Netflix scored another all-ages hit with the release of Julie and the Phantoms, the story of a high school girl and her ghostly band who combine to make one killer soundtrack. While mourning her own personal loss, Julie comes across three otherworldly souls who love music as much as she does: the quick-witted Luke (Charlie Gillespie), the sensitive Alex (Owen Joyner), and the ball of sunshine Reggie (Jeremy Shada).
The now-dead musicians had dreams of performing at the Orpheum before their untimely demise, but now their music can only be heard - and their faces seen - when they play alongside Julie herself. The friendship that first arises out of necessity soon grows genuine, however, as they help each other overcome their personal obstacles and accept their new strange existence.
The three actors shared their thoughts on the first season in a recent interview with Screen Rant, explaining where they'd like to see their characters go from here and reminiscing about which of the various musical numbers were their favorites.
Charlie, Luke's story with his parents was so beautiful, and I loved the episode "Emily." With what happened at the end of the season, and the fact that you have some more time on Earth, do you think that there are more opportunities for Luke to connect with his parents?
Charlie Gillespie: Well, I'm not sure. Honestly, I think we got the best out of that story. I think we got our message across, and I think more people are reflecting on their relationships sometimes. Like I was telling the boys, I've been waking up to emails and Instagram messages from people telling me stories about how they lost a mom, how they lost a sibling or a parent or grandparent. They've lost some things that they used to love doing in their life, but the show made them reflect on that, and they're bringing it back in. They love the laughter, and they feel so much happier. And that's the point of entertainment - to hopefully get people out of things and hopefully have fun at the same time.
We got we got so much, but I think there's so much more we can do. There's Reggie's world, there's Alex's world - there's a lot we can dive into. There's Bobby still. There's a lot a lot of like material out there. I think we said a good goodbye to Luke's mom and dad.
Onto something that is hopefully not a goodbye: the Alex and Willie story has been one of the highlights for me.
Owen Joyner: Hopefully. Suddenly Alex gets written out!
Jeremy Shada: Alex is gone. Owen's gone.
Can you envision a happily ever after life for the two of them, and what has it been like developing that dynamic?
Owen Joyner: Booboo's the coolest. The boys can speak on this too; we all became such good friends and were sad to see him go. But it was interesting, because the band, we did like a six-week intensive boot camp kind of thing, where we really kind of had to be friends. We bonded pretty quick, but we also had all that time to bond and create a real chemistry that you would see on camera.
Booboo and I were talking, and he was a guest star, so he was flying in the day before we started shooting our biggest scene. We were kind of nervous and we were like, "We've got to create this chemistry out of kind of nowhere." We had met during the auditions and stuff, but he came in and touched down. He texted me real quick, and he came to my house, and we just sat there and ran the scenes for a while. And it was pretty instant. So, I think we were pretty excited to get going.
But yeah, I'm excited to see where it goes. Hopefully we see some more. I hope we see some more in season 2, because Booboo's so much fun to work with and act with. We'll see what happens.
Reggie is such a beautiful soul. I love how he wants to reach out to Julie's family, trying to make a connection with people who just can't see him. As an actor, what's it like to sort of do the inverse of the norm, where you're sort of talking to the wall?
Jeremy Shada: It's interesting, because it's almost like you have a scene where it's a monologue. In that you're just doing a lot of lines, but there's no back and forth, really. It's you just talking at people a lot, and it's very interesting.
I feel like in some ways, it's harder for the other people that can't know that you're talking and stuff. Because, for me, Reggie has so many funny lines that I feel like it's harder for the other cast members to just act like they're not hearing it. My whole thing is, I'm physically interacting with them and doing all this, and they have to act like they can't see it. I feel like I get the fun part of that, a little bit.
But like you said, I think it's really cool that Reggie's personality is such that, even though he really has a very one-sided relationship with Julie's family, it's still something that he holds on to and enjoys and furthers. It feels like they're his family too, which is so sweet. I think that's the epitome of him as a person; he really makes the best out of any situation, and I love that about him. He has that happy go lucky, glass is half full type of mentality - and that's really fun. I love playing that.
Do you each have a favorite musical number or song that was the most fun for you to perform?
Charlie Gillespie: That's a hard question. It's a lot harder than it seems, because there's the more that we talk about the songs, the more that there's memories that come around and everything. I usually say "Bright" because that's the one that we started off with, or I'll say "Now Or Never" because we had this big meeting where we were deciding when we could put the fireworks on.
But right now, when you asked, I feel like I want to tell the world how "The Band Is Back" was. It's this one that we got to film on the beach. [It was] this really cool little introductory workshop that we were doing. There's a couple of writers that came in and we got to figure out how we wanted to go for it, and Kenny really wanted this Monkees vibe. You know, Kenny introduced me [to them]. I knew "I'm A Believer" - that song is like a classic, but I didn't realize how big The Monkees were. Then we got to go up and act all goofy, and people were hearing us dance. [Jeremy] was jumping up, chair to chair, and he fell once, and the whole crowd was like, "OH!"
Jeremy Shada: Ate it, face first.
Charlie Gillespie: And he was fine! He got back up, just like Reggie would.
Jeremy Shada: I got back up as fast as possible. Because I was like, "If I don't get up as fast as possible and act like it was less of a big deal than it was, I might not get to shoot this scene." And I really wanted to shoot that scene. I was like, "I'm totally fine! Leg's broken? It's fine, don't worry about it."
Owen Joyner: My favorite probably was "Nothing To Lose" just because those little solos within it, we actually got to create ourselves, which was so cool. We got to workshop those ourselves and send it in, and it was just so fun. Because it was one of the last things we shot too, so it was like kind of leading up to that. We got to wear cool suits, and we were on stage with Cheyenne. That room is just insane, so that was a lot of fun for me.
Jeremy Shada: I would say "Bright," probably, just because it was the first one that we got to do as a full Julie and the Phantoms band. And it's also the song that we all auditioned for the show with and got the show basically of performing live in front of Kenny and all the people. That'll always have a special place in all of our hearts, I think. Just because that was the first song that any of us did for the show, which is cool.
The first season of Julie and the Phantoms is currently available to stream on Netflix.