Devon Hales – Teenage Bounty Hunters

By starrymag | September 9, 2020

By: Lisa Steinberg

 

 

Q) In the breakdown you received originally for April, was she as extra and dramatic as the April we see on screen? Or was that context something you constructed about her with your performance?

 

A) I definitely found some key things in the breakdown.  It talked about how she views herself as the most Christian, the most popular girl at the school.  It talked about how she is kind of a born politician. Because it was one of the sides that I had to audition with, it talked a little bit about Sterling (Maddie Phillips) becoming fellowship leader, and it said when Sterling is chosen fellowship leader “April can barely contain her rage behind her wide Jesus-loving smile.” Definitely some very clear images.  I think being from the South, being the most Christian, and the politician descriptor, I was like, those are all people, or there are people in those groups, who have the public persona and the private persona.  The public persona is always putting on a show.

The drama of that I definitely found in the breakdown, but the rest was kind of just me trying to see what I could get away with.  As someone who grew up in the South, who went to a private Christian school for some very formative years, from third to eighth grade, I think most people know these kinds of religious people – Christian or not, but a lot of times it’s Christian.  It’s like no, you are allowed to have a real, genuine human reaction to something that just happened to you.  The flair for the dramatic just comes from always being on display, always putting on a show.  It’s a defense mechanism for sure.

I am also a theater baby and I was for a long time. So, the flair for the dramatic that’s like second nature, not necessarily to me, but I know so clearly what it looks like and I know those people.  Yeah, so a little bit of both.  I was just having the time of my life and I was like, as much as they’ll let me get away with, I’m going to do.

 

Q) There is really an incredible artform that you bring to that craft and creativity where you balance it so well.  You do it so naturally and in an unexpected way that the audience gets that giggle, but we know you’re not working for that giggle.

 

A) Sure. Yeah. I appreciate that.  Some of that grounding is definitely in credit to our different directors.  Like in episodes one and two, we were still definitely having a little bit of a negotiation about “Okay, how much are we pushing this?” Yeah, making sure that it still felt real.  Even from the audition, as soon as I read the sides, in my mind, there was really only one thing that this is and it’s either going to work and I am going to get this job, or casting is going to look at it and be like, “Wow. Okay. Yep. Nope. Never calling her in for anything again.”  I think a couple of us feel that way.  We really went for it in our audition tapes and, thankfully, it paid off and it is pretty true to what you see in the rest of the series.

 

Q) Well, I certainly think you did an amazing job with that natural rhythm in those scenes.

 

A) Yeah, and I think it’s fun that she is surprising.  You never know what she is going to do and that is super fun for me as an actor, and also to watch. Because you know, that’s what I want to watch on TV, a character where you are like, “Oh Jesus, what are they going to do next?”

 

Q) When you began reading the scripts and learning more about who April was and this compartmentalized side, what really struck you the most and resonated with how she was written? And subsequently, what was your process for crafting how you wanted to play her?

 

A) I think there were two things that were really important as I started to learn where this journey was going to go.  Revealing her humanity, obviously.  We wanted to be very careful because, there was a danger of it feeling like two different people, you know.  Because we really went all the way with the “head bitch in charge” aspect of her.  I think we were able to find moments, even in the beginning when she is being the worst, to see moments of her almost losing it and then really having to like to pull it back together and put that face back on.  So, I think finding moments to show that as awful as she is being, there is no denying that, that she’s still a person with feelings and a full emotional spectrum under there and just being so cautious about what she lets slip.  So that was one part.

Then, I wanted to be very careful after her sexual identity is revealed that she didn’t suddenly become this perfect, gay angel.  That obviously we immediately feel for her, but she’s been that all along, it’s just the audience that’s catching up.  We’re not trying to make her, because this is revealed, suddenly into this perfect, fully lovable character.  She’s still got her own issues.  She’s still got things to work through.  She’s still being really mean to certain people.  Making sure that there was room for both.  Finding a way to make her a fully-fledged, flawed human being was really important.

