Movies & TV / Columns
Lucas Friedman On Starring In Beth + Jeremy and Steve, Working With Daniel Hill
Image Credit: Freestyle Digital Media
The 411 Interview: Lucas Friedman
Lucas Friedman is an actor who, according to his IMDB page, is making his feature film debut in the dark comedy Beth + Jeremy and Steve, which is set to hit all major HD digital internet, satellite, and cable platforms and DVD starting May 30th, 2025 from Freestyle Digital Media. In this interview, Friedman talks with this writer about making Beth + Jeremy and Steve, working with director Daniel Hill, his fellow cast members, and more.
**
Bryan Kristopowitz: How did you get involved with Beth + Jeremy and Steve?
Lucas Friedman: Dan had done some work with my mom in shows around town, and he reached out to her about having me audition since I could still play a 17-year-old at the time. I came in, read with him and producer Barry Hunt, and the rest, as they say, is history.
BK: How did you approach your character Jeremy?
LF: Jeremy and I were very similar in a lot of ways – similar ages, old souls, music lovers, Portland kids, etc. Most of the work was finding out the specific ways in which we were dissimilar. The biggest thing for me is that Jeremy is an athlete, and I had never been involved in that culture. I was and am a mega-nerd. So, on top of the swimming lessons, I had to learn about that specific kind of swagger skilled young athletes have. I had to discover this kind of ease and confidence, at least externally, that felt very foreign, but was in retrospect really good for me. Playing Jeremy helped me grow a lot as a young man.
BK: Is Jeremy a victim?
LF: I don’t see him that way. Part of it is that I don’t think he wants to see himself that way, either. He wants to feel strong despite it all, that he made these choices for himself, that he had and has agency. I think a victim requires a villain, a perpetrator, and by the end of the film Jeremy sees Beth and Steve too deeply, understands why and how they’re fucked up too well to see them in that one-dimensional way.
BK: Describe your working relationship with director Daniel Hill.
LF: I’ve always really looked up to Dan and felt a kinship with him. We’re both Jewish kids from the big city who ended up in Portland, and we both love music and film and old stuff. Knowing the movie has autobiographical elements, I really wanted to channel his cool, his confidence, and his style. As a performer himself, he really knows how to communicate with actors and create spaces for discovery, curated places to be vulnerable in. I think at the time, when I was 20-21, I really wanted to impress him, and I psyched myself out a lot over that, but he was always calm and encouraging. Even in the most fraught emotional moments of the film, he made me feel safe.
BK: Describe your working relationship with Briana Ratterman, who plays Beth.
LF: Briana is an angel. Looking back, that was such a vulnerable role for her to take on, and I would have been really scared to be in her shoes, interacting with this young actor who she was supposed to be connecting with romantically in the context of the play. But she was always kind and generous with her energy on set, supportive, totally professional. Her vulnerability in our scenes pushed me to places I didn’t know I could go as an actor.
BK: Describe your working relationship with Matthew Dibiasio, who plays Steve.
LF: Tragedy is hard, but comedy is harder. I think that’s why Matt is such an extraordinary actor – he’s so damn funny, and it takes that kind of skill and precision and timing, the kind of poise only a great comic performer has, to really break your heart. Matt scared me as Steve, genuinely, but he also took a character that could have been just another asshole and made me kinda love him despite it all. His Steve felt – in some fucked up way – like more of a dad to Jeremy than Jeremy’s dad, who we barely see.
BK: What was the hardest part of making Beth + Jeremy and Steve for you as an actor? What was the easiest?
LF: The hardest part… I had been through a lot, in terms of relationships and mental health, in the years right before filming. High school was only three, four years away at the time. Reaching back to that, to those still unhealed wounds, was really tough for me. In a lot of ways, I was trying to run away from some of the same things that Jeremy struggles with in the film. The easiest part? Probably pining for my high school ex towards the beginning of the movie. I’m a pro at pining for unrequited loves.
BK: What is your favorite scene in the movie?
LF: My favorite scene is actually the batting cages. It’s just such a bizarre interaction – it’s scary, it’s funny, it’s awkward, all at the same time. The physical act of swinging and hitting really helped me tap into some complicated rage towards Steve (and the world) in that scene.
BK: What was it like swimming in that pool?
LF: Peaceful! I had never swam competitively, and spending 1-4 hours a day in the pool training for the film was one of the best times of my life. There’s something amazing about being in the pool – it feels unearthly, the combination of the weightlessness, the soundlessness, the way that light travels under the water. It was a perfect metaphor for the isolation Jeremy feels.
BK: Any moviemaking heroes?
LF: Most of my heroes are actors! But as far as movie-MAKERS goes, I really love Richard Ayoade, both for his unique, eccentric style as a performer, and the way he captures childhood loneliness in his film Submarine (2010). All my favorite filmmakers seem to start out as comedians, I think, because you have to be able to make me laugh first to really move me and make me cry.
BK: Any upcoming projects you can tell us about?
LF: I’m only just getting back into acting after a loooong hiatus. Hopefully, I’ll have plenty of exciting projects to share soon, but nothing right now!
BK: What do you hope audiences get out of Beth + Jeremy and Steve?
LF: I hope it prompts people to think about how complicated and messy and grey being human is. None of us are perfect, and we all make mistakes, small ones and terrible, huge ones, but we all are coming from the same place – from a desire for love and the freedom to be our fullest, most contradictory selves.
BK: What do you think Jeremy’s future is?
LF: I think he becomes a journalist, writing poetic editorials about sports that cross over into life and philosophy and humor.
BK: Are you a vinyl aficionado in real life?
LF: I have a record player, but my collection is pretty pitiful. I’m a poser in that regard, sadly, although I’m trying to change that!
BK: Are you a fan of both The Flash and Sean Connery?
LF: The Flash I don’t care too much about, but Sean Connery? Hell yeah. I think my personal favorite role of his is Agamemnon in Time Bandits (1981). His fight with that freaky skull-headed Minotaur lives in my brain rent-free.
**
A very special thanks to Lucas Friedman for agreeing to participate in this interview and to david j. moore for setting it up.
Beth + Jeremy and Steve is set to hit all major HD digital internet, satellite, and cable platforms and DVD starting May 30th, 2025
Check out my review of Beth + Jeremy and Steve here!
Check out the official Beth + Jeremy and Steve Facebook page here!
Check out the official Lucas Friedman Facebook page here!
Check out Lucas Friedman’s IMDB page here!
Lucas Friedman headshot courtesy of Lucas Friedman. All other images courtesy of Freestyle Digital Media.
