Dexter: Resurrection’s Kadia Saraf Talks Episode 7, Creating Claudette, and More (Exclusive)

Dexter: Resurrection‘s Kadia Saraf sat down with ComicBook.com for an exclusive interview where we dove into how she discovered the character of Detective Claudette Wallace, her meeting with Dexter himself, and much more. Dexter: Resurrection has seen the emergence of a bunch of new friends and foes in the Dexter universe. The titular serial killer is in uncharted territory now that he has moved to New York City, opening himself up to all kinds of new threats and opportunities. However, one of the biggest threats posed to him isn’t even necessarily because of anything he did.

Frequently, a season of Dexter begins with Dexter messing up or creating an issue that snowballs into a larger conflict. However, this time, the catalyst is from his son Harrison, who kills a man and becomes the prime suspect in the murder investigation. Dexter’s no stranger to good investigators, but Harrison isn’t. This all leads to the introduction of one of Dexter: Resurrection‘s best characters, Detective Claudette Wallace, who doesn’t miss any details.

I spoke with actress Kadia Saraf ahead of the premiere for Dexter: Resurrection‘s seventh episode to talk about how she developed the character, what it was like to finally share the screen with Dexter, and much more. As you might imagine, there are some spoilers below, so if you’re not fully caught up on the show, you may want to bookmark this for later.

This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

ComicBook: What was your audition process like for this show? How did you get involved with it?

Kadia Saraf: It started with David Zayas and myself. We have been friends for many years. My kid and his grandkid, they’re in an acting program, and we came to see their show and he said, ‘Oh, Dexter’s coming back. We’re resurrecting him. And I saw this character in the script that you should definitely ask your reps about.’ And I did. I was initially told that it’s already out to someone as an offer. I remember in the moment when I got that email back thinking maybe it’s not over until it’s over kind of thing. Probably three days later, the audition came in and I had a very short time to tape it. So I taped actually the scene, the first scene that Claudette and Oliva introduced by the garbage dock.

I did that one and then one of the scenes where we’re going through finding out what happened in the hotel room. So I sent those tapes in, and the next morning I woke up and thought to myself, ‘Oh, I wish I had another day.’ I had these ideas to do some more with the character, and my manager just texted me back, ‘Have some faith, just have some faith.’ And I remember having goosebumps and so in that moment, I just let go. That was in December [2024]. Then when the industry came back after the holidays in January, I got an email, a call that I’m being tested and that I don’t need to do anything else.

I was kind of shocked, what do you mean you don’t have to meet me? I don’t have to do pushups and pullups and prove all the things that I can do and all the reasons why they should hire me. And she said, no, they already know and saw the tape, and you were Claudette. They’ve been looking for Claudette for a long time, and you are Claudette. And it was one of these really, really special moments. I mean, they say it takes 20 years to become an overnight success kind of thing. It’s been an accumulation of a lot of work. And then this unique moment was just played out with ease, if that makes sense.

How much of Claudette is on the page? As I am talking to you and seeing her in the show, you’re two very different people. She’s very proper, very straight, very heavy eye contact, and intimidating. How much of that is something you brought to it?

So we’ll go back to the tape because what was interesting to me is that what I brought to them initially was exactly what they were looking for. But when I showed up on set, suddenly I had these millions of questions because there’s more scenes, there’s a lot more progression. How is she at home? They kind of calmed me down and said, ‘Everything’s okay. You already understand her.’ They gave me some pointers of who she is. I think the pointers that were anchoring me more where she has a very flat affect, and that is pretty much all that I needed because she is on the page, but I think the way I personally picked it up from the page is because of all those elements that I can so relate to her.

It is pretty much in her demeanor. I mean, the body language is a little different than my own, but that’s the fun part where you get to explore is how would a person like this is so hyperfocused, how does she move? What does she do with her arms? These are not things we usually think about. Everything is so natural, but with her, it is very much condensed. It is consolidated almost.

Jack Alcott said in one of the interviews, she is a human laser beam and that to me was like, oh, yes, this is what it is. She is honed in and it just informs everything else, whether it’s the language, the cadence of her speech, the body movement and all of that. But I would say the writing was pretty much, the writing is brilliant on the show, and Clyde and Scott very much knew who she, apparently they’ve been developing this character for a long time. I heard later. So they knew her very well, and they were very excited to bring her to life and to give it to me, to bring her to life. So what I found so special is that I picked it up. I picked their vision up from the page. Naturally, there were many elements that were natural to me.

That’s very interesting. Like you said, the human laser beam kind of thing. She has these eyes that you could burn right through someone’s head.

Ask my kids. [laughs]

It feels like she could spark a confession, whether you’ve done it or not, just by staring at you long enough, which maybe your kids can relate to that.

