Man on the Inside’s Lilah Richcreek Estrada discusses season 2 romance
Season 2 of A man within allowed Lilah Richcreek Estrada to explore more of her character Julie, including her love life.
When the hit Netflix series returned on November 20, Julie was juggling her complicated relationship with her estranged mother Vanessa (Constance Marie) while sharing interesting scenes with Didi (Stephanie Beatriz) that turned romantic in the finale.
“It was so much fun. Stephanie is just so much fun to work with. When we had a cat and mouse [game] of nuzzling each other in Season 1, that was one of my favorite things to shoot last season,” Richcreek Estrada, 36, told Us Weekly exclusively. “Didi is the only person who stands up to Julie and really gets along with her.”
The actress loved learning a lot about Julie through her relationship with Didi.
“I love that aspect of playing with Julie, seeing herself in a certain way and meeting her match,” noted Richcreek Estrada. “She likes it, but doesn’t know what to do with those feelings and freaks out. It just gave her a whole different layer, which I was so excited about. And Stephanie is also so easy to act with that it made it all really easy.”
Based on Maite Alberdi‘s 2020 documentary, The mole cop, A man within is a comedy series that follows recently widowed retiree Charles (Ted Danson), who originally infiltrated a senior home to solve a case for private detective Julie.
His mission in Season 1 was to find out who had been stealing from the retirement community, but Charles soon began to feel at home at Pacific View. Season 2 switched to a university with new cast members among others Mary Steenburgen, Max Greenfield, David Strathairn, Michaela Conlin, Jason Mantzoukas, Constance Marie And Jill Talley.
‘I’ve always wanted to see more of Julie’s personal life. Because I think Yana Grebenyuk Michael [Schur] – by design in Season 1 – didn’t want anyone to know anything about her, which was perfect,” she recalls. “That’s also so perfect for how Julie wants to be seen. But of course I wanted to see more of her. I want to see more of what makes her human. Fortunately, we get to see that, I think that’s so special.”
Richcreek Estrada recalled her earlier conversations with Schur about Julie.
“I know who that type of person is and honestly – because it’s so well written – that’s exactly what I got from her. When I read about her in Season 1 because the writing is so good, I feel like we were on the same page,” she continued. “This time last year he told me his idea for season 2. What a dream. I’m so grateful. That will be so fun to shoot.”
She added, “I did everything I could to make her as human as possible. She presents in a certain way, but often people who present so strongly in a certain way don’t do that inside. I wanted to make sure that both sides were seen and I wanted to make her feel like she was really human. I just get a lot of empathy from people because she’s much deeper than you get to see in the previous season.”
Season 2 was also different for Richcreek Estrada when she started filming “five and a half weeks” after giving birth, telling us, “I just had a baby when we started filming. I don’t know how I did it. I feel like I blacked out and did what I wanted to do. But I had a very, very good town and I still have that. I just did what I had to do and I was so grateful that I could work. I also just rode the wave of all the emotions I had felt every minute of the day.”
A man within is now streaming on Netflix.
