What Happens In Vegas

Mandeep Dhillon, Jorja Fox, and Paula Newsome are solving crimes, changing the game, and kicking ass in CSI: Vegas.

- By Mara Reinstein

“I’ll give you a fact,” Jorja Fox says cheerfully. The actress has spent the past 40 minutes on a Friday afternoon talking all things CSI, but before she takes off and enjoys her weekend, she’s eager to share a crucial piece of information courtesy of a recent conversation with Daniel Holstein, a forensic detective and the series’ tech adviser. “He told me that when he started out, maybe four percent of the crime scene investigators out there were women,” she says. “But now, the statistic is almost reversed!”

And though Fox is reluctant to take personal credit for the remarkable increase—she did, after all, play methodical-yet empathetic scientist Sara Sidle for nearly 15 years on the top-rated and groundbreaking smash CSI: Crime Scene Investigation—she is more than proud. “It’s flattering because women are persistent and problem-solvers, and they have seen this is a job that they can do,” she says. “It’s also cool and exciting because on the new show we are reflecting reality as much as we can.”