Yeah, they can absolutely relate. It’s when I don’t yell and I don’t get upset when I’m just quiet and look at them. Everything just is laid out.

What kind of research did you do to prepare for this? Did you read anything? Did you talk to anybody?

Books! I mean, this is a world that I already immersed myself in prior. Anything that has to do with forensics and human psychology, human behavior, body language, the littlest movements in the face, like how to read people, that fascinated me forever. And so again, it was just sliding just deeper into this world. But for me, research, I can show you books that I created. I wrote an entire notebook that is Claudette writing everything about the case. So I really dove deep as Claudette to understand what it is that she sees.

If I may be more intuitive as Kadia, Claudette might be more the quick calculations of things. It’s pretty much parallel to somebody’s intuition, but it’s really all in the mind. Everything just makes sense or doesn’t make sense. There’s not a lot in between. They’re quick calculations. I would say that I am very much like her in that regard. I mean, I do pay attention to details. If I want to teach you the letters A, B, and C, I feel like I would have to know and master A all the way to Z. I can’t just master A, B, C. So the same thing happened here with everything that has to do with criminology, with law enforcement, with the system in New York, talking to detectives and understanding her, how long she’s been there to have that kind of experience.

Also because of the partnership with Oliva, it gave me freedom to soften just a little bit more to explore how much she allows herself to be in that space, because she’s very unique and she has respect. She’s getting the respect that she deserves, but I’m sure there’s a lot of raised eyebrows as well. But yeah, there’s a lot of hours and hours of pages written and pages read. I created a whole chart of all the serial killers and how many kills they had and when they were caught, who’s still in prison, what their sun sign, moon sign, and ascendant. It’s pretty deep. It goes deep.

I saw in your credits that you had a “Story by” credit on an episode of Law and Order. I don’t totally know how that works in terms of whether you get a writer’s credit or a story credit. Does that mean you just kind of came up with the broad strokes, or did you write something?

So the way it works is we brought the concept for the episode because the reason I started learning a ASL (American Sign Language) a few years ago, and I’ve learned a lot about the deaf community and felt that their story needs to be told in a very honest way.

So the showrunner and I sat down and talked about it and agreed on it. I brought all the stories, the important points of what they’re experiencing with the system and justice system in New York and the country, but it’s specifically to New York. And then there were writers who actually wrote the teleplay. So it’s dialogue in the scenes that would be getting the writers credit, I got the story by, but there’s suggestions of what they would say and wouldn’t say. And so it’s a very collaborative kind of project. But yeah, it was an incredible manifestation of an idea, and they were very open and excited about it too.

I asked because I thought that was interesting and hearing you talk about your process of building this character is very clear, you’re driven by storytelling. It’s not just about showing up and saying your lines. You dig deep. Did you talk with David Zayas at all about his time as a cop in New York in real life?

Yes, he has fascinating stories. He is such an amazing human and we wanted to work together for many years, by the way. We’ve always looked for opportunities, but our roads never crossed in that way. And so to be able to do this on Dexter is, I mean, you can it up really. I could write down a list of the things I want, and it’s just so much better than what I imagined, and I have very, very big and vivid imagination.

But we did talk, and he is incredible as an actor, storyteller, a friend, and just working with him and he has such a wealth of knowledge of this world, and you wouldn’t know. He doesn’t walk around that just, it goes deep. It doesn’t go out. It goes deep. And yes, he’s shared how it actually works, what things would be truthful in terms of our behavior and what is movie magic, and we also have to accept that there’s some movie magic in there. I always question things like, wait, that doesn’t make sense and then everybody got that half smile. I was like, ‘Oh, okay. Movie magic in that part. Okay.’ I accept that.

I spoke with the actor who played Ryan, Bryan Lillis, and he said his scripts only included the scenes that he was in, and he had to kind of get it out of Jack as to what was going on with the rest of the show. Was that your experience or did you have a bit more context?

Yeah, I saw the scripts before as they were coming out and yeah, I knew that [my meeting with Dexter] was coming in episode seven, so I knew the meeting was coming in episode seven, not before, and well, that was the first time I met Michael [C. Hall].

We were both in the makeup trailer at the same time, but we didn’t meet. That was I think my first day he walked out when I walked in or something like that. And we didn’t meet until then. At some point, a couple of weeks in, I kind of shared in the makeup trailer that I actually like it like that, and I would like to keep it like that and meet him for the first time as Kadia meeting Michael, same as Claudette meets Dexter.

