Law & Order's Dylan McDermott Moves From Series Regular to Recurring in Organized Crime Season 2

Kimberly Roots
·2 min read
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.

Elliot Stabler won’t be able to relax for a while on Law & Order: Organized Crime, because the man playing his nemesis just inked a new deal for Season 2 of the SVU spinoff.

Dylan McDermott, who portrays villain Richard Wheatley on the NBC drama, will recur in Season 2, our sister site Deadline reports. This is a change from the show’s freshman run, in which McDermott was a series regular.

More from TVLine

McDermott reportedly will appear in eight episodes of the upcoming season.

In a call with reporters ahead of the show’s renewal in May, franchise creator Dick Wolf mentioned that Season 2 likely would consist of three eight-episode arcs, for a total of 24 episodes.

“The first third of the season is The Godfather. The second third is American Gangster. And the last third is Scarface,” Wolf said. “And these villains are going to be really bad guys that give [Stabler] a constant source of energy, outrage, belief in justice and a different way of pursuing criminals than we’ve had before.”

In the Season 1 finale, Wheatley survived a hit (put out by his own son!) and wound up in prison, where he awaited trial for the murder of Stabler’s wife, Kathy. While there, however, he used a contraband cell phone to lure Stabler’s former partner, Law & Order: SVU‘s Olivia Benson, to a hospital where Wheatley was orchestrating the murder of his ex-wife Angela.

Earlier in July, Nick Creegan, who plays Wheatley’s son, Richard Jr., signed on to The CW’s Batwoman as a series regular for the forthcoming third season.

Do you have thoughts on Richard Wheatley’s presence in Season 2 of Organized Crime? Sound off in the comments!

Best of TVLine

Get more from TVLine.com: Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Newsletter