[This story contains spoilers from season three, episode five of The Gilded Age.]

Broadway actor Jordan Donicas arrival as Dr. William Kirkland has spiced up Peggy Scotts love life on The Gilded Age.

What started as a house call to treat his mentors daughter from a debilitating cold has blossomed into one of the HBOs hit period dramas hottest romances. Since his introduction in episode two (What the Papers Say), Dr. Kirkland has become a fixture. Peggy (a role Dene Benton has made a fan-favorite) and her mother Dorothys (Audra McDonald) visit to their cousin Athena (Jessica Frances Dukes) in Newport, Rhode Island, where his family has long maintained a home, in episode three (Love Is Never Easy) solidified his presence. From the moment Dr. Kirkland knew Peggy was nearby, he reached out with a letter requesting permission to call on her. That led to a romantic get-to-know-you stroll, parasol and all, by the sea which evolved into a meet-The-Kirklands moment for Peggy and her parents. The latter, however, didnt go over well with the good doctors mother, Mrs. Kirkland, inhabited by the incomparable Phylicia Rashad, who objects to her son and Peggys budding romance. Her family, she boasted during the two families first meeting, has a rich and long history that includes generations of free Black people in Newport. Because of that history, Mrs. Kirkland frowns upon the Scotts, particularly Peggys father Arthur (John Douglas Thompson) who was once enslaved. Peggys dark complexion also appears to be a concern to her. Then in episode four (Marriage Is a Gamble), after attending Peggys speech with her husband Mr. Kirkland (Brian Stokes Mitchell) at their sons insistence, Mrs. Kirkland also objects to Peggys outspokenness on race matters and suffrage. That disdain makes her determined to break thehold Peggyhas on her sons heart, creating aformidable roadblock to their promising happily ever after.

As Athena and others speculate whether Dr. Kirkland and Peggy are headed towards marriage, another complication emerges as the two lovebirds take in a baseball game and run into none other than Peggys former employer and complicated love interest newspaper publisher T. Thomas Fortune (Sullivan Jones). During the exchange, Mr. Fortune, from whom Peggy has worked hard to distance herself,offers her the unbelievable opportunity to interview Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, an early Black writer, abolitionist and leading voice of the era who supported suffrage, among other efforts, in Philadelphia thatDr. Kirkland urges her to accept. When Mr. Fortune appears at the train station with his luggage ready to accompany Peggy, who is visibly disturbed by his unexpected presence and intention, Dr. Kirkland jumps to her protection, making his feelings for her even clearer.

The Hollywood Reporter caught up with Donica who is known for his Broadway roles in Phantom of the Opera, My Fair Lady, Camelot, for which he earned a Tony nomination, and, of course, Sunset Blvd, his most recent credit, and learned that his impressive Broadway pedigree wasnt what landed him the role of winning Peggys heart. It does, however, inform his portrayal of Dr. Kirkland.

His personal experience of being raised by his mother and aunts, he shares, also feeds his characters relationship with his mother played by Rashad. Donica is also a romantic at heart, which makes showing up for Peggy as Dr. Kirkland all the more effortless. Balancing that love for his mother and Peggy is not easy for Dr. Kirkland, Donica admits, but there is a good reason he refuses to let either one of them go. Arguably, it is his face-off with Mr. Fortune in episode five (A Different World) that shows just how serious the good Dr. Kirkland is when it comes to Peggy, giving fans all the more reason to stay tuned into their romance.

***

You and Dene were in Into the Woods together.

At New York City Center

So is this how you ended up on The Gilded Age as Dr. William Kirkland?

No. I did three years on The CWs Charmed. Sonja Warfield watched that show. She actually had no idea that Im a singer. She had never seen me sing and perform on stage. So they reached out. [At the time] I was cast as the Phantom [in Phantom of the Opera] in London so I was going to move to London last year to do that, and like a day later, I got a call asking me to interview with Sonja and Michael Engler.

They sent me the scenes for what they have written for the character so far. We met for an hour, an hour and a half, and I gave them my interpretation and rundown of not only the research I have done for the time period, but also of the character and how I saw him off the page. It clicked immediately for me. Its very rare that you read something and how you imagine it in your brain is how it plays out on camera. It felt very natural and symbiotic. Because Ive done a lot of period pieces on stage, I feel very comfortable in that world. And when we got done filming, Sonja walked up to me and said, Im so glad I watched Charmed, and I was like, Me, too!

