Exclusive Interview: Pop Culturalist Chats with Half Brothers’ Connor Del Rio

Connor Del Rio found his passion for his craft after taking his first improv class at the world-renowned Second City comedy club. Being celebrated and embraced for his humor, Connor knew in that moment that this was his calling in life. It’s led him to projects like Key and Peele, This Isn’t Working, Level Up, and his latest film, Half Brothers.

We caught up with Connor to chat about Half Brothers, why he’s drawn to roles and projects with complicated family dynamics, and how he hopes the film inspires others to be more empathetic.

Career

PC: How did you discover your passion for acting?
Connor: It’s interesting. When I was younger, I was always the class clown and an idiot. [laughs] That started in fourth grade. I remember singing presentations that didn’t need to be sung and doing silly stuff like that.

Strangers kept asking me, “Are you an actor?” I was like, “No.” They were like, “You should do it! You’d probably be good at it.” That kept happening over and over. I remember I went to one of my best friends’ holiday parties when I was fifteen. One of his extended family members was like, “Are you an actor?” I was like, “No.” They told me I should do it. I sat there and I was like, “Man, this happens so much. Maybe I should try it.”

It was never an idea for me at any point. Then I went to Second City in Chicago, which is this super-famous comedy club for improv and sketch comedy: Tina Fey, Steve Carell, Amy Poehler—the list goes on. I took my first improv class there. From day one, when I was celebrated for acting like a fool, I fell in love. It was instant. I knew it. I was like, “This is what I’m supposed to do.” I’m very grateful to have learned my passion at the age of fifteen. That doesn’t happen for a lot of people. Everybody has a passion. It’s just a matter of finding it. I was lucky.

PC: Who or what has had the biggest influence on your career, either personally or professionally?
Connor: I was always inspired by my family and friends because they pushed me and they celebrated me. Jim Carrey was a massive influence. I watched Ace Ventura: Pet Detective every day. In fact, in some of my earliest projects, you can see how much he influenced me. I didn’t copy him, but he was someone I watched so much that there were certain cadences. Jim Carrey talks like this. If you listen to Ryan Reynolds, his cadence is similar to Jim’s. When you look at it, he inspired so many up-and-coming actors.

My sister and I also would pretend to sleep and wake back up to watch Conan O’Brien at ten thirty at night. He was a big inspiration. I love Conan, love Jim Carrey. As I got older, Bryan Cranston, Sam Rockwell, Carrie Coon. Carrie Coon is the best actor of this generation. I’m throwing that out there. She doesn’t get enough credit. She deserves even more. Also Regina King and Christian Bale. I like people who are the utmost professionals. People who take it to the next level. People who will make you comfortable on set. I dig that.

Half Brothers

PC: Tell us about Half Brothers, your character, and what drew you to this project.
Connor: Half Brothers is about this super-successful Mexican aviation engineer and executive. He finds out that he has a half brother in the United States. Their ailing father sends them on their road trip to discover why he never came back to his son in Mexico. They grow through the trip with each other, and they follow their father’s immigration path from the United States to Mexico and vice versa. It’s a really heartfelt story. It’s a comedy, but it has some pretty harsh truths in there as well. It’s one big metaphor for the relationship between the United States and Mexico.

My character is Asher. He’s the American brother. He’s very spontaneous. He’s filled with warmth. He wants to bring positivity to as many people as he can. While he has this frenetic exterior, he’s a character in pain. He’s grieving and he’s struggled his whole life, especially in adolescence, with developing friendships. He’s a really lovable guy and he’s a fun guy. He makes terrible spontaneous decisions, but those decisions are justified by grief in a sense. I don’t think any of us are ever ourselves when we’re going through a heavy grief period in our lives, especially for the first couple of weeks.

After I read the script, before I even got the part, I texted my agent, “Oh my gosh. I connect to this character so much.” I was crying at the end of the script. I have a complicated relationship with my father, and that’s one of the big themes of our movie. I was really able to relate to that story from my own personal standpoint.

I really enjoy being a part of stories about complicated relationships with fathers and sons because that’s not a small niche group of people. Millions of people relate to that on some level, whether you lost your dad or have an interesting relationship, a nuanced relationship, or no relationship. Millions of people can relate to that—not just sons, daughters as well. But from a more personal standpoint, I really like the stories that involve fathers and sons.

PC: Asher and Renato have quite the journey in this film. How did you and Luis [Gerardo Méndez] prepare to tackle that dynamic?
Connor: We were moving really fast on set. So we had to be prepared. Number one, we had to know our lines. We always did. There was never a day where Luis and I didn’t know our lines. We’re professionals, baby. [laughs]

But it was really important to find moments outside of the script and the writing. For example, Renato and Asher start to warm up to each other a bit more. It was important to find those moments of silence that we can find between each other. We would rehearse, even on the day. We would say, “Okay, right here between these two lines, why don’t we share a look and just have a moment between each other?”

