What drew you to the series?
It’s funny, as an actor …
He cares about people, he cares about the environment that people are working in.
He cares about optics.
It’s super, super rare to be able to say that.
Because the original, I had only watched before my studio test.
I had never seen it.
Not for any particular reason, but I didn’t cross paths with it.
That show as it was, it will not fly today.
It would make no sense today.
There was no other way to do it.
If it was going to be full throttle, let’s do this thing so that it’s successful.
Just call him ‘Mr.
Reboot’
What was it like joining a franchise that has such a big fandom attached to it already?
Did you feel any pressure?
Now, my friends and I jokingly say I’m Mr. Reboot.
You got a reboot planned?
You don’t even have to ask me.
I’m the guy.
I’m going to make it work.
I was like, “Man, what are we doing?”
Yeah, also on HBO Max.
“Lethal Weapon,” my character was a brand new forensic scientist.
Then Nick Lott obviously none of us were in the original.
They’re different enough in a lot of different categories.
But there comes a lot of freedom with that, where you’re like, “Cool.
I can take a stab at do good work.
Hopefully people respond to that.
I’m not worried about having to do an impersonation of something,” because that never works.
Because also people are like, “Well, we already watched it.
Why are we trying to watch this again in the same manner?”
That’s a huge privilege in this business.
The fans have been very kind to us.
They’ve been very positive, the most positive you could be.
It’s truly all you could ask for.
Yeah, everything about it, the way it came together, the timing of it.
Then also knowing that HBO Max as a newly formed platform needed a show to work.
That’s another, highly, highly privileged position to be in because you almost never get that.
It ended up working out in a weird, cosmic way.
What’s it like working with the rest of the cast, especiallyWhitney Peakwho plays your daughter?
It’s a dream.
It’s a dream in every direction.
I was like, “No one’s going to buy me as this dad.”
Right away, I was like, “This makes no sense.”
I watch a ton of anime.
I’m skateboarding, I’m motorcycling, and doing all this stuff that’s very youthful.
I met her mom, who I was hyper intimidated by.
But that day, I wore a suit that matched.
Then I wore my most boring tie that had these stripes.
Stripes is as far as I went.
I wasn’t saying, “Word.”
I wasn’t saying, “Yo.”
It was clear when we went in there, and they allowed me to improvise a bunch.
Because my background is also comedy.
I’ve done pretty straight comedies.
I’ve been fortunate enough to also do some dramas and stuff.
But I think that’s what ended up working out because I can’t be serious for too long.
Even though on this show, she deserves it.
The kids are always doing outrageous things.
Obviously that goes for relationships and real life as well.
But with Whitney, it was really easy right away.
But right away, they were like, “These people have known each other forever.”
It felt like that, which was really wild.
But when I was talking to Whitney, I wasn’t mentioning my Nintendo 3DS.
I wasn’t mentioning VR or skateboarding or any of that stuff.
It was funny because since then, I’ve hung out a ton.
A lot of it has been between me and her and her mom and my wife.
The four of us went out a bunch when they first moved to New York.
It really felt like I was taking on this actual parental situation.
I’m from here.
I’m freshly moving back from LA."
I’ve built furniture for her, I’ve picked up furniture, all this straight-up actual parent stuff.
That’s totally enough."
I automatically am filling in that thing of, I don’t know, worry.
I worry about her, or I hope she’s okay, all that stuff.
Then with the other kids, it’s really interesting.
I call them kids; they’re not all actual kids, but we all get along very easily.
We all can hang out very easily.
Everybody’s such a unique individual that you put us all together, all the gaps are filled.
I love working with Luke Kirby.
Luke is such a talented actor, and Laura Benanti as well.
I really have a lot of love for all the people that I work with.
Working on Morbius was ‘amazing’
You’re set to appear in “Morbius.”
Can you tell us anything about that?
It’s more like, can you tell me anything about it?
I should write a letter to Sony or something and be like, “What’s happening?”
I know that it was supposed to come out May of 2020.
Now, the second “Venom” has come out, and I don’t know what the plans …
I have no idea what’s happening.
Also, Spider-Man is my favorite.
I have right here, this limited edition Conan O’Brien Spider-Man.
He’s my favorite character, between him and Batman.
But I’m dying for “Morbius” to come out, for people to see this.
I’m not trying to inflate my character because I’m in a very limited fashion.
But if you were to choose a small role to be, it would be this one.
Because everything we did was all secret.
It’s really locked down, isn’t it?
You’re not even on theIMDb page.
I’m really dying for that to come out.
We need to see you in this role.
But also, have you thought about doing an older Spider-Man?
Because you guys haven’t really done that yet."
I was like, “Also, I’m Afro-Latino from Brooklyn, just like the character.
I live and breathe this stuff.
I’ve read so much of it.
