Without a rehearsal?

TNT has been showing the earliest episodes of Without a Trace on Monday nights, and this week's was fascinating to watch from an acting perspective.

Throughout the episode, Anthony LaPaglia's Jack Malone and Poppy Montgomery's Samantha Spade have a very odd dynamic going on; she's being flirty and he's being withdrawn. At the end of the episode, we learn that Jack and his wife have been separated for three months. Later on in the series, we learn that Jack and Sam had had a relationship that ended before the series began (if I'm remembering correctly). And that's how LaPaglia was playing this episode, while Montgomery seemed to be playing it as if she were flirting with the safely married guy she wouldn't mind having a relationship with if not for the inconvenient fact of his marriage. It all made for a very weird viewing experience, and reminded me of how William B. Davis has said he made up a different backstory for Cancer Man in every episode of X-Files he appeared in.