Mark Harmon & Cote de Pablo on Ziva’s ‘NCIS’ Return, Tiva & the Threat to Gibbs
The last time Cote de Pablo and Mark Harmon paired up for a TV Guide Magazine cover sho..ot, in 2009, it ended with a food fight and her face smushed into a cake. The mood is more serious this August day when we go back to the NCIS set in Valencia, California, to mark the momentous return of her character, Ziva David.
With shoo..ting for Season 17 under way, Harmon sports a nasty stage-makeup scratch on his forehead, while de Pablo is on a closed set to do a fight scene (her character is a martial arts expert). Together for our photographer later — and minus any visible signs of an altercation — they have the same easy rapport we see onscreen. He whispers in her ear, she laughs and leans her head on his shoulder. (“I don’t think we’d be here if we weren’t [friends off camera],” she notes.)
Afterward, we sit down with the costars to talk about the staggeringly popular drama’s upcoming season and how it feels to be reunited.
In the trailer, Ziva mentions a woman named Sahar (Mouzam Makkar) who wants her dead and is now after Gibbs. Just how dangerous will it get?
Mark Harmon: The threat is real.
Cote de Pablo: We are very much in danger. The only way to justify Ziva [possibly] breaking cover and jeopardizing herself and the people at NCIS was to make the threat absolutely real. She lost her father [Mossad director Eli David, k.il.led in Season 10], so she feels responsible for her father figure, Gibbs, and has to save him. She’s also trying to keep her daughter a secret and safe from the people who are trying to get to Gibbs and to her. [Tali has been living in Paris with her former NCIS agent father, Tony DiNozzo, played by Michael Weatherly.]