What was your reaction and vision for Dr. Kirkland?

Ive done a lot of period pieces, and Im not a reductionist when it comes to inclusion in stories, not saying that the story has to be about what the person looks like, whos playing the role. I say that more in a sense of Im interested in what people who look like me were doing in the time and space of these stories. What I found from doing Phantom, from doing My Fair Lady, from doing even a show like Camelot, is that people have been everywhere. People of all kinds have always been nomadic, have always traveled; weve always explored. And, oftentimes, I find that people arent ready to have that conversation.

Most of the times people have a blind spot that its easier to say those things never existed than it is to embrace them and learn whereas people of color are often put in two positions where we have to re-educate ourselves, and then hopefully re-educate and expand the education of those around us. Its just kind of the plight weve all been dealt, which isnt necessarily fair, but it is part of why I do what I do, and this was the first time reading it on the page that it wasnt subtext. It was what the story was about. And I felt like everything Ive learned subtextually from reading about Alexandre Dumas and his father in France in a time period before this, reading about all the Black people before this, I was just like, Let me dive into a deeper history of Black America, one that goes beyond slavery, one that is a story that isnt often told, and if it is, most people write it away as fiction.

So what was the experience of playing Dr. Kirkland like for you?

It was a lot of fun diving into the history of the Black community and Newport and where they came from, how they got there, when they got there and how they really built up the community where they lived. Was it as large as the Vanderbilts of the world? No, but it was self-sufficient and didnt rely on white wealth to sustain itself. All those things were on the page, and all those things were fascinating to me. And it was also fascinating to me that he falls in love with Peggy pretty much immediately so then he has to fall in love with all these aspects of her relationship with her father because her father has been such an influence on his life much to the chagrin of his mother. Hes kind of the quiet rebel of the family. Hes always respectful but he is going to live the life that he wants to live. Hes got to continue to open doors for the people coming after him in the way people like Mr. Scott opened doors for him.

Take us to the scene of you as Dr. Kirkland with Peggy, Mr. and Mrs. Kirkland, and Mr. and Mrs. Scott in episode two and youre there with Dene, Phylicia Rashad, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Audra McDonald and John Douglas Thompson and you are well dressed, highly educated, highly accomplished. With the exception of Mr. Scott, none of these characters have ever been enslaved, and its on television.

Yes, Its on television, and its a reality that existed for quite a few Black folks in America and [were] able to start that conversation [that] also explores the divides within our own community that still exists today, right? So my hope is that it allows us space to talk with each other in a deeper way and to connect in a deeper way and to heal our own amongst ourselves as a community, to help continue to lift each other up.

But in a scene like that, with the folks that you just named, its so easy to sit back and watch, but theres also a force of excitement. And for me, you just got to use that stuff as an actor because William would be excited to introduce Peggy [although] he knows its going to be a little awkward. But part of why I think he falls in love with Peggy is because he knows that this woman is a fighter so [hes thinking] she will be able to handle all isms of my mother. Shed be able to stand up to her in a way that other women cant. Other women will just fall over and fold. Peggy can actually debate her, and debate her well, and win. Thats something that none of the women that my mother has tried to set me up with has. Theyre all yes people. Peggy has her own mind. She has her own thoughts, much like her father, much like her mother, and thats amazing. Thats where I fall.

And to share scenes with people like that who are so masterful at what they do and who are quite literally, in my own life, people I have looked up to, theres not much acting that I had to do, because its very real. These people are the ones who opened the door for me and Dene and now we get to learn from them, inhabit worlds with them, and hopefully take that torch that much further.

Talk about Dr. Kirklands relationship with his mother. After the Scottss unpleasant encounter with Mrs. Kirkland about Mr. Scotts enslaved background, he says what about his mother? as he questions his daughter Peggys potential for a successful relationship with Dr. Kirkland. So what about his mother? What kind of work did you and Ms. Rashad do to create that kind of quiet tension?

From the moment Phylicia and I met, we dove right into the mother-son [dynamic]. When we saw each other in the hair and makeup trailer, she said, Son, and I was like, Mom! And we dont get a lot of time outside of the space, right? Its not like theater where you have weeks of lets just sit and discuss this. So we just dove right into character conversation. I used that time to ask her all of these questions about her feelings towards Peggy, what her feelings about me are, our family history, all this, that and the other. And shes a wealth of knowledge of history herself as well, so it made it so easy. She also has some energy thats very familiar to me, that reminds me of my Aunt Kathy who has passed away, but she helped raise me. And so it was very familiar. I was the first boy born, and I was raised by all women, and so I think respect of women is always top of mind when playing any character, but specifically in a show like this.

