Agent Provocateur (Season 16, Episode 11)
Premise: A 15-year-old fan of a movie star is found drugged in a suitcase after his hotel party, and the security video that could show what happened is in the hands of a gossip site.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 16, Episode 11
- Starring
- Sgt. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), Det. Odafin “Fin” Tutuola (Ice-T), Det. Nick Amaro (Danny Pino), Det. Dominick “Sonny” Carisi Jr. (Peter Scanavino), ADA Rafael Barba (Raúl Esparza), Judge Colin McNamara (Stephen C. Bradbury)
- Guest stars
- Shiloh Fernandez as Scott Russo, Jeremy Jordan as Skye Adderson, Patti LuPone as Lydia Lebasi, Madison Grace as Madison Baker, John Pankow as Lenny Simmons
- Director
- Alex Chapple
- Writers
- Samantha Corbin-Miller
Summary
“Agent Provocateur” begins with 15-year-old Madison Baker found unconscious and naked inside a suitcase in a Tribeca alley. Her uncle, Matt Baker, never noticed she was gone, and her phone leads to the Howell Hotel, where actor Scott Russo, in town for a film festival, had been trading selfies with her. Tests show alcohol, Ambien and Xanax. Russo, shielded by his manager, Lydia Lebasi, says he left Madison at the bar, his co-star Skye Adderson only half supports him, and a man posing as an NYPD detective has already taken the hotel’s security footage.
Gossip site LMZ then airs hotel video of Russo kissing Madison, revealing who took the recordings. A search of Russo’s suite finds the same drugs; he says he shut his door on Madison and spent the night with a married co-star, Catalina Soren, now flying to New Zealand. Madison now claims she slept with Russo willingly. Barba needs the rest of the video, but LMZ boss Lenny Simmons cites the press shield law and skips a grand jury subpoena, so the squad arrests him late on a Friday. Posing as a fellow inmate called Big G, Fin gets Lenny boasting about a vault of footage and naming Lydia as his source.
Lydia tells the detectives that Russo called her about an overdosed girl in his bed, and that she supplied the suitcase, cleaned the room and had LMZ pull the footage. Russo is arrested, but Madison changes her story again: Russo turned her away at his door, with Catalina behind him in a robe, and Skye took her into his own room, where they drank, she took some of his pills and they had sex. Benson stops Skye and Lydia on their way to the airport and bluffs that LMZ has handed over the hallway video. Skye blurts out that Lydia brought the suitcase, and Lydia says the cover-up was her idea and that Skye had wanted to call an ambulance.
Spoiler, the ending: With Skye’s confession on record, the prosecution does not oppose dismissing Russo’s indictment, and the judge sets him free. Russo thanks the detectives, calls Lydia’s scheme a betrayal of his integrity and turns his week into publicity for his new film, “Falsely Accused.” The episode does not show what becomes of Skye or Lydia.
Why it stands out
- Patti LuPone guest stars as Russo’s manager, Lydia Lebasi, and Jeremy Jordan as actor Skye Adderson.
- Jordan had appeared on the show before, in the 2008 episode “Streetwise”; LuPone had earlier roles on the original Law & Order.