I’ve read all of the Miles Morales comics.”
In the meantime, my friend and I are slowly writing.
We want to do a fan film that’s me playing an older Miles Morales.
The “Batman v Superman” movie did that a little bit because Ben Affleck was an older Batman.
I even hired this woman, Jessie [Pridemore].
… She’s a costume designer that was on one of those cosplay competition shows on Sci-Fi.
I had hired her to make me a Miles Morales suit.
It’s made for me, it fits me like a glove, so I already have that.
So I want to do that.
I thought it was good."
That’s where my headspace is at.
I’m in the writer mode.
Honestly, compared to “Morbius,” “Morbius” was No.
1 of my days on set, and “Helpsters” was 1-A.
It’s right there.
Because I had never been around puppets before, and Muppets of Jim Henson’s caliber.
All of them are genius.
Watching them work, especially with how it works, they are geniuses.
I kept on telling them every five seconds, “Y’all are geniuses.”
Also, you’re performing.
But that was a real dream.
I can’t wait for people to watch that episode of “Helpsters.”
Because it’s great.
They’re not going to believe that I’m the same person.
“Helpsters” was cool.
It basically is an episode of “Black Mirror,” if it was “Total Recall” also.
I’m writing the feature version of that.
There’s another short that I did called “Lillian.”
That was me andStephanie Beatriz.
What’s interesting is, I’ll never forget this moment.
This was on the evening of hosting theArt Directors Guild Awardsthat they had asked me to host.
That was a situation where the prior year was Patton Oswalt.
I was like, “Are you guys sure?
You made a huge mistake hiring me.”
But it was such a blast, it was really funny.
I wrote the bits with my friend who also writes for “Helpsters.”
The night was a success, andGary Oldmangave me a really big compliment that night.
He was like, “Not every actor could also host.”
I was like, “Thanks.
Good luck at the Oscars next week.”
I felt someone’s hand on my shoulder, and I turned around and it was Gary.
We had briefly met five seconds before that because I was going to introduce him on stage.
The stagehand had said, “That’s Johnathan, he’s the host.
He’s going to walk you out.”
Not every actor can do both and be so charismatic."
Or, “Well, what about you?
Because blah, blah, blah.”
It was wild, wild times.
Actually, we were in the ballroom of the [Dolby Theater] … where they host the Oscars.
Which, at the time, I was in the second season of “Lethal Weapon.”
I was like, “I need to start writing a short.
I need to start writing something.
The next day I started outlining “Lillian.”
Instead, I was like, “People always say write what you know.”
That’s what “Lillian” ended up being.
She was like, “I need to see you tomorrow.
Be somewhere by Penn Station tomorrow at whatever time.”
I was like, “Okay.”
I was on a date at the time, and it ruined that date forever.
There was no going back.
I’d been there a bunch of times.
It was right around the corner from UCB.
What does anything mean?”
Then a lot more heartache happened after that before we got back together.
But the short [film] was that scene.
Stephanie played my wife, Lauren.
The stuff I like to write is very dialogue-heavy and kind of existential in a way.
It lent itself to what I like writing, where it’s like dramedy.
That’s what the short was.
Then Keesha Sharp directed it.
It was a very unique thing.
Stephanie said she would do it.
Now it’s a matter of … it takes forever for these things to come together.
But it’s really special.
All these things are percolating.
But no, this Looney Tunes thing actually happened to us.
Those are good stories, though.
Hundred percent, and that’s why I ended up going to that.
Because getting that out of my system then allowed me to get the sci-fi film done, or written.
Also, I formed a production company, and that’s where my first short was produced through.
I want more stuff like that, where people are being people and it’s not rooted in suffering.
Basically for white people, and white audiences, that exists.
They have the heavy stories, and they have the fun or frivolous stories.
My father’s Honduran, my mom’s Colombian.
Our stories of my parents' immigration is not a border crossing.
Because everybody comes from so many different places.
It’s an entire continent, plus Central America.
Or the other version of it, the white version of those things.
A white Argentinian, a whiter Chilean, or people who aren’t indigenous and all.
Can be both heavy and also fun because you also need that escapism.
I understand the need for both.
It’s exactly what you said.
It’s always the serious side of things.
You rarely have a fun romantic comedy.
So I think that’s the way forward.
There was a movie I did with Sam Daley and Bill Crossland [called “Catching Up”].
Bill has muscular dystrophy, and he’s in a wheelchair.
He put me in his movie.
Basically I got a random audition from a random source through my agent.
Then I found out that the film that they were going to do, the short went to Sundance.
I was like, “Send me the short.
I would love to see the short.”
My wife and I were at a wedding in the Berkshires, and we were sitting in the hotel.
I was like, “Do you want to watch this short with me?”
Then she was like, “Yeah, of course.”
