“Suits” is a TV drama series that revolves around a law firm in New York City. Mike Ross (played by Patrick J. Adams) is a brilliant college dropout but finds himself on the run from a drug deal gone bad. He lands himself a job working with Harvey Specter (played by Gabriel Macht), one of New York City’s best lawyers. But things get into a bit of a sticky situation when suspicions arise about Mike’s lack of qualifications when his past (in the form of his ex-best friend, Trevor) comes back to haunt him.
And the plot thickens!
The 12-episode first season debuted on 23rd June 2011, with a 90-minute premiere. Because it was so well received, the show was immediately renewed for a second season, consisting of 16 episodes. Today, it is one of US TV’s most engaging series, “Suits” season two is just about to premiere on DIVA Universal (Astro Channel 702) on 7th January 2013 (Monday).
And while you wait to catch the premiere the new season, we got busy with stealing “Suits” creator, writer, and executive producer Aaron Korsh away for a bit to chat about the upcoming season two:
Hi Aaron! Thanks for taking time off your busy schedule to speak with us. Can you talk about how originally you got the idea from the show when it first started?
“Sure. It was around the time of the writers’ strike. It was just ending. I think it was like 2007. And I’d been somewhat of a struggling – I’d been a writer’s assistant, I’d been staffed a few times in the comedy world but I was struggling. It was hard to make it. And my agent suggested to me that I write a show about my time – I worked on Wall Street as an investment banker for about – in New York for about five years.”
So it’s safe to say that you kinda have prior experience to corporate drama? How did that translate into creating “Suits” though?
“He said I was always telling him stories about those times, why don’t I write something about that? Basically just to write a spec pilot to try to get a job. I originally thought it was going to be a half hour, very fun type of thing, almost like Entourage on Wall Street. And when I sat down to write it, it kind of just came out the way it was as an hour long show with more dramatic bent to it than comedic and that’s, you know, that’s kind of what it was. I don’t know if it’s widely known or not but my first boss’s name was Harvey. So that’s where the impetus for the show came from.”
Can you talk about some of the changes this season, especially since now that Hardman’s back?
“I will say that last season we ended obviously on the cliffhanger with Trevor and it was a challenge to kind of make it, the challenge that we basically had was we didn’t want to run away from it and have at the last second, not say what Mike did or, basically cheat the audience in some way. So we wanted to kind of embrace and take it head on and embrace that challenge. And we thought the way to do that would be to bring in Hardman because all of us wondered like who is this Hardman? We, the writers wondered it. I originally put him in the pilot but the character kind of changed a little bit.”
Ah, yes, we were going to ask you about that..the bringing Hardman into this picture..
“I know the fans wondered who he was and it just seemed like a perfect fit to bring him in and let him be the foil that kind of solved the problem of how to keep Mike in the firm and still have Jessica find out about his secrets. So that was kind of the impetus of bringing Hardman along. And the other thing is I just felt like a lot of shows that I’m a big fan of often do some sort of – bringing in an outside character as a foil and they kind of do a Civil War type thing and it just appealed to me so that’s what we did. Bringing Hardman in allows the different characters to shift their dynamics and test their loyalties to each other and themselves.”
How much of a challenge is it to balance what’s going to happen with Mike amid what could happen to Harvey and Jessica with Hardman in the picture?
“It’s a big challenge. I have to say the writers that are in the room, now and much of the day just do an amazing job of coming up with ideas and things to handle. They always come up with more ideas than it’s possible to fit into a season. So we just try to balance like you say, moving forward in a satisfactory way without going so far and so fast that you don’t still have a place to go. So it’s a big challenge and they generate, the lion’s shares of the ideas come from them. And then I’ll respond to those ideas and try to shape them as best I can while at the same time working on , the episodes that are kind of about to be shot.”
Now that’s some insight. Thank you again, Aaron, for the chat. We’re looking forward to catching “Suits” season two already!
Look out for the premiere of “Suits” season two on 7th January 2013 (Monday) at 8pm, only on DIVA Universal (Astro Channel 702). For more information, hit up this link!