The life of a Hollywood star has traditionally always been synonymous with glamour. Red carpets, glam squads and adoring fans gushing over your every move is just part and parcel of the job right?
Well, maybe not always. Binge-worthy new comedy Everyone Is Doing Great, which dropped this week on just-launched streaming platform Paramount Plus, shows the flip side of chasing the acting dream.
WATCH: Everyone Is Doing Great: Official Trailer
Created by and starring One Tree Hill heartthrobs James Lafferty and Stephen Colletti, Everyone is Doing Great follows actors Jeremy (Lafferty) and Seth (Colletti) who are struggling with their careers five years after their massively successful series wraps up.
The series is loosely based on their own experiences with fame and its aftermath, with lines blurring even further with the inclusion of Aussie actress Alexandra Park, who stars as James’ wife Andrea (the pair are actually engaged in real life).
In a new interview with WHO, Alexandra explains why showing this aspect of the industry – and using a humorous light on it – was so incredibly important.
“It opens a window to a different side of the entertainment industry and shows audiences a very different side to what it’s like as opposed to the glamour and the stability and the confidence and all of the good stuff that comes with when you are a working actor and things are going well,” Alexandra explains.
“This was our example of anyone in any career in any walk of life who is trying to find their way and have found themselves not living the life that they kind of thought they would be.”
Littered throughout the first season are numerous less-than-glamorous scenarios from the acting hustle, including a side-splittingly funny “pillow audition scene” (if you know, you know!).
And while some scenes may be embellished for the laughs, it appears many of them are grounded in some sort of kernel of truth.
Ask any emerging actor who’s made a play in Hollywood and they’ll tell you Tinseltown’s reputation for notoriously brutal auditions can definitely be a reality – and Alexandra has her own war story to add to the collection.
“I was doing an audition for a film and there was a monologue, there was a lot of dialogue and the stakes were high, it was very emotional and the casting director was very distracted,” Alexandra recalls.
“Then her child just ran into the room we were auditioning in and spilt spaghetti all over the floor in the middle of my take which I finally got to what I believed she was hoping it to be. And she didn’t kind of say, ‘Johnny, go outside!’ or anything. She actually started talking to the child and it was very bizarre.”
The actress laughs, “I feel really a lot like you want me to be here, like you’re really interested in me, that’s how it’s really coming across.”
Working with her real-life partner and friends on Everyone Is Doing Great is a whole different ball game however, with Alexandra divulging the genuine connections help with their work even when it came to acting out a rocky relationship on-screen with James.
“James and I met working together. That’s one of the things we love about our relationship together is that we are both so passionate about what we do and we actually met on The Royals where James was directing me back in season two so yeah it’s really not that strange [to play fictional love interests],” she says.
“So coming into this it was just fun because there’s no limitations to what we can create on screen with these characters, there’s no “holding back” if you will. We’ve got freedom to really explore Andrea and Jeremy and make them into something that’s really relatable and exciting to see.”
Real-life dating experience also came into play in Everyone Is Doing Great’s friendship scene, including during the interactions between Alexandra’s character and fellow Aussie actress Cariba Heine, who plays Seth’s ex-girlfriend Isabella.
With both Alexandra and Cariba able to keep their natural Aussie accents for the show (a rarity in US productions), it opened up the door for the series to nail the often neglected nuances of Aussie/US culture clashes.
In one scene Andrea laments her playful ribbing of Jeremy using a colourful insult got lost in translation thanks to the subtleties of the cultural divide (“It’s almost a term of endearment in Australia!” the character protests.)
“That moment was pulled from experiences that Cariba and I had had dating over here in the States as opposed to dating Aussies who are on the same language, dialled into the tune,” Alexandra laughs.
The former Royals star also revealed it was her idea to get Cariba on-board.
“Cariba is one of my best friends and we actually both moved over here to LA around the same time and became very, very close in the past seven or eight years and I have just always admired her as an actress and loved her as a human. She’s incredibly funny and very, very smart and she’s just very unique. There’s no one quite like her.”
For those who devoured the show in one sitting (guilty!), there’s also good news on the horizon, Alexandra confirms there’s more to come.
“There will be a season two yes, one way or another,” she says.
“We’re not sure what that looks like right now but yes. We made the first season from scratch so yes, we plan on making another season. We’ve already written it so it’s ready to go and we’re just figuring all that out now.”
Everyone Is Doing Great is streaming now on Paramount Plus. Sign up for a free trial here.
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