You brought up the compartmentalization part, and that word was really important. I had a conversation about halfway through the season with Kathleen [Jordan], our creator about where this is going, and she wanted to make it very clear that this person, in her own conversation with herself and her Lord, is not in denial about who she is.  We obviously talk about that later, but just because she is not living out doesn’t mean that she hates the way that she is.  That was really important to us and I think the writers room did such a phenomenal job of finding ways to talk about that.

 

Q) It definitely seems like she has reconciled everything for herself and is capable of saying within herself that God doesn’t hate me. She’s not going to feel guilty about who she is or who she loves.  She’s ahead of a lot of people in a sense.

 

A) Yeah.  Definitely. I think ahead of where a lot of sixteen-year-olds were when I was sixteen, and when you were sixteen.  She is of a different generation than I am and the fact that she has found this self-acceptance is pretty amazing given the community that she lives in.  I hope that’s because in her world she has more representation than my generation had, than anybody had.  There is obviously still such a long way to go, but yeah, the fact that she found it is pretty amazing.

I feel like her narwhal and those “tiny, blue poisonous frogs” speech that she gives; I think that’s something she has had to practice.  I think that’s why she has it so ready.  It’s something that she has said to herself in the mirror and has had so much time to practice because she has known it for a long time but has told no one.  I think it’s just been churning.  It’s pretty amazing.

 

Q) That is a really good point.  For someone who is prepared about basically everything, this answer for Sterling is right there in her mind, on the tip of her tongue, being repeated to someone so easily.  Thinking about it now, yeah, it is something that she has had to polish for herself.

 

A) Yeah.  She was like, I don’t know when I am going to tell anybody, but I’m going to eventually. I think our idea was that she probably wasn’t going to come out until college, until she was out from under her parent’s roof and she was in a different community.  She has these aspirations and that’s why she made the choice.  She’s like, “I know the people that I am around. I know the community that I live in and I am not going to let any of those ignorant people destroy my aspirations with their ignorance.” So, her choice has been to do things her way, and then all of a sudden Sterling is coming in totally disrupting that.

 

Q) I think that’s what really balances their dynamic so well too in a way.  Like we said, April is this polished person and has thought a lot about all of this. It’s not really until the debate that Sterling has this huge epiphany.  April has had her mind set and knows who she is, and Sterling is just starting to figure herself out in that way.

 

A) It’s funny because April has stewed on this for so long and definitely has a different personality than Sterling, and Sterling is the one who is able to be like, “All of a sudden this is happening and here’s how I feel about it and we should just be honest about it.”  And April is like, “No, no, no!  I have been thinking about this for the last however many years and you are such a spaz, you can’t just Sterling your way out of this.”  Yeah, that dynamic is really fun.

 

Q) I love that the series is as much about the nuances and details we see in it as it is about the witty, clever dialogue. There is this amazing social commentary interwoven so well within the series, but it’s also about the tug and range of expressions from the characters that we see on screen as well.

Talk about how “Teenage Bounty Hunters” ends up also adding these innate type of extra amazing layers of its own to the characters and series that are just as sharp and significant, such as a subtle movement or a quick glance, that we might miss or linger on when we watch, and end up catching them even more when we binge all over again. These are the type of moments that end up being as much of a meaningful focus for the audience as what has been so spectacularly scripted.

 

A) The fact that so many of those moments ended up in there and as part of the storytelling was such a wonderful surprise. Some of them I didn’t even know about because, you know, I was worried about my own stuff.  The fact that I have seen so many gifs of me reaching over Maddie and her having a full, you know, monologue with her face, I had no idea that that was happening.  I had no idea.  I was worried about trying to deliver the “I’m going to need you to kill a pigeon” line without laughing.

Some of those moments have been the most amazing surprise and are such a credit to Kathleen for creating a world where this is possible, and to our directors who were like, “No, stay on that,” or “Yes, we are going to get that.”  There is so much.  God.  There is so little time and there is so much money on it and the fact that there were times where they would just let us play and make faces and use valuable time to catch this glance or this eye movement, it’s just such a credit to the amazing team behind this who created an environment where that was possible.

