out how the justice season works differently for those that are wealthy versus those that aren’t.
“Where you find Mason at the beginning of Season 2 is certainly where I wanted it to be,” the Welsh actor explains. “I had no real interest in him kind of just picking up the mantle after the end of Season 1 where everything in the garden is rosy and his name’s on the door and he has a brand new suit and off he goes to crack every case.
“You kind of meet Mason at a real crossroads after the end of Season 1,” he continues, “where he’s very much doubting his own prowess, his own judicial, legal prowess and whether or not he can make it in this world and whether he is indeed cut out for it. Because the way he became a lawyer was so fast tracked in the first season.”
Taking on Erle Stanley Gardner’s iconic attorney has been a satisfying experience for Rhys. While he knew very little about the 1957-66 CBS series starring Raymond Burr as Mason, he was intrigued by HBO’S reimagining and jumped at the chance to build this new incarnation from the ground up, a character that he says is tormented by “conflict and inner turmoil and a lot wrong in his life.”