“If Tim Robinson is my comedy Jesus, Kyle [Mooney] is god,” says 21-year-old actor Jaeden Martell. But don’t get it twisted, this is no fanboy outburst – Jaeden’s very own slapstick messiah is his latest collaborator. “He was a wonderful captain, he bonded all of us cast members with his awkwardness and affection. He certainly made me feel as confident as I possibly could be, stepping into comedy.”
The pair have joined forces for Kyle’s directorial debut, the turn-of-the-century disaster comedy Y2K. Jaeden plays the dorkier-than-dorky Eli, who joins best friend Danny, played by Julian Dennison, and It girl Laura, played by Rachel Zegler, after crashing a house party on NYE in 1999 to witness pure and unfiltered chaos – courtesy of some computers-gone-rogue – as the clock strikes 12. “What a special experience. I felt very fortunate to be around a group of such individually talented people. The list of qualities I was able to learn from and observe goes on and on…it felt like being on a JV dream team for a summer, seeing all of these people who’ve already done so much and just knowing they are going to succeed and excel in whatever it is they do, work and life included. And to have two genius coaches in Kyle and [writer and producer] Evan [Winter], telling us just to have fun out there.”