 

Q) I think it adds another level of what makes this series so exceptional and special.  Because of those tender moments, or those moments you end up relating to so well.  Like when April leans over Sterling during class or when Sterling is seated behind April and is gazing at her adoringly. A lot of people who are in the LGBT community can remember a time where they are watching their crush from behind in class playing with their ponytail or other type of familiar moments that they might recognize from their adolescence.  Seeing these moments, you can definitely relate to and recognize so much of yourself in these characters.

 

A) It’s so much about being a teenager and that yearning. You are so hyper aware of everything that that person is doing.  That’s such an important part of this storytelling.  I am glad that people are appreciating it.  It’s really fun.  Again, on social media, especially on Tumblr, they are doing the gifs of those moments, I am like, “Woah! We did a pretty good job on that!”  To get to see it broken down, it’s a great way to really appreciate all of those tiny little beats.

 

Q) You and Maddie have such a tenderness together and a devout conscientiousness to these characters. What was your first impression of Maddie, and how did you really end up bonding?

 

A) I had a lovely first impression of her.  I had only booked the job a day and a half, two days, before our table read for the pilot.  So, I had no idea what was going on.  It was like being shot out of the scariest cannon.  I was so excited to be there, but it was so, so stressful because I had just found out that I am doing this thing and I am walking into this room full of all of these people. I don’t know who is in here, every single person is a stranger. I know absolutely no one and I guess I am just going to do what I did on my audition tape.  Nobody gave me any notes, so I guess I am just playing that character like that!  In the most high-pressure, stressful environment she came over and was like “Oh my God, hi!”  She was so open, warm and an enthusiastic person.  I am not that way in those kinds of situations.  I shut down.  I am just like, “Okay, if I am just quiet and still, I can get through this.”

Knowing that you have the number one of the series, a lead on the series who immediately creates this environment of warmth and enthusiasm, was really great and was really important to me.  She and Anjelica [Fellini] on our first bathroom break were like, “Okay, so who are you and tell us all about yourself.”  It could very easily not be like that.  They could be like, “Nope, we are the leads of this series and we are not going to speak to you.”  But it definitely was not like that.

Over the course of filming it, we were learning so much about these characters as we went along.  The thing that really bonded us the most is that every time something new came up we were just looking at each other and being like, I cannot believe that we get to do this.  I cannot believe that this is our job.  She has way more on camera experience than I do and has been working for a long time and done a lot of projects.  This was something, not brand new, but something of this size was brand new to me.  So, it was fun knowing that as much experience as she had, she was still in the exact same place as I was in just being so excited and so dumbfounded that people trusted us enough to tell these stories.  We could not believe it.  Especially when we got later into the season and we were working off of each other way more and spending a lot more time together.  It’s not something that got old ever because we were constantly getting surprised.

I think it would have been a dream job regardless, but to get to be just in the throes of, again that yearning, that is just so cathartic to get to work with that kind of material.  Yeah, just the absolute disbelief is what bonded us.

 

Q) The dynamic between the Holy Trinity throughout the season is just as spunky, sassy, and sarcastic as it is off screen with all of the posts each of you have been sharing through Instagram. You all seem to be such an extension of one another with you, Eric [Graise] and Charity [Cervantes]. Was that a natural bond that was built around this core group of characters or was that formed beforehand between you three?

 

A) What’s extra special between the three of us is that we live in Atlanta. We are Atlanta actors and booked this job out of Atlanta.  That is something that still has a long way to go, but roles of this size for Atlanta actors, it’s not really the norm yet.  It’s trying.  We’re trying. But, yeah, for the three of us to be able to say we are from here and we can handle this…we are not from L.A., but we can handle this, we can tell these stories, that was super fun.  Also, just the proximity to each other meant that, not necessarily in these days, but in the old days we could hang out a lot.