We sit down and watch it.
Then when the credits roll, she sees Bill’s name.
… My wife was like, “Oh, I had a neighbor named Bill Crossland.”
He’s been in a wheelchair …
There’s no way that this is a different one."
I was like, “Really?”
She used to babysit him.
I was like, “Hey, I’m so and so.
My agent blah, blah, blah.
My wife is Lauren Fernandez.”
Because from Lauren’s father’s house, Bill lives across the street.
Literally across the street.
We got along famously, and then he hired me for his movie.
My trailer for this movie that had no money was my father-in-law’s house.
I would roll out of bed, go across the street to work.
This is basically my second hometown, so I was telling people, “The CVS is over here.
verify you go to Wawa,” this grocery store, this gas station chain.
The movie, I don’t know what happened with distribution.
Now it’s everywhere.
Why wasn’t this like “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” where every single person knows this movie?
Because it’s such an achievement from this kid.
I forget how old Bill is.
He’s maybe 10 years younger than me or something.
But either way, he directed that movie.
He starred in that movie.
He wrote that movie and really was more than capable of doing it.
The movie’s good.
It’s really charming.
There’s these moments in the movie you want to throw up because it’s so awful.
But the way it intertwines is great.
It defeats the entire purpose of that whole situation happening.
Because then it’s so fake.
I really started thinking about that a few years ago in hearing …
There was this one thing I heard, this was in the early, early days of the pandemic.
It was a SAG-AFTRA panel.
But everybody’s wearing masks.
The tears fell instantly from my tear ducts.
So many people have so many issues that make their lives so challenging.
But you’re like, “What, we’re going to have to print the scripts in braille?
How much is that going to cost?
Let’s hire somebody who can see.”
Those are what the conversations end up being.
It’s not for capability.
It’s not for talent or any of that stuff.
I’m f***ing tired of that in every single direction.
You haven’t even tried.
Because if you try, you’ll obviously find people that can do that.
But hopefully the tide is slowly turning with that stuff.
I want to be, if nothing else, a big impetus to keep on pushing that forward.
I don’t want to make Black movies for Black people.
I don’t want to make Latino movies for Latino people.
Because I’ve been lucky enough to have a chance.
That’s, a lot of times, all you need.
The fact that you’re working behind the scenes to make that happen is really exciting.
None of it has happened yet.
Well, besides my short film.
It doesn’t look homogenous at all."
You have a Black female director, and you have a Black Latino lead.
Stephanie is a Latina, queer lead.
Then you have Lyndon who’s white and Eastern European, I think.
That made up the core cast.
Then you have a female AD, and we had an Asian cinematographer.
I was like, this is what the f*** it should be like.
I know this is a small movie that has $0, but it all comes from the top.
If someone prioritizes that, it will happen.
I guess they just don’t exist?
Man, that’s a good question.
I think it’s really hard to say.
Because my taste is constantly shifting sands.
I really like Edgar Wright.
I always have liked Edgar Wright a lot.
Really want to work with Denzel [Washington], especially Denzel directing something.
It would be really, really great to be directed by someone like Denzel.
I’m not saying that directors that are straight-up directors don’t do good jobs.
They definitely, obviously do.
It was really great working, Kenny Leon, who’s one of those people.
He directed Episode 8 of “Gossip Girl.”
Working with him is so different.
He knows what you’re thinking, knows what the traps are for an actor.
Because then the whole time, you almost don’t want to work.
You want to watch this person work.
Even shadowing him as a director would be really interesting.
But I think that’s my longish short answer.
Someone like Denzel specifically, being directed by him would be bananas.
I watch a lot of British television.
I like a lot of British comedies.
Do you know who Rich Fulcher is?
He’s the resident American comic actor in Britain.
I’m like, “I want to do that,” and work amongst those kind of people.
I instantly got “Fawlty Towers” the first time I saw it when I was a kid.
So many Americans especially were always like, “It’s so different.”
I was like, “I’m so into it.”
Like I said, my wife and I watched it so many times.
That’s Part B of the dream.
The dream is to be the resident American actor in British television.
Or they do exist, but not in any ubiquitous way.
My wife and I started a foundation.
The business exists, or the non-profit exists, but we’re trying to basically rewrite curriculums in school.
They don’t want to feel they are racist themselves.
They probably are and it’s not their fault.
It’s just their socialization.
We were already talking about that before that even became a topic of discussion nationally.
We’re trying to figure that out, but it’s called the Johnathan and Lauren Fernandez Foundation.
Then we were like, “Well, that means we have to get to the teachers.”
Now we’re in the nascent stages of trying to figure that part out.
The Band-Aid is donating books.
Anybody could do that.
But then it’s crucial that you create the platform, and then open up the ears.
That’s the part.
Nobody wants to welcome it with open arms.
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