One of the highpoints–which was also one of the low points–of Outlander Season 5 was the death of Jamie’s godfather Murtagh (Duncan Lacroix) at the Battle of Alamance when the Regulators took on the Red Coats.

The Regulators may have lost that battle, but it was a turning point in the life of the Frasers and MacKenzies. Jamie (Sam Heughan) lost his godfather, which hardened his feelings against the British, and Roger (Richard Rankin) was inadvertently hanged–and rescued–when his identity was confused with that of a Regulator.

Even so, he was looking forward to it, having always wanted to film a death scene–this was his first, and what more heroic death than to be shot in the chest and die on the battlefield while saving his godson’s life?

Lacroix on filming Murtagh’s death scene

“In terms of acting, there wasn’t much to do per se in that scene other than the technical things going on,” Lacroix tells Parade.com when promoting the Blu-ray/DVD release of Outlander Season 5. “It crept up on me the morning of that shoot. I got real emotional. I didn’t expect to, but I got on set and watching everyone on the set and the crew walking around, everything sank in and I got a bit emotional.” He adds, “The scene itself, it was all Sam really. He was phenomenal in that scene, his reaction to Murtagh dying.”

Possibly part of the reason that Heughan’s performance can be labeled “phenomenal” was that in real life, he and Lacroix are friends, so there was an extra layer of emotion for Heughan to play. He wasn’t only losing his onscreen godfather, he was saying goodbye to a friend.

“We still keep in touch,” Lacroix says. “I still live in Glasgow, so whenever we can, we hang around. We went to see the Tyson Fury fight in Las Vegas earlier this year. It was one of those relationships that built up, along with many relationships in the show. It is one of those uncanny experiences where we stayed friends: myself, Graham McTavish (Dougal MacKenzie), Stephen Walters (Angus Mhor), and some other actors from Season 1. We all stay in touch.”

Lacroix also talked to us about Murtagh’s choosing duty over love, how Outlander ripped him from the obscurity of doing plays in Ireland, and how he is dealing with COVID-19. Check it out below.

The season began with Murtagh promising a young Jamie he would always look after him. Did that set the tone for the season as far as Jamie and Murtagh’s relationship?

We had a wonderful wee actor who was playing young Jamie. It was kind of weird. They aged me younger with remarkable makeup and I think they digitally enhanced my face as well. I had the long flowing hair. It was a vanity project for me. I think it framed the whole importance of their relationship again leading up to what was going to happen with the Regulators and the tragedy of how those two characters would have to split up.

Jamie releases Murtagh from that promise, but Murtagh still sacrifices his life to save Jamie. Was there even a decision that went into that, or was it just an instinct to protect his godson?

The latter. I don’t think he ever had any intention of ever giving up that oath. Making that oath was one of the most defining relationships and points of his life. He was a young man then and he protected Jamie. He was by Jamie’s side for the next 20 odd years, so shaking off that, even though he believed so strongly in the Regulators cause, he would never let any harm befall his godson, no matter what happened.

Murtagh had this wonderful opportunity to have a life with Jocasta, but he sacrificed that for the fight for freedom. Or was it for revenge against the British? Or did his heart still belong to Jamie’s mother?

I think he was definitely in love with Jocasta. I think it was a combination of things. The way we portrayed it in the first two seasons, he wasn’t that political; he wasn’t that invested in the Jacobite cause. He would rather get Jamie away from the battlefield and save their necks. But, I think, once Culloden happened and the whole way of the clans, the whole way of life was decimated by the British, the fact that he had Jamie taken away from him at Ardsmuir Prison and he never thought he was going to see him again. Compounded on top of that, you have the story that you didn’t see that he was an indentured servant for nearly a decade and he saw the kind of injustice that was happening in the New World. A lot of those indentured servants wanted their freedom, they wanted to be free of the crown, they wanted to settle in this new land.

The revenge was against the symbol of the British who had taken everything from him. He was representative of his world, the whole Scottish immigrant movement, once again getting all their rights stripped away from them over and over again. So I think even though he was in love with Jocasta, it was just something he could not let go like a dog with a bone.

Murtagh died earlier in the books, at Culloden. Do you think keeping him alive longer stays true to Diana Gabaldon’s vision?

I know she wasn’t that keen on him staying alive, but I have to approach it from a completely different perspective. At the end of the day, it is my job to interpret the scripts that they give me, and they wanted to keep him alive.

I think they were right in that respect. Diana is a terrific writer but there is a lot of internal thought processes in the book that if you were to actually film it, 50 pages would go by of Caitriona walking in the field. The thought processes need to be drawn out in a different way, so from a narrative point of view, it was nice to keep him there.
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This show has changed Sam Heughan and Caitriona Balfe’s lives. What about you?

I was pretty much dragged from obscurity from stage shows in Ireland to this huge thing. Unfortunately, the COVID situation has taken away some of the momentum. I was actually in L.A. when it all kind of kicked in, funny enough. I had meetings over there and all of a sudden, I was lucky to get a flight back to Scotland and straight into lockdown. Things seem to be picking up a little more now project-wise. Unfortunately, that has put a stop to the momentum of things this year.

Looking back at all five seasons, do you have a favorite memory?

There are so many to pick from, but Season 1 is always going to be the special experience because we were so unaware of what a phenomenon it was going to be, and just the way we bonded, and the stunning locations we got to see in the first season, like Cairngorms National Park and riding our horses around. It was just an amazing experience.