FBI‘s Juliana Aidén Martinez broke her silence on a possible return to Law & Order: SVU after exiting the show.
“It was such a great time that I had with the SVU cast. I would never say never,” Martinez, who played Junior Detective Kate Silva, exclusively told Us Weekly about making the move from NBC to CBS. “It was a really wonderful experience that I got to have with everyone there.”
While Martinez isn’t ruling out a return, she is currently focused on her new gig.
“It would never be a situation in which I would say no,” she noted. “But also, I’m really happy being here and telling the story of Eva Ramos. I’m open to whatever comes but I’m also really happy where I’m at.”
Martinez joined Law & Order: SVU in season 26 but has since departed alongside Octavio Pisano, who played Detective Joe Velasco since season 23. After news broke, Pisano returned to address Joe’s departure while Martinez remained focused on joining the cast of CBS’ hit series FBI.
Both SVU and FBI are set in producer Dick Wolf’s TV universe, which could allow for a crossover.
“I would love that. That would be really, really cool,” Martinez told Us about the chance to bring back Kate while also playing Eva. “I don’t think that will happen. I would probably just be off for the week that we do a crossover.”
Martinez joked that it might be “way too complicated” to explain both of her characters existing in the same place, adding, “I could just go on vacation for a week and they will just work between the two shows. That being said, it would be an absolute dream. I would just be changing outfits in between both characters and that would be awesome.”
Even if Martinez doesn’t reprise the role of Kate, she has been having a blast on FBI.
“On SVU, I just remember I’d walk in and I would imagine 26 years of running a show and the amount of people who walked through those buildings. The amount of history there really feels like you’re entering a legacy that’s embedded even in the building,” she recalled. “With the people on FBI, it’s going on its eighth year, which is incredible.”
FBI, which premiered in 2018, centers on the inner workings of the New York City field office criminal division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, where the personnel work to ensure the safety of New York City and its citizens. The CBS procedural has pushed and reinvigorated Martinez.
“Before I came into the show, I sat down with showrunner Mike Weiss and told me who he was thinking Eva was going to be. That was really the deciding factor for me to be like, ‘Yes, this is something that’s very interesting to me. This is something that I think I can offer and give value to and make it exciting and different,’” she told Us. “I liked that she was different than Kate in SVU. I really like that Eva came from a prosecutorial background so she’s very much someone that’s not afraid to speak her mind and is not afraid to be the smartest person in the room. She’s unabashed in that sense and she’s unabashedly feminine, tough and has a big heart.”
Martinez enjoyed the challenge of not doing a “copy and paste” of Kate.
“When you join a new show, you get the opportunity to do something different. It was definitely like, ‘OK, how can you show different sides of a profession? How can you show how different women approach something differently?’” she explained. “It’s cool that Eva to me is just someone different. Where Kate Silva would have been like, ‘I’m too tough to even want a relationship’ but Eva probably dreams about what Scola has and getting married and having a family. There’s a heart forwardness to her that I really like.”
Even doing the stunts has allowed Martinez to love her “childhood dream” out on screen, adding, “That’s me running. I do have wonderful stunt people and they do such an incredible job when they don’t allow me to do the stunts. Personally, I want to do all the stunts. But it’s definitely demanding. I do consider myself innately an athlete so I’ve been able to use that in ways I wasn’t able to do on SVU. The ability to really use my body and be in a story physically and dynamically is really fun.”
FBI airs on CBS Mondays at 9 p.m. ET.
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