Acting Up – Episode #30: Sam McCarthy
Welcome to ACTING UP, the place where we celebrate standout performances in TV, streaming and film. Other than spotlighting exceptional work from recent projects, this feature also shines a light on how certain actors got where they are today. Have a peek and then check out these notable performances to help hone your craft.
The Snapshot: Sam McCarthy plays the rebellious teenage son of a tightly wound widow in the super dark comedy series, Dead to Me, on Netflix. (Season two available: May 3, 2020.)
The Performer:
Sam McCarthy
The Series:
Dead To Me
The Performance:
When your father dies in a hit-and-run and your mom essentially befriends the woman responsible for it (unknowingly), it’s understandable that you might hold a little bit of anger.
That’s one of the consistently overriding emotions for Charlie Harding (played by Sam McCarthy), who spent season one of Dead to Me essentially pissed off at the world. But clearly show creator Liz Feldman had other things in mind for Charlie in season two – as he decides it’s time to start living his teenage life – just as mom, Jen (Christina Applegate) starts battling serious inner demons after ending the Steve character (James Marsden) in the season one closer.
But this is a comedy after all, and through the darkness emerges a teenager bent on dating a social-media obsessed student/influencer (aptly named Parker) and flapping his wings in the way only teenage boys know how: by doing everything in his power to get his mom to buy him a car.
It’s this kind of tunnel vision that fuels this phone exchange between Charlie and his mom:
Charlie: It’s 100 degrees out… I can’t walk anywhere. This is why I need a car. With climate change, it’s only getting more urgent.
Jen: Oh wow. Thank you for mansplaining to me why you are the most affected by climate change.
But because teenage hormones usually find a way of winning, Charlie finds a car (in his mom’s storage locker) and takes it for a spin with Parker, without a driver’s license. Only thing is: the car he selects for his joyride is an $80,000 Mercedes that belongs to missing person, Steve. You know, just a key piece of evidence in a murder investigation. Oh, teens and their choices…
The consequences of this seemingly innocent decision push the plot forward in interesting ways as Charlie remains dead set on more immediate life goals (like happiness). But he’s about to be swallowed whole by some real-life shit that threatens to derail his teen innocence altogether. All throughout, McCarthy is there to embody this role, offering up the proper cocktail of teen angst – one-part hormones, one-part chutzpah, with just a smidge of unconditional love for his mother.
In this rare exception to “the rule,” it helps that Charlie is too smart for his own good and starts to connect dots that have the potential to upend his family forever. Luckily, Charlie has a heart – and you can’t help but genuinely feel for the kid – which is what makes the layered performance by McCarthy that much more meaningful as revelations from the murder investigation unfold.
The Career:
When you’re the son of actress Carol Schneider and Brat Pack legend Andrew McCarthy (Pretty in Pink, St. Elmo’s Fire), the expectation to nail teen angst is probably higher than most.
To that end, Sam McCarthy’s DNA delivers. The 18-year-old, New York-based actor might seem like a relatively new face on the Gen Z scene given the life he breathes into both seasons of Dead to Me, but the truth is he’s been on our screen for years, maybe without us realizing it.
McCarthy made his TV debut in ABC’s The Family (2016) as Young Hank and then honed his craft as Mike Jr. in the short-lived TV Land comedy, The Jim Gaffigan Show (2016). After that, he went on to play Sam Barber Jr. in the Audience series, Condor (2018-2020) and appeared in the NBC hit show, Blacklist (2016-2018), a show his father worked on as a director also starring James Spader, a frequent co-star of Andrew in the ‘80s. Six degrees of separation complete.
While we’re playing the game, there’s another twist in Sam McCarthy filmography that could cause fans of Pretty in Pink (1986) to emit a collective “Awww.” After multiple impressive auditions, Sam earned the role playing Molly Ringwald’s son in the indie coming-of-age drama, All These Small Moments (2018). In the film’s press tour, Ringwald spoke of her connection to the McCarthy strain of blue eyes in which she said, “Those eyes have driven me crazy for years.”
Now, thanks to the popularity of Dead to Me and Sam’s emergence as an actor by his own name, the youngest McCarthy thespian should expect to see some bigger roles start coming his way.
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Acting Up: Eugenio Derbez
Acting Up: Michelle de Swarte
Acting Up: Pedro Pascal
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Gregg Rosenzweig has been a writer, creative director and managing editor for various entertainment clients, ad agencies and digital media companies over the past 20 years. He is also a partner in the talent management/production company, The Rosenzweig Group.
