On the Set of "Melissa & Joey"

Welcome to YoungHollywood. com. What's up everybody? It's uh Joey Lawrence. We're here on the set of my show, Melissa and Joey. I'm going to take you guys on a little tour. It's tight. Check it out. We got we got the audience. They sit up there. This is our kitchen set. Real working fridge and everything. Actually, the first two or three weeks there was no power in this thing. They had to pull like rotten food out of here. It was like two dead bodies in there. This is the back door to uh to nowhere. Kind of like the bridge to nowhere. This is our den. We've never actually had a scene in the den. There's the staircase up to uh up to the downstairs, up to the down. Yes, this is where fresh fruit is and and organic produce. Now, it's our makeup and changing rooms and we got craft service down here.

You're a television icon. I mean, you've been in the game since six years old and you've been on sitcoms and comedies and family comedies. You've probably seen the big change between back in the day until now. What would you say is the biggest difference?

I remember back in the day uh on Gimme a Break when I was a little kid, uh we would rehearse all week in a rehearsal hall. You didn't get the luxury of being on your set all week and they would tape off where the rooms were. And there would be doorways that were taped. I mean, everything was taped. You had to mime everything all week until literally the day before you shot in front of a live audience. So that's a major change, huge change. But a lot of other stuff is eerily the same.

You play Manny on the show. So tell me more about your character and how it evolves throughout the season.

Well, you know, he's sort of thrust into this situation. This is a guy that was living the high life in Manhattan and making millions and millions of dollars, had a great trophy wife and you know, everything in a matter of six months just like it did in the real world, collapsed and he lost everything. And that's kind of where the show begins. He takes this job as like an interim thing.

It's pretty crazy being in front of a live audience and having to change your lines and memorize them. What is your key to, you know, keeping it on point and making sure that you do a good job?

Well, you know, it always helps when the script really flows, when it's a really great script, you can feel it. You kind of just remember it. The banter goes back and forth. He says something, I respond, you know, that kind of thing.

A lot of people are comparing this to who's the boss. So, how do you feel about the way that sitcoms have changed over the years?

Well, I think it's always so funny. You know, everyone always wants to compare something to something else. They need some way to to kind of get that concise little bullet point. But I think the show is is like who's the boss in premise and if we have that kind of success, that's wonderful. But I think it's actually pretty different because they're not our kids. It's a little bit racier, it's a little edgier.

Tell me more about your character on the show.

Mel, well, she's a city council person who is in politics. She was raised as like a bad girl of DC, just sort of ignored, raised by nannies, that kind of thing. Bad girl. Little bad girl. So she's now trying to like resurrect herself and get over that image and taking care of her her teenage niece and nephew and she's very self-centered and spoiled but has a good heart and means well. To be fair, she's picking up 16 years of parenthood like that, you know, so yeah.

And how do you feel about the chemistry on the set with all of them?

Oh, we have a great time. We are having such fun here, the crew, the cast, everybody. Just so much fun. It's so easy. It's like coming to work every day is a joy.

Now with your character Ryder, take me through like a typical day on what Ryder would be doing.

Uh well, Ryder uh he obviously he goes to school like any other kid. It's a new school for him so finding friends is always a challenge for him.

Now, it's pretty crazy because, you know, Joey and Melissa are very well known. They've been around for so long. Have you had any kind of advice given to you from them as an actor or any kind of like things they've told you, you know, you're a young actor as well, just like they were when they were younger?

Yeah, I mean they've really just told me, you know, just stay grounded. So, you know, that's why on hiatus I always fly back to Seattle because I feel like it's really important to kind of just have a normal life, you know, have a as a normal kid.

So right now we're shooting so the fans want to know what is it like on set? What's a typical day?

Let's see. We get here at around like 8:30 and we do uh five to like three to five hours of school depending on how much time we can get in. And then we rehearse, we camera block and then we film.

Tell me more about Lennox and how she evolves over the show. She, you know, we've kind of seen some of the drama that she gets herself into and the weird situations that she deals with. So there's a little bit more of that. There's some love interest coming up.

Tell me more about um how your chemistry is with Ryder on the show.

We're basically just like brother and sister. We love each other, but yet we hate each other all at the same time. It's like one second we'll be sitting there really nice to each other and then one of us will say something and it'll turn into, 'Make you're such a brat!' And like so it's fun. Plus we're in school together. So we're there like together like five hours a day. So you know, we definitely get on each other's nerves a lot.

Very quiet, everybody, please. Very quiet. Hold the work please. Thank you boys. And action.