Speak about Mrs. Kirklands specific ideals in terms of race or colorism within the Black community and how her son Dr. Kirkland factors into that. Particularly because one of her objections to Peggy is also her darker complexion.

I [Dr. Kirkland] might not go to Yale or Harvard because I want to have a more ingrained Black experience so Im going to [the HBCU] Howard [University Medical School in Washington, D.C.], which, of course, she hates. But, in talking with [Phylicia about Mrs. Kirkland], it has nothing to do with the color of someones skin, and it has everything to do with the trauma in their family history. And thats something we still talk about today, how trauma transcends generations, and since our [Kirkland] family has never experienced the trauma of slavery [directly], shes not very keen on opening up our family to that trauma. So, in defense of her, shes just trying to protect her family in a very pure sense. Of course, you can get into the colorism aspect as well [because] that plays a role. But that is something that probably isnt even registering in her brain.

How does Dr. Kirkland approach loving both his mother and Peggy who could possibly become his wife?

What I loved exploring with Dr. Kirkland is the conflict between these two people that he loves and how can I try to resolve that? I got to choose my cane, my ring that I wear, but [the audience] never sees the details of these things. My cane is an elephant, and elephants are matriarchal societies. So out of respect for my mom, I always have her on my arm because I respect the fact that she is our leader. On my ring is a bridge, because I view my character as a bridge between worlds, both the white and Black world and a bridge between people within my own world so it helps to remind me what the ethos of my character is, what the logic of my character is, and you get to see that in different ways throughout the course of the season, within my family, within my profession and within my life. So, its been a blessing to portray that.

But talking with Phylicia about these things and through her thoughts about Peggy, because I view Peggy in a very similar way that I also view my mom, Mrs. Kirkland. Theres a lot of similarities: theyre both outspoken, theyre both very intelligent and theyre both leaders in their community; one is just of a different generation and has a different upbringing. But theyre quite similar, and I remember saying that to Mama Kirkland [and she protested] I really love my mother but, also, I understand that she can say some pretty [cringey] things, but guess what thats all of us. I think there is a deep respect there and the whole season he is trying to balance that love for his mother and his love for Peggy in a way hes never had to before.

Well, hes highly romantic. Is that great to play?

It is. I love romance myself. Its great and Dene makes it so easy. To not just be romantic but to also be friends and I think thats a huge key and not something that we see a lot in that time period. Its kind of like what the Russells have [or had] where theres this inherent respect for the other in what they do and how they live their lives and there is a desire to let them do that freely and to support it. And I think its the same with William and Peggy.

So lets talk about the fight with Mr. Fortune.

Aw yeah, Sullivan and I. We had fun doing that because were both the same size. Dene would always say yes my caramel kings fighting over me! [Laughs]

In that moment, Dr. Kirkland really stands his ground and makes it clear that he is going to love and protect Peggy, and there is no man thats going to get in the way of that.

And its an opportunity to show a flash of the non-mild-mannered side of him. We just get a glimpse of it in the eyes and in his response. Hes like, Im always going to be kind and maintain my gentlemanly composure. But its also like, I win; you lost your composure, but, if you want to fight, thats fine. I dont mind. And Im that way in real life, too. So theres a lot of joy that day because youre fighting and standing up for what you love and the person that you love. But also her reputation, because its about the optics of this. And also this woman told you, no. Kindly. So you need to just keep going. You have a wife and kids. I respect you. We all know who you are. Hes one of the leaders of our community, nationally, at this point in time, in real life. So its like, Why are you behaving this way? But its just fun to do physical scenes like that.

its also one of those things where when I [as Dr. Kirkland] learned more about Peggy and her past without her telling me, and Dene and I talked about it often, but Kirkland is also like, You dont owe me your deepest, darkest secrets. All I care about is who you are right now. And if this man is going to get in the way with that, I feel so strongly for you that Ill get into a fight. Ill mess up my reputation in front of all these people to stand up for you. And that means a lot, especially because two Black men fighting in a train station, we know how that goes down today. Thats not something that should really be happening for anyones safety. But for the love of a woman, whole nations have burned.

***

New episodes ofThe Gilded Ages third season continue weekly through Aug. 10, streaming on HBO Max.