Charity and I live pretty close to each other, so it’s really fun to have that connection.  I can’t speak for them, but for me it was so nice to have some consistency in the first half of the season where I was like, “I don’t know what I am doing. I don’t know if I am doing it right, but I am doing it.”  To have two other people to share scenes with, and again to sort of like freak out with about our jobs, was really special.  That bond happened pretty naturally over the course of shooting.  Even though Atlanta is a smaller market, we didn’t know each other before this.  It’s always crazy to meet brand new Atlanta people.

Charity and I laugh because she booked this job before I did.  Eric and I were like two of the last to come on board.  Charity had seen my audition tape, knew that she booked the job, and so she sent me a friend request on Instagram.  I didn’t know that I had booked the job, so I opened this request and was like, “Who is this Instagram influencer who wants to follow me?  So, I deleted it.  Then at the table read she introduced herself to me like we were best friends because she had known and was so excited that I was going to be coming on board.  We laugh about that now that I rejected her request.

 

Q) The song “Slow Burn” is quite apt on so many levels when it comes to April and Sterling’s relationship. It has such different context of meanings first in the car after this courtyard relationship debate, then at the lock-in when Sterling can’t reconcile what’s going on with the way that April is acting towards her. How does the music in these two different moments help play up separately and then tie in as well the palpable magnitude of emotions of each of these scenes?

 

A) It’s such a great song.  When we found out that it was going to be in the script in episode eight, we both started listening to it immediately. Lyrically, I think it obviously really speaks to it.  The “slow burn” part, “I’m gonna do it my way,” “if we burn it down and it takes all night.”  All of that speaks to it in pretty obvious ways.  Yeah, it was really cool to have that car scene and know that it was going to be underscored by this song.  It was nice that these two characters who have been so stressed out this whole season who have been so often at odds with each other, and even when they do get together still have so much to work through, and they are able to have this one moment of like romance and just the sort of dreamy moment. That was really, really great.  Because I had been listening to it for so long, I felt a connection to it just as an actor working on this project.  When I started, I didn’t really know where things were going to go, and it was just sort of like a slow burn leading up to all of this really juicy stuff.  So, I felt a personal connection to it beyond the character.

By the time we got to episode ten, I was like such a mess.  I was such a mess about that song.  When we were starting to shoot the night of the lock-in, where she turns it back on, there was a period of time where they were doing a lot of Maddie’s coverage and I was in the back room and I was trying to keep it together.  Because I could hear the song, they were actually playing it, and just like those first couple of seconds of the song I was like, “Oh my God.  Oh My God.”  I was so in my feelings about that song, about the show coming to an end, about the journey for these characters.  So, it was messy.

Yeah.  I think her being able to bring it back, that is such like a fun, dramatic moment of like turning that song on and being like, “Remember!”  It’s so satisfying dramatically.  Again, it’s one of those things where I am like, “Oh, I can’t believe we get to play this moment.  It’s so good.”  I don’t want to speak for Maddie…I think it’s a moment where Sterling is like “Don’t give up on this, don’t run away from this.  We said we were going to take it slow and we can.  Just come back and we can do it our way.  We can take it slow.”  She obviously doesn’t yet know why I (April) am acting the way that I am acting.

But, yeah, such a great song.  One that I will have a connection to for the rest of my life probably because it was just such a moment in my life making this first season.

 

Q) The moment at the lock-in where April is eating pizza and April is totally trying to keep herself from full blown breaking down, she’s just trying to focus on that moment and pull herself back to that compartmentalization.  These emotions on your face as April, you see this sad, forlorn struggle.  That’s what really drives the tensions and swell of emotion in that painful moment too.

 

A) It’s so painful.  What was fun about seeing that is we did so many different versions of that moment.  One where I really, really even tried harder to ignore her (Sterling), and one where I just stared at her the whole time and cried.  We shot what I think is just the best of both worlds and I can’t take any credit for it.

And God bless Spencer [House].  The pizza was totally his idea.  He was like, “Take another bite of pizza!”  And I was like, “I can’t!  I can’t. This is so sad!”  People have definitely responded to that moment.  I am glad that it conveys what it is supposed to convey.