I watched the show originally, so for me, it would be a much more immersive, impactful experience to meet him as Dexter. That scene has so much tension, and it’s just the way we met each other there. It is not a coincidence. And there’s even a scene, there’s a part there. I don’t know if you clocked it, where we both glanced at each other at the same time. We catch a glance at the same time. That was spontaneous. I’m so happy they included that because it was so natural. And then, yeah, I was told that Michael also enjoys the fact that it could be a candid meeting.

What was the actual process of working on that scene? What was it like to finally get to that moment where you could interact with Dexter? Claudette knows who Dexter is prior to this encounter, and that’s a big reason why it’s so tense.

So, because Claudette knows him a lot less than Kadia knows him… [laughs] There was just an episode and a half before that. It was still speculation. There was a lot of back and forth happening with Batista and then Oliva and Claudette kind of bouncing ideas and trying to put the pieces together. At this point, for me, the experience of meeting him, it remained a little fresh. It wasn’t like all this history because it was important to me. It wasn’t, ‘Uh oh, Dexter is in my lecture hall.’ It was, ‘Oh wait. Oh, they’re together. Let’s see what happens there.’

Claudette doesn’t emotionally attach herself much to findings. It’s not an emotional attachment. It’s simply, is there truth to it? Is it logical? She just collects pieces of information and puts them together. So for her, it was a moment where now everything comes together for her so she can move from there forward, but not just in theory. She actually could read their body language and see the two of them together.

Are there any interesting fan theories you’ve seen? Maybe ones that at this rate, don’t hold any water that you can talk about or some that you’re thinking about that could be interesting for the future?

There’s a lot of things. My kids, my teens, they’re in high school, so they have TikTok, so they send me all kinds of theories They just sent me a picture of Claudette and Dexter as a couple, and I’m like, okay. People are taking it where they want to take it. The fan base here goes wide and deep and high, and I can’t even, the wide array of theories, everyone sees the show differently, wants something else from the show, and so they will create whatever they create. I mean, I’ve seen one theory about her being a serial killer or something like that, but that’s about it. I mean, there’s no snowball growing and walking down the hill.

Since you mentioned your kids are seeing things on on social media, do you watch the show as a family?

So with the original show, I didn’t want to sit and watch with them because I didn’t want to rewatch it, so I don’t get in my head as a watcher. My daughter, she’s going to be a senior now. She binge watched it, all of them, all the way up to New Blood in a span of maybe a month and a half while writing her essays and doing her hair or whatever, all at the same time. But I don’t believe my oldest and my youngest have watched the original show, but we do watch the show together. We watch it as it comes out. We sit together and watch it.

That’s gotta be so much fun.

It’s unbelievable because I’ve been doing this for a while, and my children have been my readers for auditions for over a decade, and they’re also actors. They’re also in the businesses in some capacity. For them to be able to witness what it takes to be able to get a job like this and to work with people like that and to see, and it sets the bar for them of what the co-stars and the show creators and writers and the crew do, all this experience that I bring home, it sets the bar for them, and they know what it takes. They’re not born into this.

They know what it takes for them to sit and watch me. They’re just blown away and the compliments from them mean the most. I mean, my youngest child, he is going to be 15, sometimes he holds me and he says, “You did it. You did it. You were always a star. Now the world knows.” It’s just this old man in a young body telling me things, it’s really hard to put into words because they watched it and now they see something blossom from it, and it’s just priceless. It’s priceless.

Are they rooting for you or for Dexter?

By the way, I kept spoilers from happening here too. My daughter came to set one day, but I did not tell her. It was really hard, really hard to not tell them and to try to hide it. When I worked on the scenes I tried for them not to be spoiled, but I don’t know who they’re rooting for. I mean, they ask questions. I guess now they’re just enjoying the chase and it’s not so easy to root for one, because there’s moments that you kind of lean towards Claudette or Claudette and Oliva together. I mean, Dominic Fumusa is incredible. And then Dexter becomes so lovable suddenly with his relationship with Harrison. I don’t know. Do you find yourself rooting for one character?

I root for drama. I want whatever the most dramatic thing is to happen. I think Dexter’s at his best when he gets put in a corner and has to do whatever he has to do to get out of that, whether it’s break his code or chew his own leg off, metaphorically speaking, it is always the most tense when Dexter is against the corner.

We all are, and all characters are, if you think about it.

I recently watched these episodes at the airport during a big layover because I couldn’t wait to get home to watch the screeners. Despite all of this noise around me, I was just hyperfocused on the drama of this show because it’s so much fun to watch.

And isn’t it an amazing show? Everything, the writing the story, the people, the cast, it’s just such a wholesome buffet of drama, like you said. I just enjoy every aspect of it. It’s fantastic, really.

New episodes of Dexter: Resurrection premiere every Friday on Paramount+ with only three more episodes remain.

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