Paulina Chavez says her character Ariana may have endured a "woman's worst nightmare" in Sunday's episode of Landman, but the cast and crew made her feel safe while filming the harrowing scene.

Ariana valiantly fights him off until her fiance Cooper (Jacob Lofland) arrives and beats up the guy.

"Everybody was so respectful on set and wanting to make sure that we were very comfortable. Jacob and I very much love to keep it as light-hearted as possible," Chavez, 23, told UPI in a recent Zoom interview.

"We have a whole season under our belt of just heartache and Ariana having a lot of emotional moments," she said. "There was a really cool aspect to it of us going to stunt rehearsal and mapping out exactly what Taylor wanted. All the punches that we needed to throw, the tackle, everything was very calculated and that was genuinely so fun."

"Luckily, the guy who plays Johnny (Mike Harkins) was incredibly respectful and such a sweet guy. But it was like that switch of putting yourself in that situation is hard," she recalled.

"It felt very, very real, especially when we did the sequence of the shirt ripping part. That was the hardest part for me."

"I don't think it'll define her. It'll make her more aware and cautious. But, I think she's just going to be more of a bad-ass," Chavez said. "If you think she was mean before, she's not going to be nicer to people."

Ariana was introduced in Season 1 as the widow of a man killed drilling for oil for the company where Cooper and his father work.

Cooper initially tries to help the struggling single mother of an infant son, but ends up falling in love with her.

The younger couple had just gotten financially settled and were making wedding plans when Ariana was attacked.

"It's just life, you know? You get engaged, you're happy, things are looking up and then a shitty guy from the bar comes and [expletive] up your day," Chavez laughed.

Season 2 shows Ariana interacting more with Cooper's wealthy, dysfunctional family -- father Tommy (Billy Bob Thornton,) mother Angela (Ali Larter), sister Ainsley (Michelle Randolph) and grandfather T.L. (Sam Elliott.)

"Ariana's definitely been in her bubble with her family," Chavez said.

"To see a different family dynamic is very much eye-opening for her. But you do understand a person when you see where they came from and how they were raised and it could either scare you away, or it can make you love them even more."

One of Chavez's favorite scenes to film this season was with all the stars sitting around a dinner table after the funeral for Tommy's much-loathed, never-seen mother.

"It's very, very interesting, like Sam Elliott's monologue that he had [recalling happier days with his dead wife.] He kept looking over at Jacob and I," Chavez said.

"There's just something so powerful about all of us being in the same room together and reacting off of each other," she added. "It was so much fun. I loved it."

Sheridan, who helms numerous other successful shows, as well, including Mayor of Kingstown and Tulsa King, was always accessible if his actors needed him, according to Chavez.

"Any time I had any questions about anything, I would just pick up the phone, call and then we would have a discussion about what his vision is and why he was going in the direction that he was going in," the actress said.

The last time she reached out to him was to discuss what would happen in Season 2, Episode 9 and that wasn't limited to the horrific assault that occurs at the end of the show.

"My main question was, 'Why do I keep calling [Cooper] a stray dog?'" she said.

"Taylor was like: 'You need to understand that Cooper is not even a little bit your type, but the person that he is, is so sexy to you that nobody else in the world is your type anymore. You only have eyes for him.' And I was like, 'That makes sense.'"

The series also stars Andy Garcia and Demi Moore. It has already been renewed for Season 3.