 

Q) There is this stoic resolve that April has, and yet the cracks are evident as well. But only if you’re really paying attention.  If any of the other people around them had been paying attention, they would have seen that little tiny crack that stays with her.

 

A) It’s so sad.

 

Q) April has all of this self-confidence, except when it comes to what’s really personal for her. What is it about that moment when Sterling makes a move that really gives April permission, or is like an internal dare, to let her guard down and recognize that she doesn’t have to always have these walls that won’t allow anyone else in?

 

A) I definitely think it’s her being surprised by Sterling. I think her thing with Sterling is always, “You don’t really stand up for yourself, and you don’t really necessarily have an opinion. These good things just like happen to you and it has nothing to do with anything that you’re doing.”  And that is so infuriating.  I think when she watches Sterling give that speech at the memorial there is like a, “Hmm.”  I think definitely at the debate where she is like, “Why are you so confident?  This is so unlike you.  Who even is this person?” I think that’s definitely another moment of like, “Hmm…what’s going on?”

Obviously, I think it’s a huge moment where she is finally able to tell Sterling “This is what you did to me, this is why I am mad at you.”  Sterling does say she wants to focus on healing their friendship.  I don’t think April thinks that that is really going to happen.  So, when they are working on that project together, I don’t necessarily think she is thinking about her in a romantic way yet.  It’s just like, “I have known this person for so long and suddenly she’s full of surprises and she is keeping her word and she has opinions about The Bible.  This is so unlike you.”

I think allowing yourself to be surprised by another person really helps break those walls down even if it is sort of unconsciously.  That whole moment is fueled by Sterling making the first move.  And it’s like, “Whoa, that’s kind of great.”  I think it’s a love affair by a thousand tiny cuts.  She really has to whittle her way in there.  Sterling is the one who plans their date.  April is so used to being the one to make all of the decisions because other people won’t.  She’s like if I don’t, you all are just going to sit there, and there is nothing more infuriating than that.  I just have to be the one to do it.  So, having Sterling come in and kind of disrupt that pattern is part of the turn on.

 

Q) April has been holding on to this moment from fifth grade of Sterling “giving April away,” and she has been keeping that so locked inside of her.  Then this great surprise of seeing Sterling in a whole other way outside of that is quite jarring.  April says, “Why can’t people just tell the truth?” Nobody else has really ever told her the truth.  And April’s own truth is so hidden away.  Sterling as you said really does whittle her way at that until April ends up so caught off guard in the most amazing ways.

 

A) I think, yes, it’s about that moment in fifth grade. But when something like that happens and you don’t ever talk about it, it just festers and becomes this much larger thing and this person, who is just a person, has this much larger place in your psyche. Sterling is just another person making choices like we all are. She is not this ultimate antagonist.

 

Q) In the beginning we have this one view of April where she is supposed to be the villain/foil, but then we slowly see this underlying vulnerability and great deal of depth that makes you empathize for her.  What has it meant to you portraying such a richly multi-dimensional character like April who represents a range in where LGBTQ viewers see themselves in the variety of April’s layers?

 

A) It’s been incredible.  Again, it goes back to that thing where I can’t believe someone picked me to do this and trusts me to tell this story.  It’s crazy.  It’s that thing where you actually gain more by specificity than you do of this sort of stock general character.  The more human and the more specific we could make her; I think that the more there is for viewers to pull out for themselves.  It’s been cool to get responses like that. Like, “Yes, I am queer, and I am from the South, and this resonates to me for this reason.” Or, “I am not from the South and I am not religious, but my family still doesn’t understand and thank you for telling this story.”

I think we are definitely not trying to put these characters on screen and say there you go; we have fixed the representation problem.  We are definitely not.  People in the LGBTQ community obviously know that.  These are two characters who move through the world with a ton of privilege because of the way they look, because of the communities that they are from, and because of their socioeconomic status.  Our job is to portray these characters as honestly and as fully as possible and hope that it resonates and just try to continue to move that dial, move that needle.

