Five seasons into Abbott Elementary, Janelle James has watched many young performers display their skills on the series, but she admits the process of finding them hasn’t been simple.
The Golden Globe nominee noted that there aren’t “a lot of dark-skinned Black kids” represented by agents, which created challenges when casting for the ABC comedy set in a predominantly Black elementary school in Philadelphia.
If I remember, in our early seasons, they had to go find kids.
She explained on Vulture’s Good One podcast,
Acting, especially as a kid, is a very expensive thing. You have to have a parent that is free to take you around and do auditions and stuff. And that doesn’t really exist in the Black community.
So, we had to go find them. A lot of them aren’t professional actors. Now they are, because a lot of them have grown up with the show, and I think that’s amazing. But a lot of them had never been on a set or anything before. I mean, we were learning together, is how I felt.
James added,
The actress who portrays Principal Ava previously told Deadline that the Quinta Brunson–created series getting a Season 5 renewal is “amazing at a time of shows going to three seasons and then sometimes without even a real ending.”
The fact that we’re trucking along and the fact that we, especially Quinta, have done this through so many different calamities that people don’t think about it. You shouldn’t think about it, because you’re just being entertained, but we’ve done this show through the pandemic, strikes, fires in LA, personal strife. I think the show keeps getting better.
James elaborated, saying,
Season 5 of Abbott Elementary debuted in the US on 1 October.
Source: Deadline