While it may take some cast members some time to warm up to each other, Brian Tyree Henry and Wagner Moura instantly connected when they met up to discuss the Apple TV+ show Dope Thief. The two play Ray and Manny, longtime friends and delinquents who make their money by posing as DEA agents and robbing low-level drug dealers.
“I remember having the phone call with Wagner to try to convince him to join the show, and I was like, ‘It’s a lot. They’re about to ask you to do a lot of s***, and I don’t know if you…I was like, look I’m telling you.’ And he was like, ‘Well, now you’ve convinced me.’ And I was like, ‘S***, man. I’ve now thrown him into this thing,'” Brian recalls to ABC Audio.
When they met, he says Wagner was indeed “being thrown on set” but requested time to go into a room with Brian and break the ice.
“Then we stood in front of each other and I think we were holding arms and he was like, ‘I’m Wagner, I’m Brazilian.’ Then I’m like oh cool, ‘I’m Brian, I’m from North Carolina, and we’re going to go out there. We’re going to do this’…And then it just took off,” Brian continues.
Though they did not have the luxury or time to really get to know each other before filming, he says, “I wanted [Wagner] to feel safe. I wanted him to feel like he could trust me.”
That eventually led to a friendship that goes beyond the show. “Really where the magic really happens is what happens between takes,” Brian says. “Honestly, like, I don’t think we ever left each other’s side.”
The final episode of Dope Thief premieres on Friday.
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