From creators/showrunners Lucia Aniello, Paul W. Downs and Jen Statsky, the second season of the HBO Max original comedy series Hacks follows legendary Las Vegas comedian Deborah Vance (Jean Smart) on the road and traveling across the country with talented but disgruntled writer Ava (Hannah Einbinder). As they workshop a new stand-up act, they quickly learn what works and what doesn’t, both on stage and in their own collaborative relationship.
During this interview with Collider, Devon Sawa (who plays Deborah’s unexpected love interested in Episode 206) talked about his audition process for the role, why this Hacks character appealed to him, how Smart was involved with the casting for this specific character, playing a different kind of one night stand, which moment wasn’t in the script, and what makes Smart such a great acting partner. He also talked about returning for the upcoming second season of Chucky as a third character, and how wild the ride has been.
Collider: I love everything that you did in this role. The only disappointment was how short an amount of time we got to see you and Jean Smart together in this. I just thought this was so much fun. How did this all come about for you? What was this audition like? Did you read scenes that actually made it into the episode?
DEVON SAWA: I think that I got all three of those scenes for the audition and just assumed there was gonna be more. It went down like this, first of all, I’ve seen the show and I love the show. I don’t watch a lot of TV, but this is one of the shows that I would watch. I don’t know whether it’s because they were perfect little 30-minute increments and it was easy to watch, but it’s just so good. So, I got the audition and, at first, it said, “Sexy FedEx guy.” I was like, “What is sexy FedEx guy? That’s what my career has come to?” But then, I read it and it was really, really good. It’s Hacks, so even though it was short, it was good, and it was only with Jean. Not that I wouldn’t wanna work with Hannah [Einbinder] or anybody else, but it was not with a whole bunch of actors, where you get one line. It was nice little scenes with a legend. It was like a workshop.
Did you have to do a self-tape?
SAWA: Yeah, that’s how it’s all been going now. Everything is self-tapes.
Did you know that Jean Smart was personally involved in the casting process and watching the self-tapes? Is that something they ever mentioned to you?
SAWA: No, and there was a huge gap in time, after I sent the tape. It was like three weeks and I’d forgotten all about it. You send a tape, and then that’s it. You think it’s gone. And then, three weeks later, it was like, “What are you doing on Friday? Wanna go work on Hacks?” After I got there, I heard that this was the only role where Jean wanted to be involved in the casting process because, obviously, it’s an intimate scene and she wanted to know who she would be with. Because it’s Hacks, I think the majority of people that auditioned probably played up the comedy of it, where I knew right away that this wasn’t necessarily a comedic part. Hacks is a comedy, but the comedy is always in the situations. If the comedy isn’t written on the page, there’s probably not supposed to be comedy there, so I didn’t wanna try to goof it up. It was more of a real moment for Jean’s character, Deborah, so I played it very straight and very grounded.
When it comes to a role, there’s connecting to the character on the page, and then there’s connecting to the character once you’re in the scene with the actor or actors that you’re working with. When you did the audition, what did you connect with, with him? What brought him to life for you and how did you want to convey that on your self-tape?
SAWA: Actors are supposed to do these things called slates, where you go, “Hi, my name is,” and you say your height, where you’re from, that you have citizenship, being double vaxxed is a new one, and all these things. I decided to go on a little bit of a tangent after that and let them see a little bit of who I am, what you’re gonna get on set and what I think I’m gonna bring to the character, and I congratulated Jean on her awards. I just wanted them to see me as a human, and not just a slate. That’s what I added to those three scenes that let them see what I was gonna be like. And then, when I got to set, the first thing we did was that car scene, which was great because I got to have a little bit of a feel of what Jean was like to work with. I’m not in a place where I could walk onto Hacks and just improvise because it’s not my show and these are Emmy Award-winning writers. Jean started off doing the scene like it was written, and then, all of a sudden, we were playing it overly drunk. And then, we were talking to the Uber guy. Everyone just felt comfortable and it was just really easy to do.
How do you feel about the whole audition process, in general? As self-tapes become more widely used and you’re not physically in the room, does it make things easier or does it make things more disconnected? The whole process just seems so weird.
SAWA: It is weird. I love putting self-tapes together now because I’m not the other kind of actor. When you’re in L.A., there are actors where, when you go to the audition, you hear the other actor go in the room and they’re all about, “Oh, my God, it’s good to see you. Gimme a hug. How’s your kid? How about the weather? Did you see that sports game?” Whatever it is, they have a gift for gab and they’ve already won the room over, before the scene even starts. I would walk into the room and just be like, “Okay, can we start?” And so, I feel self-tapes are a much more comfortable way for me to show you what I’ve got. I don’t wanna talk about the weather. It’s a weird process.
Are you someone who gets nervous with every project you do? Do you get nervous at the audition stage? Do you try not to get attached to a character at the audition stage, so that you don’t get nervous? Are you always nervous on the first day on set?
