Alyssa Diaz revealed that a Season 5 scene in The Rookie used a hand double after Shawn Ashmore’s handwriting proved too hard to read. The detail came out during a July 25 interview at San Diego Comic-Con, where the pair revisited how a whiteboard riddle was shot and edited into the episode.
July 25 at San Diego Comic-Con
Diaz and Ashmore spoke about the scene while reflecting on their run as Angela Lopez and Wesley Evers, the characters they have played since October 2018. Diaz said, “Shawn did give us a warning because he had to write the riddle on a whiteboard,” and added, “I looked at it and said, ‘Oh my God, your writing is horrible. It’s hieroglyphics,’” before laughing off the fix with, “Again, the magic of editing,”
The Whiteboard Riddle
The Season 5 sequence mixed a case-solving beat with Angela giving birth to the couple’s second child, which made the writing detail more than a throwaway prop issue. Ashmore said, “I have a lot of talents, but handwriting is not one of them.” He also said, “We had to get a double to do the writing.”
His account makes the cut clearer: “If you watch the episode, the first line is actually me writing. Then it cuts away. When it comes back, everything is written—and it’s someone else’s handwriting.” That is the kind of production sleight of hand long-running shows rely on when a scene has to carry plot and character movement at the same time.
Angela and Wesley Since 2018
“To have almost nine years is such a gift. It’s like a real relationship. When he comes in, I’m like, ‘Hello, TV husband,’” Diaz said, putting the couple’s on-screen run in plain terms. She also said, “We know each other. We work well together,” and added that the proposal, marriage, kids, and kidnappings have tracked alongside real-life family milestones for both of them.
The Rookie was renewed for season 9, and all eight seasons are available to stream on Hulu. For readers catching up, that means the hand-double reveal sits inside a much longer arc: a duo that started in Season 2, married in season 3, welcomed their first child in season 4, and kept enough continuity that even a whiteboard in Season 5 had to be engineered around one performer’s handwriting.
