“I was screaming in my bedroom when they called me at 10 am.” Every year after the star Joseph Chiu says about receiving news that Prime Video has renewed the romance series for a second season.
The 24-year-old Canadian actor plays Geordie Lane in the film adaptation of Carly Fortune’s romance novel. Every summer afterwhich was released last month. In the weeks following the release, Prime Video made the announcement Every year after He will return for the second season and continue to follow Fortune, Our golden summer.
In The Book of Fortune, the character of Cheo, best friend of leading man Matt Cornette, plays a much smaller role, which allowed the actor some space to find his Geordie. “I was fully committed to the role of best friend and doing my best to make Sam seem more well-adjusted,” he says. “I really like Stiles Teen Wolf. There were a lot of references that I was trying to get that energy from regarding the best friend [character]”.
The actor had just graduated from college when he booked the role, and he wasn’t expecting things to happen so quickly. He found his way into acting during school after swapping majors. It also wasn’t the first time he had a bit of a pivot.
When he was 14 years old, he was a K-pop trainee at Korean entertainment company FNC Entertainment. “I was an apprentice for three months,” he says. “I actually did pretty well in that program, but then my mom wanted me to finish high school and go on to college.”
Below, Chiu discusses the making of season one, what he hopes for season two, and how he feels about the recent film and television spotlight in Canada.
Did you feel better after the first season? Were you optimistic?
Honestly, with these things, I have no idea. I was on a show called Engine heads Where I did a five-episode arc, and people seemed to be very excited about season two. But then we were not renewed. I was happy with the way the first season went for me because the way I was cast was crazy in itself. I was just grateful that I got to work as an actor.
You auditioned for a different role, didn’t you? You had just graduated from university, right? When did it all hit you?
Honestly, I think everything hit me after the show was released. Up until then, I was very obsessed with the whole prep aspect of the character and really trying to justify the choices I made with the character. I put a lot of myself into this role of Geordie. As a 23-year-old still trying to buy into characters, it was a bit difficult and very vulnerable for me, at least, to decide how much of myself I wanted to show. This was my first role in the series, and I had never traveled for this role before. I’ve always worked in Toronto or Hamilton. Once I got to the set, the first day Amy [B. Harris] He invited me to go see the collection. I was a little shy, honestly. But my first scene was actually my audition scene as Geordie. Once I started doing that, it became fun again. There was no pressure to get it right just because Geordie, specifically for me, isn’t really a character in the book. It was just really taking it moment by moment and really trying to do it. I’m just trying to be as present as I can with the two actresses that day, which are Sadie and Aurora.
What was that shooting experience like? What do you hope for next season in this regard?
Filming on Bowen Island was beautiful. We took a boat to work every morning. I have allergies, so I was sedated with antihistamines. It made me a little sleepy, so I drank a lot of black coffee. As for the island itself, it’s really beautiful. I think it’s a lot like Barry’s Bay, although I’ve never done it before, so I can’t really say.
Carly seemed happy with the similarities, so we can take her word for it.
But what I will say is that it reminded me of where my grandmother used to live, which was Wellington, New Zealand. There is only a feeling of peace and boredom. There is a great feeling of boredom. But honestly, this is what I realize, now in hindsight, is what it feels like to be safe. Do you know how people say touch the grass?
Yes.
I touched grass every day for three and a half months, so it was pretty cool.
Where do you think Jordi is going forward?
I like this question because I can be a writer now.
Let’s hear some of your fan fiction.
My PR answer is that’s a great question for our showrunner, but what I would describe as the strength that I have, as one of the actors, would be just, I’d love to see Jordi and Chantal in an actual relationship. Aurora and I, we have a certain kind of chemistry where it can become kind of comedic, but then we can immediately go into the depths of seriousness and really talk about some great stuff. As for Delilah, I don’t know, it happened in real life, there was a childhood crush and it was unrequited love. I would use that and try to draw on it and maybe build a moment of confrontation with Delilah into all of these feelings that Jordi had buried. The way she looks in the ending scene, it’s exciting for me as an actor because I’m excited to entertain all the possibilities in terms of the stakes. Now that Chantal is involved, I want to explore the backstory between Delilah and Jordi.
They live in a small town, but it’s clear that Geordie loves her or used to love her, and how Geordie has treated her over the years. I want to see some jealousy from Geordie too in the past and how he became accepted. Abby is a really funny actress, so I think we’ll have some good comedic moments balanced out with a great rain confessional. I want to see Geordie singing when he was 17. He was really drunk at the bar and started saying, “Hey Delilah.” Something like this. I think it would be really cool.
I like it.
Also, Delilah comes to watch Jordi play a basketball game and he plants the aura the whole time.
People are really interested in the Canadian film and television industry at the moment, which I have to imagine as a young actor is very exciting for you as a young actor.
It feels great. Alicia and I are the only Canadian actors, but Alicia is based in Los Angeles. But if you book a regular role for an American-produced series filmed in Toronto, your colleagues literally celebrate you. Because we’re Canada, we really put our people in the spotlight and just try to send them out to go to Hollywood, so it’s actually crazy. It’s everything I dreamed of. Now, for me, it’s just about celebrating my friends who are also pursuing this career and trying to uplift them and their talents. As Canadians, we don’t really have to. Access is less. There’s less of a spotlight on me, so I’m just trying to use my platform right now to celebrate my friends and also people that I really love.
