Kaitlyn Alexander – Couple-ish

Q) Who was your favorite character to write and why?

A) My favorite character to write was definitely Amy (played by Mercedes Morris). She’s just so hilarious and fun to write. She’s one of those people who doesn’t talk around a problem. She just puts stuff out there and goes about solving it.

Q) You co-wrote, created and star in the series. How were you to able to balance and juggle the various roles?

A) Juggling and balancing so many hats was definitely a little bit challenging, but luckily they didn’t really overlap all that much. I kind of created this whole idea way back when (seems like a blur – Wow), wrote it with my friends RJ [Lackie] and Elizabeth and then we went into filming. So, there was never really a moment where I was like, “Ahhh!! TOO MANY THINGS! ABORT!” It was just kind of like, “Okay, now I’m on to the acting portion of this project. Cool. I’ll focus on that.”

Q) You play Dee. What is something surprising or unique about your character viewers will come to learn?

A) Something surprising or unique about Dee…hmmm. Well, they’re a very emotional person, which I guess could be something surprising because not too many people have seen me play an emotional character before so that’ll be something new.

Q) What are the overarching themes you had in mind when writing “Couple-ish?”

A) The overarching theme I kind of wrote into “Couple-ish” is that relationships of any kind are fucking tough. And that’s kind of where I went with it. It came out of this place where I just wanted to see an honest story that I could relate to for once. I mean, it’s obviously an extraordinary circumstance, but they’re just a group of normal people dealing with it.

Q) What was your biggest trepidation about working in the series?

A) Honestly, I was just so worried that people would hate it. Like, I wrote this and obviously I’m passionate about it, but it was always a “What if people don’t like it or it’s not what THEY wanted to see?” At the end of the day, you should never write for other people you should write for yourself. So, that’s what I did.

Q) How did the writing to filming process go and did you have to adapt some of the dialogue on set if it wasn’t working for a scene?

A) The writing to filming process went pretty smoothly. I handed off scripts to the production team about a month in advance and we never really cut anything because we had spent about a month cutting the episodes to shreds in the writing room previously. On set, there were honestly not that many dialogue changes. Sometimes it was just a spur of the moment, “Wow, this word sounds better,” and I was all for that.

Q) What have you taken away from your experience with Kickstarter to the final cut of “Couple-ish?”

A) Making a webseries is hard. And bloody expensive! The amount of costs that are in making something that’s essentially got two hours of footage are astounding. And things happen that you’re just like, “Alright, improvise people” because that’s show business. I mean it’s fun, but I learned that it’s not as easy as it may seem.

Q) Can you talk about casing Nick and Mercedes, what about them stood out or made you feel they embodied these characters? Did they add anything to the roles not originally scripted?

A) So, Mercedes was actually the only person who came into the room that was the Amy we all had in our minds. It was basically like, “Damn, okay yeah, she’s Amy. Cool.” She also had amazing chemistry with Sharon [Belle] so we were all on board instantaneously. At his first audition, Nick [Potter] prepared by working as many awful puns as he could into the sides we gave him, which obviously won my heart immediately. It was great and we had this comfort with each other that kind of made him the smartest choice.

Q) “Couple-ish” has already received such an outpouring of love and support. What do you credit that to?”

A) I honestly don’t know. I mean, the fact that I was on such a hugely popular webseries and people know who I am already definitely helps, but I think if there was anything else it would be that I’m trying to tell stories we don’t see often. I don’t see a lead non-binary character anywhere, let alone a bisexual one. I see most stories I relate to on sci-fi shows and that’s great, but I wanted people like me to exist in real life stories and I think that resonated with a lot more people than I thought it would.

Q) The series premieres today, December 9th. What are you most nervous or excited about?

A) I’m just excited for it to finally be seen. It’s been a long post-production process and I’ve seen all the episodes like twelve times at least so I’m just waiting for other eyes to see them!