good-cop-bad-cop

They played "good-cop-bad-cop", they skipped questions and repeated questions, they went over the same ground three and four times, they pointed out natural causes for things he had witnessed, they asked what his real motives were to get his adrenalin pumping, they called him "imaginative", and calmed him down when he took offense, and at the end of two hours both they and Prophet were exhausted.

1993, Gayle Peters, Taken!, Bitingduck Press LLC, →ISBN, page 108

He played good-cop-bad-cop all by himself. First he was tender and considerate, worrying that she might have cut her hand, and the next instant he was berating her for a supposedly faulty memory where her own marriage was concerned.

1998, Kelly Jamison, The Bride Was a Rental, Harlequin Books, →ISBN

You just have to be really strong and if the actor starts to bitch, you say, ‘Okay’ and you play good-cop-bad-cop, and you bring in the other head producer.

1999, Latin Style

He singlehandedly played good-cop-bad-cop, refusing to budge while expressing sympathy for their plight.

1999, The New York Times Biographical Service

Truitt could tell by reading his deputy’s body language that if they were to play good-cop-bad-cop, he would have to take the role of the good cop himself.

2001, Teri Holbrook, The Mother Tongue, Crimeline, →ISBN