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[Editor's note: The following contains major spoilers for On Call.]
Summary
- 'On Call' is a fast-paced police drama on Prime Video, following Traci Harmon and Alex Diaz on police patrol in Long Beach.
- The Dick Wolf executive produced series focuses on authentic policing with a mix of camera techniques for a unique look.
- The half-hour format allows for intense, filler-free storytelling and realistic character interactions.
On Call is a fast-paced half-hour police drama for Prime Video that follows 12-year veteran officer Traci Harmon (Troian Bellisario) and rookie Alex Diaz (Brandon Larracuente), who she’s training to see past his own naïve optimism in an effort to sharpen his instincts and keep him alive. As they patrol the streets of Long Beach, California, being present in the community as they resolve incidents, they also learn about each other while they navigate how to work together. Harmon’s past influences her current decisions, and when she makes a choice that affects Diaz’s future, it will certainly make things more complicated moving forward.
After screening the season, Collider got the opportunity to chat one-on-one with Bellisario about what sets this cop drama apart from the others and the goal of providing an authentic look at policing. She also talked about the mixture of different types of cameras they used, that the half-hour episodes allow no room for filler, her On Call wardrobe compared to Pretty Little Liars, the lack of vanity with a police uniform, finding the dynamic between Harmon and Diaz, memorable experiences while shooting on location, the tension with Sergeant Lasman (Eriq La Salle), and what could come next in a possible Season 2.
'On Call's Unique Shooting Style Creates a Fast-Paced Feeling for the Half-Hour Drama
Collider: Did you know what the tone and vibe of this series would really be? That seems like something you can’t necessarily convey in a script, but that you need to get there to see exactly how it will all be done and so that you can feel what it’s really going to be like.
TROIAN BELLISARIO: It’s a really big kudos to Tim [Walsh] and Elliot [Wolf], our creators and our writers, because they put on the first or second page of the script that we were gonna be shooting this with a mixture of dash-cam, hand-held, body cam, and cell phone footage. Our goal is to provide an authentic look into what policing looks like in 2025. So, on the page it might have been like, “Okay, here’s a cop drama. Let’s get into it. Here are my expectations of it.” But this was gonna be shot in a way that I haven’t seen. And then, when we got to filming it, and we got to see what they were getting on the dash-cam and with the body cam, and we got to see the edit, it was even more like, “Oh, that’s what you guys were talking about.” It was really surprising and it was really cool to get to witness it come together in real time.
Did you have to get used to that, as an actor?
BELLISARIO: The really interesting thing was, when we were doing body cam, we couldn’t be filming other things because we would catch the cameras on the body cam. Sometimes I would have to shoot body cam for one take, and then Brandon [Larracuente] would have to shoot with it because otherwise you’d see that the GoPro was on him. It was actually really wonderful because it allowed me to have these takes of the scene and experiences of the scene where there was no crew visible and I wasn’t worried about what I was doing. I got to be there behind the camera, literally, experiencing my scene partner and the scene as realistically as possible because there wasn’t a big, giant camera with four people behind it and there wasn’t somebody holding a bounce card. It was actually really wonderful for the experience and I would really draw on it. That was a gift. It was actually really helpful.
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A half-hour drama is a pretty rare thing. Did that feel different? Did it feel more intense?
BELLISARIO: Yeah, it definitely felt different. It was so wild. Every time I would read a script, I would get to page 26 and be like, “Oh, okay.” That was a real shock to me, every time. We would shoot two episodes at a time, so they were cross-blocked. I don’t know how we would have done an hour of that kind of fast-paced drama. That’s the gift of a half-hour drama. You don’t get any time for filler, just like these characters don’t get a moment to breathe. They don’t even get a moment to eat lunch, half the time. They take two bites, and then they’re throwing it away. There is no locker room banter. They’re on the way to something, constantly. They’re being interrupted. They’re compartmentalizing. They’re taking a phone call from their family, and then they’re addressing the call. It was really fantastic to be able to be working in that medium. I also don’t think we could have done it as an hour-long because we would have had to figure out a way to stretch it.
Troian Bellisario Appreciated Not Having To Think About Her 'On Call' Wardrobe
Image via Prime Video
You’ve been on both ends of the extreme wardrobe spectrum on a TV series. With Pretty Little Liars, everybody had their own sense of style and you had endless wardrobe. And with On Call, you’re in a cop uniform pretty much the whole time. What has that experience been like? How did that inform the character for you?
BELLISARIO: It was really such a freedom. When I was on Pretty Little Liars, it was about the narrative and it was about the emotional beats, but it was also about the fashion and the glamor. Particularly for me, as a young actor, I felt a little bit bogged down by that. Here I am, fresh out of drama school, and I’ve got this scene where I’m tearing my heart out, and I’m getting emotionally prepped with my music in my ears, and then somebody would come up to me and be like, “Hold on, let me just fix your hair.” That was important. It would have been bizarre if I had walked into a scene and my makeup was askew or my clothes were boring. It just wouldn’t have been the show. So, to be able to show up on set and have it be like, “Here’s your uniform, your hair is up in a bun, and you’re not wearing any makeup,” there was no veil between me and the character. I couldn’t even take a moment and be like, “Does anybody wanna touch me up or check anything?” They’re like, “No, we don’t.” Obviously, we had an incredible hair and makeup department. It takes that to do it. But they were like, “Sorry, we’re covering somebody in blood, we don’t have time to think about you.” It was a really wonderful thing because I had the freedom for that not to be on my mind.
