The Hulu adaptation of the hit podcast The Dropout has brought the story of Elizabeth Holmes to larger audiences. While many labeled Holmes a con artist after the truth about her biotech company Theranos was revealed, The Dropout humanizes her decisions and lets audiences into her point of view. Amanda Seyfried delivers a pitch-perfect performance as the eventually-disgraced CEO Elizabeth Holmes, but she is bolstered by a cast of supporting actors who similarly understood the assignment. Among those is Dylan Minnette, whose young and idealistic Theranos employee Tyler Shultz adds a fresh voice and perspective that could change the company forever.
In an exclusive interview with CBR, Dylan Minnette dove into bringing Tyler Shultz to life for the series. He spoke about what set this role apart from his previous genre work, what it's like to sing on camera, and why it was so great to work alongside Amanda Seyfried.
CBR: You have been involved with a lot of big-name series -- 13 Reasons Why, Scandal, Agents of SHIELD, even Supernatural. How did The Dropout differ from some of this previous work?
Dylan Minnette: First and foremost, I've never been involved in something that is a true story. I've never portrayed a character that is non-fictional, so that is the biggest difference. [It] is definitely an added pressure and is intimidating to approach but exciting. I feel like this sort of project is something that I've been wanting to do for a while. I've been a part of a lot of genre things and to be a part of what is a drama but kind of a biopic, in a sense, of Elizabeth, it's really inspiring -- especially with the ensemble and the people involved. It was just sort of a no-brainer for me when I was approached with it. I was like, "I feel so fortunate that they would think of me to join this ensemble as well. I would love to be a part of this."
I'm happy it worked out because it was at a time in my life where I... I'm now at a point where I'm just doing music for a while. I'm taking a break from acting for a while. I thought that [the break] was already starting. I was like, "Well, nothing's gonna shoot in LA, and nothing's gonna shoot for a month or two." Then this thing fell into my lap [where] that is exactly what that was, for my part of the show. I think it was meant to be. I'm happy that I was able to fit this in and do this before I go and take this big break because I feel really fulfilled by being able to be a part of something like this, for sure.
Was Tyler a character that was easy for you to relate to? Did you have to work hard to tap into that energy?
I think it was easy, in a sense. It was easy in the sense that I think that Tyler and I are similar in the way that we carry ourselves and communicate, at least just based on what I've seen in interviews and just heard him speaking. The way he makes jokes or laughs at things or talks about things, I feel like I sort of speak just like this guy. [It was] nothing like what Amanda [Seyfried] had to do with Elizabeth -- the voice and the wardrobe. I feel sort of tied to Tyler in that way.
Also Liz [Meriwether], the showrunner, wasn't putting pressure on that either. She just wanted the goal to be to just be able to portray what they were feeling emotionally in that scene. That's most important, as long as I understand what they're going through in their mind, what he's going through in his mind. Being able to listen to him speak on his own -- on interviews on the podcast and on YouTube and things like that, but also he had his own audiobook where he was speaking on just his experience of working at Theranos -- that was really helpful to be able to have in the back of my mind. Knowing what he was feeling in these exact scenarios that we are portraying was really helpful.
It's great that you could tap into that. You mentioned that you are focusing more on your music career. I know we get to hear Tyler sing in the latter part of this series. Is that a Dylan original? Did you have a hand in that?
I did not. I did not, but it was so hilarious and brilliantly written. It was just perfect with what it was. I mean, I'm sure if I had thoughts they would have heard them, but I didn't. I was like, "This is so hilarious and so awkward. I love it." Singing on camera is not my first choice. That's not something that I was necessarily excited to do. It's weird. I'm used to singing for people but doing it on camera, it's just uncomfortable [and] kind of awkward. I'd never do a musical or something. [It was uncomfortable] especially because the scene is so unbearably awkward and just painful. Amanda was making it so hard in the best way, just staring me dead in my eyes off-camera, just not letting it go and having these animated reactions. It's just so awkward. Hopefully, it helped the scene. I haven't seen it yet. That was a fun one, but equally hard as well.
I think it plays. I think it absolutely works.
Good.
So just to end my time here, I want to ask if anything else caught you by surprise while filming The Dropout. Did you run into any surprises while portraying this role or diving into the story?
No. I mean I guess what I can say is I think it... Well, it's not really a surprise because I sort of expected Amanda to be great and really cool, but I think what was surprising is they had only been shooting for a couple months by the time I came in. The rapport that Amanda made everyone have and the sort of relationships she had with every single person in every department of the crew was extremely impressive and just really, really cool and inspiring. I thought it was really surprising how much of a unit it felt like with Amanda at the charge, at the head of it. She's just an amazing leader.
I think that stepping into that, that's what made it so easy. She just made everyone feel so welcome. I wasn't even working with her in the first day or week of shooting my stuff, and she made a point to come and meet me and talk to me and get to know me. I just think that she's amazing. So I think what was surprising was just how she managed to create such a great team in such a short amount of time and get everyone to really trust her. She's just a great person to work with.
Catch the first six episodes of The Dropout streaming now on Hulu, with new episodes releasing Thursdays through April 7.
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