There are so many stories to be told and so much representation lacking, and it can obviously be extremely frustrating the pace at which the entertainment industry moves and at which the world moves.  As long as we keep pushing and trying to say there is such an empty space where this representation should be, and there is an audience out there who is completely underserved.  It’s a shame that we have to prove that these stories are marketable and can make people money.  It’s unfortunate that we have to do that.  But, yeah, we hope that this is part of just a step on a much larger plan.

 

Q) The scene in the arcade where April validates who she is and says she isn’t going to hell for being a lesbian is one of the most meaningful assertions on screen for the LGBTQ community. Not a lot of shows specifically have characters say I am gay, or I am a lesbian. There are allusions but never explicitly mentioned. I feel like this series sets a high bar and really puts a strong focus on subverting certain harmful stereotypes.  Like April saying she doesn’t think God hates her because she is gay.  They go to a religious school, but this toxic assertion of religion as a way to guilt gay teens has been perpetuated so much.  It’s rare to see this kind of representation positively being portrayed. What kind of feedback have you received in this regard?

 

A) I mean, that is all a credit to Kathleen. It would be very easy to, and sometimes understandable, her phrase is like punch up at Christianity, to punch up at the South, to make this a story about the self-loathing.  We wanted to create a world where we are just trying to represent it in a slightly different way and the writers’ room made every effort to do that.

I hope that it feels like a refreshing take on all of these issues and what would it be like for someone to know this and accept this about herself but still have to struggle with it, to struggle with the outside world.  We are not saying, “There she goes, she’s a lesbian and she is coming out and everything is sunshine and rainbows.”  Because it’s not.  I think it’s definitely not when you are trying to represent those communities authentically as we are.

 

Q) Seeing these affirmations there and seeing someone who does accept herself as much as she can and as open as she can accept herself, it’s quite the rarity, and so huge in the form of representation.

 

A) I know you mentioned, and we have definitely gotten a lot of feedback, the fact that she actually is able to say it, and it’s not just that she makes out with a girl. It’s not just, “Have you told anyone we are gay?” It’s like, “I am a lesbian.”  I feel like, as you mentioned, it’s not often that it is clearly and boldly said.

I know that we have seen that there is some frustration about Sterling not saying bisexual and sort of alluding to it in every other way.  I think again, trying to represent this journey authentically, there are a lot of communities that are like okay, you brought your parents around to the gays, you brought your parents around to the lesbians, but they can’t quite understand bisexuality.  They’re like, “I don’t quite get that.”  I think in a community where she (Sterling) has probably not often heard that particular label, it’s not something that she is seeing as much. I think it’s authentic that it is taking her a little longer to find the words for that.  I am glad that fans are excited that April said exactly what it was.  That’s been great to see the response on that.

 

Q) I think where Sterling says “I’d be in the blue-pink-purple part” really epitomizes it without necessarily needed that explicitness.  Like you said, she doesn’t really specifically have the terms, and maybe she’s not familiar with what those feelings mean and the puzzle pieces from where she is growing up.  But I think it’s accurate and you don’t have to necessarily label yourself. You can find yourself in whatever color feels fitting for you.  You don’t have to have the answers at sixteen either.

 

A) Right!  Not only is she sixteen, but this I like a brand new realization to her. I think the fact that she is able to articulate it as clearly as she does for it being a brand new thing; I think it’s pretty amazing.

 

Q) That really is the epitome of Sterling to me.  The way she does express it is pure Sterling. 

 

A) Yeah. It’s very on brand.  That is true.

 

Q) At the end of the season we have this devastating parting between Sterling and April where April slinks away and heads back into the lock-in after this hard conversation.  Do they think they have to go back to full enemies, or can they exist without having to totally back-peddle?

 

A) I don’t know.  I think even if they look to each other and were like “Okay, we are going to go back to being enemies, deal?” “Deal.” They would not be able to keep that up.  In no world.  They have both been so irreparably shaken and changed by this experience, that even if they tried there is no way.  And I think the way that it ended neither of them is furious with the other person.  Even Sterling, who is mad, very quickly came to understand why I (April) am acting the way that I am acting.  She’s keeping her own secrets, so it’s like you can’t really be that mad because you have been keeping a big old secret.