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In the first episode, your character laughs at her trainee’s optimism, which says a lot about what their dynamic is going to be over the season. What was it like to develop that dynamic and define what that would be? Did it feel like she was being faced with who she used to be, before all the years of seeing everything that she’s seen?
BELLISARIO: For sure. I think that Traci was always Traci, but we get to hear about these things that have really shaped her, like what happened between her and Lasman. Obviously, we start the series with a profound loss, and I think that, potentially, Traci might have been a much more, I don’t want to say fun field training officer, but I do think maybe she might have been a little bit more like, “Yeah, I’m gonna teach you. Yeah, I’ve gotta train you.” She’s gonna do her job well, but maybe she’d also allow herself to be friends with this person because they’re in a car together. But when we meet her, she’s freshly bereaved of a dear friend and one of her mentees, and all of a sudden, here’s a brand-new person to train. The biggest thing that we get to see is, “Oh, she can’t afford to be friends with this person because she takes a lot of responsibility for what happened.” It’s a little bit like, “I don’t care if you like me. I don’t care if we’re friends. I don’t care if you think I’m nice. But I am going to protect you and I’m going to make sure that when you leave my tutelage, you are safe.” And so, when she meets Diaz, there’s probably a lot of optimism she sees in him that she maybe no longer feels in herself because she can’t afford to. Especially 12 years on the force, she knows the members of this community. She might have done the same thing that Diaz did and been like, “You can get better. I’m gonna let you go.” And then, maybe a little while later, she ran into that same person and was disappointed in herself and thinking, “Oh, wow, I didn’t fix it.” That’s a real heartbreak.
Because you do shoot this on location, do you ever get any random people that are confused by a bunch of people in police uniforms and cop cars and try to report a crime to you?
BELLISARIO: Oh, my gosh, no. There were two things that did happen. We shot everything on location, so when we were outside of a bar, Brandon and I were standing around with our arms folded, looking out and waiting for the scene to start. A camera was inside and you couldn’t see any crew, but I remember a bunch of people going by in a car and they were looking at us. I was like, “Oh, my God, they think I’m a police officer right now.” All of a sudden, I was like, “You’re not just an actor.” And then, I was on a ride along and we were getting a report from somebody. I was sitting there with a nametag on, with an actual police officer, and this woman who was giving her statement was talking to the police officer, and then she would turn and start telling me. And I was like, “Oh, no, don’t be looking at me like. I can’t do anything. I’m not here.” When she was looking at me, I was like, “Oh, she thinks I can help her in some way, or she expects me to be able to.” Those were two really eye-opening moments when people were really looking at me and I was like, “They don’t think you’re pretending right now.”
‘On Call’s Harmon and Diaz Would Both Have a Lot To Learn in a Possible Season 2
Image via Prime Video
The final episode of the season really has a triple whammy in it. There’s this scene between you and Eric La Salle, and then there’s the scene with Traci giving her recommendation for Diaz, and then there’s the scene between you and Lori Loughlin. What do you think that means for a possible Season 2? What would you want to see with her next and how all of this would affect things going forward?
BELLISARIO: That’s a great question. Harmon really exposed that she’s fallible. When she went off book to try to get justice for Delgado, I think she thought, “I need to do this and there’s no world in which I can’t do this.” But I don’t think she thought that there would be repercussions. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have told Bishop. I think she thought, “Yeah, I might get in some trouble for it, but of course, I have to do this. This person was my dear friend. I need to get justice for her.” And so, when Bishop turns around and says, “You need to be smarter and you’re lucky that you’re not fired,” I think it’s rock bottom for Traci, where she realizes, “Oh, I’m back at the beginning, as well. I thought I was teaching a lesson just to Diaz, but actually, I’ve got a big lesson to learn, as well.” And similarly, when she denies Diaz, he’s done so much, he’s grown so much, and he’s become so good at the job. She can trust him and she knows that he’s got her back and she believes in him. And then, all of a sudden, he makes this one mistake where he runs off and she sees that, deep down, he’s still that same person and that’s not safe. If she lets him go, she could lose somebody else dear to her. I think she decides, “You can not like me. You can think I’m mean, but I care deeply about you and I want you to stay alive.” I think they’ve both got a lot to learn in Season 2.
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She walks into that moment with Lasman thinking that he’s the one responsible for keeping her from the job she wants, when he’s the one who’s had her back. That’s such an interesting moment between your characters.
BELLISARIO: I love that about the relationships on this show. In episode seven, Lasman and Harmon really clash. You can see that they are almost diametrically opposed, as far as their philosophies about what we need to do as police officers in this situation and what is helping. Harmon couldn’t think Lasman is more wrong, and Lasman couldn’t think Harmon is more wrong. And then, all of a sudden, you see that it doesn’t matter that they might not see eye to eye. Like he says, they’re gonna have to learn to stand shoulder to shoulder because they’re in this together. That’s the job. She comes from this place and he comes from this place, but they’ve gotta do it together. That’s a huge revelation for her.
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On Call
Release Date January 9, 2025
Seasons 1
Creator(s) Tim Walsh , Elliot Wolf
On Call is available to stream on Prime Video. Check out the trailer:
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English (US) ·