Letterkenny just released its ninth season, a huge accomplishment for a show that started out as a series of skits on YouTube. The Canadian comedy features showrunner Jared Keeso as Wayne, a "hick" in the rural Ontarian town of Letterkenny. He and his sister Katy (Michelle Mylett) and friend Daryl (Nathan Dales) come into conflict with the town's hockey players as well as the punk, drug-dealing skids, led by Stewart (Tyler Johnston).
While the show has talked about a number of different issues of the years, Letterkenny is just as often about nothing at all, and one of the biggest draws is the characters talking about unimportant things. CBR sat down with Mylett, Dales and Johnston to talk about Season 9, as well as how the show has changed since it started.
CBR: Did you expect the show to go for this many seasons when you started?
Michelle Mylett: Yes -- well, no. But I think we all thought it was special. We had good feelings about it from the start, and we all got along so well and worked so well together. So it definitely felt special. But then you just never know how other people are going to receive it. Right? So you just hope for the best. And we've been very lucky. We're all very thankful that people feel the same way that we do about it
Tyler Johnston: We were joking in Season 1 that it was the most fun summer camp that we’d ever been to before. And we were hoping to go to summer camp again and again. Then when it got picked up in America on Hulu the show just took on a whole other life. And I don't think any of us could have predicted in 2015 that in 2020 we would be on a North America-wide, Letterkenny live tour. But I'm happy to be along for the ride. And hopefully we can go 10 or 15 more years.
CBR: What was your favorite scene from the new season?
Johnston: One of my favorite scenes of the season was actually Michelle, Nathan and Jared. Just the three of them in bed during the sleepover episode. I just thought some of those scenes were really cute.
Nathan Dales: That one was really fun to shoot and I really liked the concept behind talking quietly but not really talking that quietly next to people in bed. The whispering, sleepover girl-talk stuff is my favorite stuff from this season. it's so much fun and I love that concept of going “Hey, are you awake?” and then the other person softly responding "yes"… I just love everything about it.
CBR: How do you think your character has changed over the course of nine seasons?
Mylett: I think Katy's only become more confident. But she's got strong values, she knows who she is. That hasn't changed even though some relationships have changed. Her and Wayne as siblings share a similar kind of strength of character. She's definitely developed and had new experiences that have shaped her but at the same time she kind of just is who she is.
Dales: I think Daryl has become more confused. With every season he becomes more and more confused. And that's the baseline that I run off with before I start every season. Same dude, more confused
Johnston: I mean, Stewart has gone from the literal basement of the basement to where he is now. He's finally out and he kind of gravitates towards anything that's working for him. So I think if he's getting attention through one way or the other he’ll gravitate towards that until that falls apart, and then he’ll find something else and just head that way.
CBR: Speaking of how Stewart has changed -- do you think we could ever see short-haired Stewart again?
Johnston: I think the potential is there. Jared asked me if I wanted to put the wig back on after that season, and I personally did. I think the long hair is a big part of the skids, and it certainly provides him with the “outsider” appearance. The short hair was a lot of fun, but I sort of equated the short hair with Stewart’s relationship with Gae, and then when she broke his heart the hair came back. If he's ever in another relationship with a very controlling woman... then he might get his hair cut again.
CBR: Michelle, you open the season with this huge rap/spoken word piece -- what was it like to perform something like that?
Mylett: I was nervous, especially initially when it was pitched to me by Jared. When he sent it to me I was like “oh my goodness, okay.” And then I had to go on set and perform that acapella in front of all the crew and a lot of the cast. As supportive as everybody was, I was really nervous, but it was really fun. Definitely out of my comfort zone.
CBR: What makes working on Letterkenny different from other shows you’ve worked on?
Johnston: I grew up in Vancouver, and I've been acting for like 18 years now. But we always have to hide Vancouver or hide Toronto as Canadian cities. We’re usually playing Seattle or playing New York. And for me it's been really neat to be part of a Canadian show where we could just let our Canadian flag fly and let our outs and abouts go. And it's been really refreshing to embrace our Canadiana as much as we can.
Dales: What makes this show different for me than other shows is getting to hang out with the people that I would want to hang out with even if we weren't working together. You get to work together and make something fun and have a bunch of laughs. That's different from any other show that I've ever worked on. You're not just in for a couple weeks' shoot and then gone. It's just like, “Yeah well this is now going to be six years of us doing this together.” So the camaraderie there and working with your friends, man, that's what's different about it. And that's what puts me over the moon on it.
Created by Jared Keeso, Letterkenny stars Keeso as Wayne, Nathan Dales as Daryl, Michelle Mylett as Katy, K. Trevor Wilson as Squirrely Dan, Dylan Playfair as Reilly, Andrew Herr as Jonesy and Tyler Johnston as Stewart. Season 9 is available to watch now on Crave and Hulu.