Even though Alexandra Daddario’s early police procedural guest role had the potential to be a compelling side story for the series, the show completely wasted her in this early performance. One iconic ‘00s cop show’s premise was always irresistible, even for seasoned fans of legal dramas who felt like they had seen it all before the show premiered. The series centered on an unlikely professional partnership between Tim DeKay’s by-the-book FBI agent Peter Burke and Matt Bomer’s slick, charismatic con man Neal Caffrey.
While the James Spader vehicle The Blacklist also explored the story of a redeemed criminal helping the FBI hunt down their most wanted fugitives, this earlier 2009 series instead ensured that its two protagonists always felt more evenly matched than that procedural ever managed. Spader’s character was always a few steps ahead in The Blacklist, whereas Caffrey and Burke complimented each other perfectly and their chemistry ensured the show was always more than another attempt to replicate Law & Order’s cop drama formula.
However, White Collar truly dropped the ball with one early piece of casting. Future Immortal Universe star Alexandra Daddario played Caffrey’s love interest Kate Moreau, an enigmatic true love who disappeared after the pair began working for the crime boss Vincent Adler. Throughout season 1, Caffrey’s search for Daddario’s Kate humanized him, but viewers were only ever afforded brief glimpses of the character via flashbacks and phone calls. Then White Collar wasted the future star with a misjudged twist in this subplot’s ending.
Alexandra Daddario Was Wasted In Her White Collar Role
Shortly after Kate and Caffrey are reunited, an explosive plane crash kills off Daddario’s White Collar character in a brutal blow to the charming con man. While this plot twist was used to fuel Caffrey’s subsequent vendetta against Adler, it was also clearly a way for the show to keep its central partnership alive if White Collar was renewed for another season.
Caffrey always hoped to escape the clutches of the FBI and Adler alike, running away with Kate once they were reunited. Thus, killing off Kate fundamentally altered the character’s motivations, prompting Caffrey to align himself with the FBI so he could take down Adler once and for all, as vengeance for the mob boss murdering the love of his life.
All of this would have worked fine, on a purely narrative level, if it weren’t for Daddario’s star power. There is a reason that the actor soon became the breakout star of True Detective season 1, holding her own against established superstars like Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson with a brief but memorable role as the mistress of Harrelson’s hypocritical family man, Marty Hart.
Alexandra Daddario Became A Much Bigger Star After White Collar
While Daddario made a self-effacing viral gag about the President seeing her topless after Barack Obama reportedly requested an advance copy of True Detective season 1, the star’s part in the show was no joke for her career. In the years that followed, Daddario played lead roles in the blockbusters San Andreas and Baywatch, as well as starring in the shows Why Women Kill, The White Lotus, and the three-season hit Mayfair Witches.
While that Anne Rice spinoff was not quite as massive as its predecessor, AMC’s Interview with the Vampire, the popularity of Mayfair Witches proves that Daddario is an in-demand star with plenty of versatility. Her roles in smaller indie movies like 2018’s We Have Always Lived in the Castle and 2019’s We Summon the Darkness earned her superb reviews from critics, while guest appearances in everything from New Girl to American Horror Story: Hotel highlighted her range.
Sadly, even though the legal drama gave her what was arguably her breakout role, White Collar ironically never used Daddario to her full potential. Nowadays, her part as a one-episode potential love interest in a 2012 outing of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia is about as well-remembered as her two-season role on White Collar, which just goes to show how badly the show wasted her emerging star power.
- Release Date
-
2009 – 2014-00-00
- Network
-
USA
