GHOSTS Post-Mortem: Danielle Pinnock on the Devastating Reveal of Alberta’s Killer

[Warning: This post contains spoilers for the Thursday, May 4 episode of GHOSTS, “Whodunnit.”]

After almost 100 years, Alberta (Danielle Pinnock) learned the truth about her murder on the Thursday, May 4 episode of GHOSTS, “Whodunnit.”

With just one day to wrap up the murder mystery, Sam (Rose McIver) and Jay (Utkarsh Ambudkar) buckled down with their investigating—murder board and all—turning over every possible stone to try and get more clues.

But when the evidence pointed to Alberta’s sister being the murderer, Hetty (Rebecca Wisocky) finally cracked and admitted she knew who killed Alberta…and had known it all along.

The killer? Hetty’s son, Thomas, who had been entangled with Alberta’s boyfriend, Earl (Brooks Brantly).

Originally, Earl had promised Thomas he would dump Alberta; instead, Earl dumped Thomas. A devastated Thomas put a poisoned bottle of booze—which was originally going to be used by Al Capone (Jeremy Luke) to kill himself, thanks to a rejection from Alberta—outside of Alberta’s door, and the songstress was doomed.

The reveal stunned Alberta, who was devastated her friend had kept something this big from her for so long.

“The great thing about Rebecca and I is that we are theater girls,” Pinnock tells Give Me My Remote. “So we went into an immediate deep dive, because as you know this was a great deal of information. We know that Hetty has been gaslighting Alberta for the last 100 years, saying, ‘No, girl, you died of a heart attack.’ And Alberta in her spirit and in her gut was like, no, I think something else happened. And so with that gaslighting, we’re now getting a chance to see 100 years of a friendship begin to unravel, which is so exciting for us as actors to play.”

“With Rebecca, we were like okay, let’s now try to put all these puzzle pieces together,” she continues. “Why did Thomas do something like this? Earl was bisexual—shout out to him! And I love that, because I’ve been saying this from the beginning, [Alberta] is a hot mess with a heart of gold. Her death would also have to be a hot mess. There’s no way that this would have been an organized death. It was obviously going to be filled full of chaos, which is exactly what it was.”

Pinnock was delighted by the episode, which included “anything that you could imagine the 1920s being.”

“The Joes—[showrunners] Joe Port and Joe Wiseman—and our writers give us that,” she gushes. “And I am so excited to delve into this flashback. It is probably my favorite flashback of both seasons for this character, specifically, because we really get to see why Alberta is the way that she is. She wasn’t just talking the talk; she actually walked the walk of this chaotic, amazing, full-of-life 1920s experience, right?”

The episode also allowed the show to lean deep into the betrayal—and the inherent drama of that reveal.

“With this unraveling of their friendship, it’s really fun to play, because we’ve never gotten this deep or dramatic in the show in the two seasons,” Pinnock notes. “And it does feel a little bit different, tonally. Obviously, we still have a little comedy from the ghosts [as they’re eavesdropping]…But the director, as well as our showrunners, really pushed us to play the drama of it all, because this has been a 100-year mystery. This woman has lied to her for the last 100 years. So I’m excited for audiences to see that as well. And I can’t wait to see the response.”

Getting to show the complexity of Alberta has been a big priority for Pinnock.

“This girl gives zero effs, okay? She’s fearless,” Pinnock praises. “She had to be during that time period as a jazz singer. There were a lot of gangster types that were circulating those clubs and people that were scammers, trying to not give the musicians their money. And she had to build up a tough exterior. And I think that’s the beauty of season 2, particularly…The most important thing for me when playing Alberta is that she is a fully grounded, fully realized, and multi dimensional character. I didn’t want to just end up becoming the lady who has the funny one-liners.”

“These last few episodes, we really do begin to peel back the layers even more so,” she continues. “And I have to say great gratitude to Joe Port and Joe Wiseman, for being very collaborative with me, because my greatest want for Alberta is for her to be seen as a fully realized full-dimensional character. And it’s in these episodes that we really do get to see kind of her desires. We see with ‘Alberta’s Descendant’ that she’s always wanted to become a parent, and that’s why she tries to parent for the first time, even in the afterlife.”

“I wanted us to peel back her vulnerability,” she concludes. “We’re getting to see that in these last couple of episodes where her friendship with Hetty is now on the rocks. And we have to end up seeing her possibly rebuild—or decide to rebuild—her relationship with Hetty. I can’t wait for audiences to see it; I’ve worked my tail off this season to make sure that this character is not only just funny, but that she is just fully realized. I think that’s the most important thing for me.”

GHOSTS, Thursdays, 8:30/7:30c, CBS

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