Warning: Contains SPOILERS for The Cleaning Lady season 4, episode 4.
The Cleaning Lady returned to FOX on March 25 following a ten-month hiatus. The show airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET with new installments available to stream the following day on Hulu. Season 4, episode 4, titled “Suspicious Minds,” sees Thony and Jorge make a game-changing decision that alters their relationship. To prevent either of them from having to testify, the two get married seconds before they are arrested and brought in for questioning.
Élodie Yung, Martha Millan, Kate Del Castillo, Santiago Cabrera, Khalen Roman Sanchez, Faith Bryant, and Sean Lew make up the main cast, but The Cleaning Lady season 4 has introduced several new faces. Brian Norris plays Cowboy Hat, a mysterious member of the cartel who works under Jorge. Norris is known for projects such as Walker, Perry Masson, The Rookie: Feds, and General Hospital.
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ScreenRant interviews Brian Norris about his reaction to that major wedding twist, how Cowboy Hat feels about Thony, his character’s backstory, and which episode of The Cleaning Lady season 4 he’s most looking forward to airing.
The Cleaning Lady Season 4 Will Reveal More About Cowboy Hat
“I’ve got a lot of secrets. I think that the biggest challenge ended up being the most fun.”
ScreenRant: What excited you most about joining The Cleaning Lady for season 4?
Brian Norris: So much. I mean, getting to play with Élodie [Yung], with Santiago [Cabrera]—these are really exciting people to get to work with, first off, but really the best answer I have for you is the wardrobe. That was the coolest thing. When I showed up to that fitting, I thought, “Oh, now I really know what we’re doing here. Getting to try on Scarface clothes, as done by way of a cowboy in Vegas—it was exquisite. That rack was amazing.
Your character’s name is Cowboy Hat, so you know you’re going to have a cool wardrobe.
Brian Norris: And the very first day they took me to a haberdashery in Albuquerque, run by these two men who I think have been running it for centuries at this point. They’re the store that cut Bryan Cranston’s Heisenberg hat for Breaking Bad. And so just getting to go there, I’m already thinking this is the coolest thing I’m going to get to do all year. And then they cut a custom hat, two of them, actually, for me, and so that was a heck of a day.
What do you find most fascinating about the character? Because he’s very mysterious—we don’t know a lot about him.
Brian Norris: I’ve got a lot of secrets. I think that the biggest challenge ended up being the most fun. A lot of times, the way television’s made now, you kind of know everything going in. The teams have had to create a bible for the whole thing and an answer for everything and so there’s tons of backstory to build off of and create from. And for this, it was all about grounding a mystery.
He doesn’t have the same attachments that everyone else has. Everyone else has family on this show, everyone else has all of these things that pull them towards responsibility, and I got none of that. And so creating the life around that was both challenging because it wasn’t always there explicitly, but ended up being the most fun thing in the entire world. I’d be emailing Dan at midnight being like, “What about this for him?” It was so much fun.
Have you come up with a specific backstory for Cowboy Hat, then? It sounds like you had some ideas.
Brian Norris: I definitely have ideas for me to keep close to the vest. I think you’re going to see everything you need to see onscreen throughout the season. We reveal a lot. I showed up on set, and a couple writers came up to me, and they just said, “We have some fun things planned for you,” and then would leave. I was like, “What are they?!”
Norris Enjoys Playing With Thony And Cowboy Hat’s Dynamic
“If I have my first moment seeing her as more than just a problem, then it’s actually a moment of closeness.”
How does Cowboy Hat feel about Thony? His leader seems to be a bit invested in her.
Brian Norris: Oh, I don’t like it. I don’t like it one bit. I feel like I’m the one who’s most commonly saying, “What are we doing here?” The first time that I meet her, I have to drive her off the road and threaten her to get her to roll down the window. I don’t know that I trust her too much. That’s what I’d say.
What were your thoughts on Thony and Jorge’s marriage? Were you surprised by the twist?
Brian Norris: I did not see the twist coming when it came. I heard that something was coming in Episode 4 and that it was going to be a lot of fun. She’s scrappy. She’s tough to pin down. You feel like you got her. I mean, I’ve got the door open for the car.
We’re going to put her in, we’re ready to finish the thing. But she’s got that ace up her sleeve, and I think I’ve got to give her credit for that. I think that’s maybe the move that Cowboy Hat respects the most. It’s like, “Oh, you’re a little unhinged. You’re a wild card. Okay, I see you. Fun.”
What questions did you have about Cowboy Hat as the actor?
Brian Norris: Well, I can tell you two things. One is I can tell you the thing that I begged the writers for every single chance I got. I wanted a scene in a honky tonk. That is, to me, what Cowboy Hat does at the end of a busy day. I don’t have a family to go home to. You go to the bar, you get drunk, and you dance on a table, on a bar with as many women as possible. And so that was one of the things I wanted to explore a little bit.
But one of the things that we talked about a little on set and around Episode 4 was just parents. I have that moment with Thony where I ask her whether she sings to her kid, and there are so many different things you can do with that. If I just don’t trust her, then that’s a threat and one of the darkest threats in the entire world. If I have my first moment seeing her as more than just a problem, then it’s actually a moment of closeness and really exploring, figuring that out, getting to play around all of that was really interesting and exciting.
Is there an upcoming episode you’re excited for fans to see?
Brian Norris: Episode 4 has already happened, but that chase ending, getting out of the cars is one of my favorite things we shot the entire time. For me personally, 8 and 9. They have a lot of fireworks going on. So get excited. You’re going to dig it.
What other projects do you have in the pipeline?
Brian Norris: I’m just finishing up a movie. It’s this beautiful twisted psychological horror movie called The Doppelganger about a couple who’s going to the woods to try to work on their marriage. I think it would work out for them except that they run into a shape-shifting demon who prays about emotional discord and all hell breaks loose.
So we are finishing that now and that was a lot of fun. I enjoyed just getting to work in every type of medium and to go from the most kind of fun splashy television where I’m getting to wear crazy costumes and get to play all this fun stuff and explosions are happening to an intimate little character study. So I’m excited for that movie to finish and for the world to get to see that as well.
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About FOX’s The Cleaning Lady
Daniel Cerone Serves As Showrunner And Executive Producer
The Cleaning Lady returns for an action-packed season 4, with the series’ beloved characters in ever-changing and increasingly dangerous situations. After three seasons of being a pawn caught between the FBI and the world of organized crime, THONY (Élodie Yung) makes the bold decision to take charge of her own destiny — by exchanging her cleaning lady uniform for the scrubs of a surgical intern at a small community hospital.
Check out our other interviews with The Cleaning Lady cast:
The Cleaning Lady season 4 airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET on FOX.
