Rafi Silver goes inside season 2’s big twist

Will the real Robert House please stand up? In “The Wrangler,” episode 5 of Fallout season 2, the show answered a question fans have been thinking about since Justin Theroux was cast to play New Vegas-controlling billionaire Mr. House. How could that happen when another actor — Rafi Silver — was already playing the role?

[Ed. note: The following contains spoilers for the Fallout season 2 episode “The Wrangler.”]

We first met Silver as Mr House in season 1, during a flashback where he met with the other powerful people who engineered the apocalypse. With season 2 heading to New Vegas, it made sense that we would see him in more flashbacks. What we didn’t expect is that there are technically two Robert Houses.

That came as a surprise to Rafi Silver, who played House in the first season, and has an odd connection to the Fallout franchise.

“My wife was a voiceover agent, and she happened to be working on Fallout: New Vegas back in the day when they were casting the voice [of Mr. House],” he tells Polygon. “When I got the audition that said ‘Robert House,’ my wife was like, ‘I know that character. I auditioned many voices for that character. There’s source material for it. [René Auberjonois] played it. You can take a look at it.'”

From there, Silver was cast, played his role, and moved on without knowing what was to come. Then he got a call from co-showrunner Geneva Robertson-Dworet, who revealed the surprising twist: Silver’s Mr. House serves as the public face of the man, while the genuine Robert House (Theroux) stays secure in his penthouse high above the Lucky 38 Casino.

“Geneva called me on the phone and told me, ‘Look, this is the twist with your character. There are a lot of endings to New Vegas that make the playthrough very different for the player,” he recalls. “One of the things we think is fun is that Robert House likes to play chess with the world, and a lot of people are out there trying to kill him. So just like Howard Hughes did — which was a source material for [House] — we think that he has an actor playing him as the public persona, and that’s who you are.'”

Photo: Prime Video

Theroux’s House is behind the scenes, calling the shots and organizing the apocalypse, while his double is glad-handing gamblers and being the public-facing life of the party. In reality, the faux Mr. House has far more in common with former film star Cooper Howard (Walton Goggins) than with the reclusive billionaire who shares his name. Just like Coop, Silver’s character is merely an actor playing a role.

“When [Cooper] comes to see me in episode 5, there’s this quick little moment. It’s an unspoken exchange where we’re in the elevator,” he explains. “You think I’m Robert House until that moment.”

Instead, according to Silver, “I’m a dude playing a dude disguised as another dude,” taking a line directly from Tropic Thunder, which Theroux co-wrote. And while it’s certainly complimentary to suddenly find yourself playing a double for a man who’s appeared multiple times on People Magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive list — “I told my wife immediately, and she jumped for joy,” Silver says — he wasn’t cast to simply stand in as Theroux’s doppelganger. Instead, the two collaborated on bringing Mr. House to life in season 2.

Photo: Prime Video

“We talked a lot about Justin’s take on the character, all the research I had done, how exciting it is to play such an interesting role, how exciting it is to have this little twist,” Silver says. When it came time to film together, though, Silver didn’t have to act very much.

“Justin Theroux is one of the best actors, and to be on set with him and Walton, it was almost as if I was playing the role, because I got to watch and study two incredible actors on set, which is exactly what my character does,” Silver says. “He is enamored by this man, Robert House, and has to figure out his mannerisms, the way he looks, the way he walks. So there was another layer to that in the fact that it was Justin Theroux, and he’s such an awesome actor.”

As for what’s ahead now that the cat’s out of the bag (at least for the audience — the rest of the world seemingly has no idea there are two Houses), Silver is playing his cards close to the vest. He does admit, however, that he’s put some thought into what his character is up to when he isn’t cosplaying as Mr. House. Don’t expect to hear about that anytime soon, though.

Photo: Johnny LaVallee Photography

“I have thought about it a lot, and I’ve had some talks about it, but if I reveal it, then it becomes canon, and it becomes lore, ” he said. “I don’t think I want to do that, if that makes sense. If I tell you who I am, then all of a sudden, we’re going to go back and trace it.” What he will say is that his head-canon version of his character’s identity is “very specific.”

Hopefully we’ll find out who that character really is one day. If it turns out to be Robert’s brother, Anthony House, though, I’ll have to put my foot down. In the games, Anthony clearly hates his brother, and he’s far too paranoid and deeply obsessed with conspiracy theories to be anyone’s public face.

New episodes of Fallout release Wednesdays on Prime Video.