We were constantly asking each other questions. Even when we were off set, I’d call him or he’d call me and we’d talk a scene through. That comes from the friendship that we developed and the trust that we developed. I love him to death. When you love your fellow acting partner, it makes everything easy because the trust is there, and trust is everything when it comes to performance.

PC: The film does a fantastic job balancing comedy with drama. For you as an actor, is one more challenging than the other?
Connor: On an instinctual level, I’ve always been there with comedy. When you’re working with a comedic actor as talented as Luis and working with a comedic director as talented as Luke [Greenfield], the comedy is easy. The drama is always hard. As an actor, you want those scenes to come off as raw, real, and organic as possible.

I’m not going up there in a scene where I have to cry about my dad thinking about a goldfish I had that died. I’m really trying to get into the head of Asher, my character, and visualizing that. It can be really hard. What we’re talking about is having a hard cry. When you think about a hard cry that you had in a day, you’re exhausted after it. Now imagine doing that for nine, ten hours straight. It was brutal.

Juan Pablo [Espinosa], who plays our father, is amazing. His scenes are so harsh. They’re so heavy. He was doing that all day. I’m telling you it feels like you’ve been filming for a week when you do a day of that. It’s really exhausting, so I always give a lot of credit to the actors out there who take on those heavy roles. Talking about you, Nicole Kidman. [laughs] She plays broken character after broken character.

PC: With the film out now, what do you hope audiences take away?
Connor: It’s crazy. It’s changed a lot for me because of the year that we’ve all gone through. One thing I hope people see and that I’m proud of is the Latin/Hispanic actors. This is an American film by an American studio. All the lead actors, outside of me—I’m half Cuban and half Irish, so I’m still in there, even though people look at me like I’m a White boy—but we have Luis, Juan Pablo, José Zúñiga. It was really special to be a part of it because you don’t see that a lot. I hope that’s one thing that changes the focus of other studios and streaming platforms. People like good storytelling at the end of the day, whether you’re American or you’re from Mexico, Canada, France—it doesn’t matter. People like good stories, so they’re going to tune in no matter what. I was really proud of it.

But at the end of the day, I hope it changes people’s minds about stereotypes. I hope they look at different perspectives and dig a little deeper. I hope they look at people with empathy. We all have differences, but even our differences are so similar. There are successful aviation engineers in Mexico, just like there are in America. There are struggling people in Mexico like there are in America. There are hungry people in Mexico, just like there are hungry people in America. Mexico and the United States are really half brothers in a sense.

With the pandemic and everything going on, I hope families can sit down, watch the movie, and find warmth and laughter for ninety minutes. I hope they get distracted from the world.

Pop Culturalist Speed Round

PC: Guilty pleasure TV show?
Connor: The Great British Baking Show. I don’t know if that’s considered a guilty pleasure. I freaking love The Great British Baking Show. I don’t watch reality TV, by the way, at all. But I can’t get enough of it. I love it.

PC: Guilty pleasure movie?
Connor: Unfaithful. I love Diane Lane so much. She’s amazing and exquisite in every way. I’m a big fan of hers. This is going to creep her out. I hope she never sees this. [laughs]

PC: Favorite book?
Connor: Most recently, it’s Replay. It’s a sci-fi book that’s freaking awesome about this guy who keeps waking up in 1963. He lives to the age of forty-three, dies for no reason, goes back to 1963 with all the same memories. In one life, he’s like, “Well, I know who’s going to win the Kentucky Derby. I know who’s going to win the Super Bowl. I know all of this. I know IBM stock is going to go through the roof in the ’90s.” He becomes a billionaire in one life, dies, comes back, and he’s like, “Oh, that life sucked.” Then he decides to move out to the middle of nowhere and live there. In one life, he tries to stop the JFK assassination. It’s a really interesting book.

PC: Favorite play or musical?
Connor: Favorite play would be Long Day’s Journey into Night. That’s kind of cliché, but I freaking love that play so much. It’s another one with a complicated family and a complicated relationship with a father and one of the sons.

Favorite musical is Grease. Nothing comes close. Everybody hates me for it. I’m like, “You’re crazy. Grease is the coolest musical ever made.” Some of the Broadway stuff is fine, but it’s the movie for me. They should never reboot that. There will never be another John Travolta. There will never be another Kenickie. Kenickie is my favorite character in the movie.

PC: A band or artist that fans would be surprised to learn is on your playlist?
Connor: All my friends and family know I’m deathly obsessed with the Arctic Monkeys, so nobody would be surprised to see that on there. Maybe Head Automatica? I have a playlist called “Faves”: all my favorite tracks throughout my whole life. I added them to it.

PC: Who would play you in the story of your life?
Connor: Maybe Noah Jupe? He’s a great young actor. Or maybe if Sam Rockwell has a kid and he grows up. Some people say I look like him, which I’ll totally take. He’s a handsome, handsome guy. His future son could play me.

To keep up with Connor, follow him on Twitter and Instagram. Watch Half Brothers today.