"You can't deny the place that the show has in the history of television, and I feel personally that I played a pretty extraordinary character on a TV show," McMahon said during a telephone interview.
The two stars took the crew out for a post-production celebration at Beso in Hollywood when they completed filming their last scene, a surgery with Roma Maffia, who played lesbian anesthesiologist Liz. They already had said goodbye to Joely Richardson four days earlier, whose last scene was the family dinner that echoed other family gatherings of previous seasons.
"There have been so many goodbyes that maybe, honestly, the goodbye gene is spent now and now I'm ready for this goodbye with this story," Richardson said. But hours later, when her work on "Nip/Tuck" was over, Richardson wept as she went around the room quietly hugging everyone. Thirteen-year-old Kelsey Lynn Batelaan, who played Annie McNamara, received a long embrace from Walsh when she completed her work.
"Right now, it's kind of overwhelming and there are mixed emotions," Maffia said. "But I think when time passes, or when I drive by the lot, it's gonna be like damn."
If there is a surprise to the way "Nip/Tuck" ends, it's in its restrained quality, which several of the actors said they appreciated after seasons of shocking and preposterous story lines.
"I've always thought the show should have been simpler than it was so, for me, it was nice to have a little less than what we've been expanding upon for the last number of years," McMahon said. "I think you'll have an emotionally justifiable episode in the end."
In separate interviews, Walsh and McMahon both said that what they'd miss the most about working on the show was each other.
"I'll miss every day sitting in one trailer or another, talking about everything going on with the show and our lives," Walsh said. "We are what Ryan wanted the show to be. I love him. That's the best thing I got out of the show -- it was him."
--
maria.elena.fernandez@latimes.com