I think the fact that although they might be pretty devastated by it, and obviously Sterling has a couple of other things to deal with, I think there is probably an amount of respect and fondness for the other person and for the moments that they did have.  April obviously doesn’t understand why Sterling was like, “Actually I don’t know.”  But she made her choice first.  So, yeah, it’s going to be fingers crossed that we get a season two.  All of the fingers.  All of the toes.  Everything is crossed for everybody.  I am glad to see that everybody is on board for that.

I think it’s going to be fun because those feelings don’t just go away.  And so watching them try to find that, I think is going to make really great TV.

 

Q) I am going to need April and Sterling to have a special sit-down session with the Spanish teacher for her novella, because what’s going on with the two of them is way juicier than whatever she is coming up with.

 

A) Mmhmm.  Yeah.  Our stuff has twists, it has turns. Oh yeah.  What a good telenovela that would be.  It would be spicy.  I think it would be great.

 

Q) Yeah. They’re going to have to work more on their practice conversations, but I definitely think the novella would be better if Sterling and April had a bit of input.

 

A) Yeah. I am going to have to schedule some tutoring sessions with Sterling because I am much better at Spanish than she is.  I am going to have to get her up to par.  I am going to have to do some tongue rolling.  Mmhmm.  Even having to tutor Sterling in Spanish.  There’s your whole second season there.  Come on!

 

Q) The fans of “Teenage Bounty Hunters” have been so embracing and engaging on all of the social media platforms. What has that feedback and interaction meant to you, and do you think it helps the hopefulness for a season two?

 

A) Yeah.  Absolutely it does.  It’s just like more than you could even wish for.  I think we all agree that just the four, to four and a half, months that we made the show, that was the dream.  That was the most amazing experience and the best group of people.  The fact that it came out on Netflix and people got to watch it is kind of a perk because we just had such a good time making it. And that’s our job. We just kept saying to each other, “I can’t believe that people are actually going to watch the show that we made.”  It feels like we just made it for us and like we got to do all of the things that we wanted to do. We hoped that we were making a really great show, and to now know that we did, and that it does resonate on so many different levels is just totally beyond.  There was this one tweet that came out pretty early that I think just resonates on such a deep level with me, “If ya’ll would have told me fifty seconds before I hit play on ‘Teenage Bounty Hunters’ that it was such a good show, I would have slapped you into next Tuesday,” or something like that.

People who have no reason to watch this show.  Some random dude from Ohio, like there is no reason for him to click on “Teenage Bounty Hunters.”  The fact that they did and watched all of it and then just had their minds blown by it, it’s like what could be better than that?  It just goes back to how much I love surprising people.  But the fact that the show has served the audience, and it was sort of intended for the teen-based audience, is great.  And that’s what’s going to get us a second season.  The power of the teens.

 

Q) Then there are older members of the LGBTQ community who were those younger teens and know this story for themselves just as much as well.

 

A) Right.  Mmhmm.  It’s just the greatest thing.  And sort of talking about what you were just talking about, and going back to also some of the feedback that we have gotten from the queer community, we have gotten messages from people who are on totally different stages of their journey.  Truly young teens who are like, “This is something I am realizing, and I haven’t come out to anybody yet, and this makes me feel like I could.”  Or, “I just came out to my parents and thankfully they had this response. Or “they didn’t have this response, and this has been a safe place to go and to watch.”  Or, yeah, like you were saying, people for who coming out was a million years ago and still are making a radical choice to move through the world authentically.  It’s just so beautiful that showing this particular relationship and the nuances of it has resonated in so many different ways.

Obviously, a huge part of their story is the coming out story and that gets told a lot and it is extremely important.  But that’s not necessarily the beginning or the end of the journey.  You still have to make a choice to show up and move through this world that doesn’t want you to succeed.  So, the fact that people who are already on that journey are still able to see themselves and take comfort in what is being shown has been amazing.