SAWA: I started off as a child actor and my auditioning process stopped at a very early age, after I booked Casper. There was not a lot of auditioning after that, so I went for years and years and years and years without auditioning. If I had a camera crew, grips, electric, makeup, I’m so comfortable. It’s where I grew up. It’s my home. And then, I took a break from the business and when I came back, I had to get into the auditioning process. Especially things like testing, I remember going to my first test at Fox, and it was between me and another guy. You walk into this room and there are tiers. There’s a stage with different tiers and couches, and all these studio execs are sitting there in suits, eating their lunch, and they wanna see your scene now. I was like, “Jesus, this is like a stage play.” All I could think about was wanting to leave the room. I don’t even remember the audition. I just wanted to leave. It was horrible. It was a horrible experience. They don’t do that anymore because they can’t, so things have gotten better for me. It’s a weird business. It’s horribly uncomfortable. I was thinking, “But this is not how it’s gonna be on set. I’ve been on set. It’s a lot different from this big room with all these suits, who are not laughing at the right things and who are just eating. I didn’t get that job, by the way, after all that.
There is something so refreshing about your character in Hacks. I particularly liked that he is just this guy who likes Deborah. He doesn’t seem to have any like weird or creepy ulterior motives. He just wants to share some sexy time with her, no matter her age or occupation. Did that whole vibe of it feel different to you, to approach what is really essentially a one night stand in this way? We’re so used to these types of scenes being about the nudity, the sex, the lighting and the music, and this was just like two people having a conversation.
SAWA: Yeah. I don’t know what it was, it just felt very comfortable doing the scenes. It just felt extremely comfortable. I don’t know if it was the writing, or because of COVID and there being not a lot of people around or maybe it was closed set. Off camera, Jean and I would be in the waiting area, talking about the most random everyday stuff. We just got very comfortable with talking, and then we went in there and did it. I just felt very comfortable.
Was you kissing her knee in the script?
SAWA: No.
Did that just come out of you guys working together?
SAWA: I didn’t run that by the intimacy coach. After I did that, I was like, “Oh, my God, should I have?” But that just was what it was.
What was it like to shoot the first scene that you guys did together? You said it was the one in the car, but how confined did that set feel?
SAWA: It was a car that was in a studio, and there was a grip spinning the light around and another grip with a two by four, rocking the car. And there was an Uber driver in the front, and we were talking to the Uber driver. It was a good thing that we did that one first because it’s so bizarre to see all these people around you, making the car bump. We were supposed to be drunk, and Jean was going off about something. It just all worked. It was written a lot shorter, and then it became huge, and then they cut it back down to shorter again. It was a lot of fun.
I also really appreciated that Deborah is the one that sneaks out and just leaves this guy sleeping while his friends are out in the other room. What do you think that conversation was, once he finally woke up and went out into the other room?
SAWA: I think that they fill him in on who she is. He didn’t know who she was. At least, I don’t think he did, but maybe there’s more to the story. I don’t know. But I think he gets filled in on who she is, and maybe they pull up some YouTube videos.
I’d love to see them cross paths again, in another season.
SAWA: I’ve plotted, in my head, lots of ways to come back and I would be happy to. Let’s just hope that Paul [W. Downs] reads this and comes up with a way as well.
Jean Smart is great. She’s always been great, but she’s just been on such a hot streak lately. What was it like to work with her? What did you most enjoy about doing all of this with her and what does she bring, in the moment, when you’re in a scene with her?
SAWA: You instantly feel like you’re two actors in a zone. It’s hard to explain. It’s like a really high level of tennis. I know that she’s top of what she does. I’ve been doing this for a very long time, so it’s nice to work with an actor that’s probably a lot more experienced than me, even though I’ve been doing this thing for a while. It’s like when I worked with John Travolta, or Guy Pearce, or Sharon Stone, or any of these people that you can step back and watch because maybe you can absorb some knowledge from them. It’s like Kobe Bryant looking at Michael Jordan. What can I get from this person? What can I learn from them? What do they do in this situation? There’s a lot of that going on.
Only in horror and sci-fi, can you get killed off, not once, but twice, and still return for a third role?
SAWA: I know, right?
Did you always know that you would be returning to Chucky, if there was a second season, or were you surprised about that?
SAWA: Don [Mancini] had told me last year. The nice thing about Chucky was that I read all the scripts right away. I was on this one show, Nikita, a long time ago, and no one knew. Whenever a character died, we’d find out that Thursday night, before we started shooting on Monday. Everybody would get the new script and go through it to see if they survived because it was one of those shows where people died. It was easy to do Chucky because I knew I was dying. And then, half-way through the season, Don had said, “You’re gonna come back.” I was like, “Great. How?” And he said, “Don’t worry about it. You’re gonna come back.” So, I started thinking maybe it was a third twin, or maybe I’d come back as a zombie. And then, he told me and it was like, “Whoa!” I guess they realized they have something here, so they gave Don a whole bunch more money and it’s nutty this year. I can’t really talk about it, but it’s awesome.
I love when you think you know what to expect, with something like that, but then it’s still surprising and just so wild and unexpected.
SAWA: When I first signed onto it, I had a couple of haters that were like, “Why are you doing Chucky?” I knew, because I was shooting it, that this is a different thing and that Don might be a genius. It was like, “Yes, it’s Chucky. It’s that iconic character, but it’s different.” He’s dealing with some really, really important stuff, and it’s visually outstanding. Listen, I’m on Hacks and I’m on Chucky. I’m a happy guy. I really, really truly am.
Hacks is available to stream on HBO Max.