The provocative six-part AMC anthology series Soulmates explores what happens when a technology can determine one’s soulmate. Each episode explores the implications of what taking or not taking that test has on individuals and relationships. In “Layover,” Nathan Stewart-Jarrett (Candyman) and Bill Skarsgard (It) play a pair of gay men who have a chance encounter, leading them on an unexpected adventure.
The episode, which is easily the best so far, is “kind of a crime caper,” Stewart-Jarrett, who made his acclaimed Broadway debut in the 2018 revival of Angels in America and has appeared on Famous in Love, tells ET. “I thought, ‘You’ve never seen it. There are lots of different male-female relationships moving into relationships through a caper and I have not seen two gay characters go through that.”
The actor adds, “I think it was really, really exciting and just really fun on the initial read. I feel from what I’ve seen, it’s a bit of a jump away thematically from the rest of the world [of Soulmates], so it’s exciting to be a bit of the outlier there.”
As Jonah, Stewart-Jarrett seduces Mateo before stealing his passport, delaying his trip to Colombia where he was set to meet his soulmate. Determined to help him get it back, Jonah finds himself catching feelings while also trying to survive one expected situation after the next.
What makes this journey so believable is the natural chemistry between the two actors, as seen in ET’s exclusive clip from the upcoming episode. “I’ve never met [Bill] before and it was great,” Stewart-Jarrett says of working with his co-star, teasing that in their first shot on set, “we were literally tied together. What can I really say? [We’re] literally tied together.”
While how they end up tied together is a bit of a spoiler about where their adventure takes the two men, their unexpected encounter does complicate things for Mateo, who already has been assigned a soulmate -- even though he hasn’t met him yet.
“The point of it is that they met in real life and whether that is a great future they have and it’s wonderful or whether it’s a fun affair, or whatever that may be is that they met person to person and that is what propels them forward,” Stewart-Jarrett says of Mateo and Jonah, reflecting on the notion of the series. “I don’t think that it matters if they’re soulmates or not, really. I think they had an experience, and hopefully once the credits roll, they have a wonderful, long life and more experiences together.”
Soulmates airs Mondays at 10 p.m. ET/PT on AMC.
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