Note: This story contain spoilers from “Reasonable Doubt” Season 3, Episode 9.
“Reasonable Doubt” star Joseph Sikora said his character Bill Sterling does in fact have “true respect” for his colleague and boss Jax Stewart, despite the shady way he’s trying to make partner behind her back.
“I think that Bill is a complex character in the way that he sees Jax for who she is … she is exceptional,” Sikora explained to TheWrap. “I think that Bill understands exceptionalism, and so he’s attracted to that part of Jax, saying, ‘Hey, look, all of these things I can learn from Jax.’”
However, Sikora shared that while Jax (Emayatzy Corinealdi) is the “Michael Jordan” of her craft as an attorney, that doesn’t mean she shouldn’t take some coaching from time to time.
“It’s short-sighted to think that you can’t learn something from other people,” Sikora explained. “And as [Bill] says out loud that’s one of Jax’s faults. I think we as audience members know that is one of Jax’s faults, but Jax is that anomaly that’s going to succeed.”
Tensions between Jax and Bill have grown thicker since the new attorney and former coastguardsman stepped onto the scene. While Jax took Bill on as her co-counsel to help him get more experience with criminal litigation, he’s slowly but steadily crossed professional and personal boundaries with her in his pursuit of making partner. Between Bill sleeping with Jax’s best friend Sally (Nefetari Spencer) and challenging what he calls Jax’s “whimsical decisions” in Ozzie’s case, the pair eventually have a fallout where Bill’s issues with Jax and his divorce stresses, and Jax’s frustrations with Bill’s microaggressions finally hit the floor.
In Episode 9, Jax busts Bill’s partner ploy and his sneaky links with Sally, and her calls Jax out for being a stubborn leader with poor listening skills.
“So the plan is that I win and you get promoted,” Jax says. “What do I get? Do I get to tell them that you’re divorcing your sympathetic Black wife while currently f—king another Black woman, who happens to be my friend, behind my back? That’s not exactly painting the picture of partner stability, Bill, now is it?”
“You say you want me to learn, this is our case, but you just want an assistant! A lackey to hang on to your every word,” Bill snaps back.
“And what do you think Steven and Vince want you to be?” Jax claps back, referring to her fellow partners.
By the end of the episode, with the intensity of a pricey divorce battle upon him, Bill tries to seal his future at the firm by working with Steven and Vince to boot Jax out from her role as their case’s closer. But of course, Jax finds that out too.
“[Bill] has been honest [about] how much he does respect Jax, and how much he has learned from Jax,” Sikora said. “But there’s also a but there. But, ‘I feel I could do this.’ To the partners, ‘I’m going to show you how great I am, because I’m going to do the closing argument and watch me kill it.’ And Jax is like, ‘No, no, that ain’t happening.’ She uncovered that, and she squashed that, she nipped it right in the bud.”
He continued: “To get to places, you have to have that belief in yourself, that last oomph of belief, which Jax has in spades. Bill is trying to say, ‘Hey, I got it too.’ But I think there is a true respect.”
“Reasonable Doubt” releases new episodes Thursdays on Hulu and Disney+.
