Peacock’s new Stephanie Hsu-led dark romantic comedy Laid puts its protagonist in a bit of a pickle: what the heck do you do when all the people you’ve dated start kicking the bucket out of nowhere?
Hsu plays Ruby, a feisty (and, frankly, a little messy) event-planner in her early thirties navigating the turbulent waters of modern-day dating, whose exes start dying, in the order of when she previously dated them. She enlists the help of her true-crime-obsessed best friend AJ (played by Girls‘ Zosia Mamet) to figure out what exactly is going on in their crazy timeline.
We Got This Covered talked to the cast of the show in order to get to the very bottom of this situation, too. Our method? Asking them which character from a select list of beloved and lesser loved television icons they would freely submit to this predicament, which they would try their best to save, and whose fate they would just leave up to chance. Let’s call it “Kill, Save, Chance It.”
For Hsu and Mamet, the category was “characters from other famous female friendship-centric shows” and the potential casualties were Carrie from Sex and the City, Hannah from Mamet’s own Girls, and Ilana from Broad City.
“This game’s hard,” Hsu admitted, calling her cast mate to the rescue. “I think I’m gonna save Ilana,” Mamet began. Then, using her first-hand experience to justify turning against the lead of the show that was her home for five years, she decided, “I mean, honestly, Hannah is pretty insufferable at times, I think I’m going to kill [her].” Finally, “I think that SJP [Sarah Jessica Parker] can really fend for herself,” she said, adding “I think Carrie is probably able to battle, like, the zombie apocalypse on her own.”
The chemistry is so undeniable with the two, whose on-screen friendship is the pulsating heart of Laid, that Hsu confessed she was going to make the exact same choices. “True story!,” the Oscar-nominated actress remarked for good measure.
Then, it was the boys’ turn. They got to pick between television’s most annoying exes: Mr. Big from Sex and the City, Ross from Friends, and Ryan from The Office. Andre Hyland, who plays AJ’s gamer/streamer/stoner boyfriend on the upcoming series, had absolutely no doubts about who he was going to hang, exclaiming “Oh, he can die!” as soon as he saw a picture of John James Preston. We know Carrie would’ve felt that in her bones as she pushed Big to his death during this supposed zombie apocalypse she’s trying to outlive.
Michael Angarano, meanwhile, was very adamant about saving Ross. He’s probably team “They were on a break.” “Ross is the one to salvage,” he said, with Hyland agreeing and even coming up with a scenario where the dinosaur expert mended Carrie’s broken heart in a Friends/SITC (and, we assume, The Walking Dead?) crossover. Damn, now we really want to watch this show, too.
Though Angarano only joins Laid in its third episode, his character, Richie, will play a crucial role in Ruby’s journey, as the yin to her yang. “He’s able to be very honest with her and I think that is something that she needs on this journey of hers,” he told WGTC.
Well, we might not have learned much about why Ruby’s exes are dropping like flies, but at least we know Ross Geller would save Carrie from the zombie apocalypse, and that’s more than enough. Though perhaps not as medium-defining as the characters listed above, Laid has got its fair share of famous faces popping up now and then for a sling of cheeky cameos, too, so don’t miss it when it premieres on Peacock, Thursday, Dec. 19.