‘UnREAL’: Josh Kelly Talks Jeremy & His Concerns For Rachel

On Lifetime’s “UnREAL,” Rachel has been getting closer to “Everlasting” suitor Adam, and recently, it’s been in front of the lens of her ex, Jeremy.

In last week’s episode of the cable network drama, Josh Kelly’s character — new “Everlasting” DP (director of photography) Jeremy — shot the interaction where Rachel attempted to “produce” Adam into kissing one of the girls on camera. As she spoke to the British suitor, what Jeremy captured (and what she watched back later) though, was Rachel falling under Adam’s spell as he leaned in close and kissed her cheek. Jeremy may be engaged to “Everlasting” makeup artist Lizzie, but watching the moment set off a flurry of emotions for Josh’s character in a perfect behind-the-scenes twist.

“I mean, it’s a ton of feelings because it’s him conflicted [over] whether or not he still likes Rachel, and whether he should like Rachel, because Lizzie obviously wants to make him happy and Lizzie could make him happy, but would he be happy with Lizzie? And so, should he even care, and why does he care,” Josh explained, when Access Hollywood asked him about Jeremy’s feelings at seeing the Rachel/Adam interaction. “But then, the truth of the matter is, he does actually care about Rachel, so he wants her to be happy as well. But it’s also selfish because he doesn’t really want her to hook up with him.”

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Jeremy’s caring and concern stems from his history with Rachel. His history with her includes knowing about Rachel’s situation with her mother, who thinks she needs psychological help (and who wants her back in therapy).

“I think Jeremy knows almost everything because Sarah [Gertrude Shapiro], the creator, and the casting director, Barbara Fiorentino, they did a really good job when I was auditioning for this role of explaining a lot of the backstory of what Jeremy’s relationship with Rachel is to really help me play the character better,” Josh said. “Before they ever did whatever they did, they were best friends first and then they kind of hooked up or whatever, in the flashback. So yeah, he knows everything.”

Shiri Appleby and Josh Kelly in ‘UnREAL’ (Lifetime)

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One thing that took Josh’s character by surprise earlier this season was the release of Rachel’s private unsent letter to Jeremy, and videos of the former couple that were housed on her computer. They were sent to the whole staff when Rachel couldn’t come up with the cash in time to pay off her former roommate who was blackmailing her.

“Obviously he’s embarrassed about it, but the truth of the matter is, if you love someone, you can’t really be ashamed of anything in your past,” Josh said of how Jeremy processed the unexpected information share. “If you’re in a good relationship, you can be honest about it, and so if you’re not and you’re ashamed of things that come out, then you might not be in the right relationship and so I think that is something that’s going through his head with his current fiancee.”

Other than the teasing Rachel got from the “Everlasting” cast (including suitor Adam), and Lizzie’s hurt feelings, which Jeremy had to deal with, the two people at the center of the video and email – Rachel and Jeremy — haven’t really discussed it. But don’t worry, the subject will get addressed in a future episode.

“Definitely. It becomes a bigger thing,” Josh said, hinting at what’s to come.

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Since Jeremy works behind-the-scenes as a cameraperson, his interactions with the suitor have been mostly limited to filming the Brit on his dates with Adam’s potential ladies. For those hoping to see some Jeremy/Adam scenes, there will be a few this season.

“There’s some, but not as many as we wanted. Freddie [Stroma] and I – we were roommates up in Vancouver,” Josh said, referring to where the Lifetime show was filmed.

“It was awesome. It was so much fun and we were like, ‘This will be awesome, dude. We live together, we can study lines together.’ And then we had barely any scenes together. It was funny,” Josh laughed.

Josh Kelly and Freddie Stroma (Lifetime)

In the weeks ahead, “UnREAL” will start to venture into fantasy date storylines for “Everlasting.” At least one adventure meant that Josh got to take to the skies in a hot air balloon ride in a meta-esque situation, where he was playing a camerman shooting a reality show, while being filmed himself.

“It was cool,” Josh said. “That was one of the real, as you said, ‘meta’ things that [was] weird. It was weird being there all the time, even if you didn’t really have anything to say in the scene, but it was also really cool because Jeremy’s the lead camera guy and the DP for the show, so he gets to go on hot air balloon rides and he gets to go on all the fun trips to wherever they might travel.”

Unlike Freddie, whose attire on the show is more dressy, playing a behind-the-scenes guy meant Josh was often outfitted like Shiri – in comfortable clothing. He also had camera gear strapped on, which – at first – had producers worrying.

“When we did the pilot, I had just done this movie called ‘Jarhead 2,’ and I broke my shoulder halfway through the movie and so everyone was really concerned. They’re like, ‘He can’t lift a camera…’ and I let them know, ‘It’s Ok, it’s totally fine, it’s not a big deal,’ and it turned out it was fine,” Josh said.

Although he didn’t actually film things as he played Jeremy on the series (they had a viewfinder on his camera so it looked like he was “doing the right thing”), Josh managed to impress “UnREAL’s” real crew thanks to his own past experience and on-set practice.

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“I actually really like working behind the camera. I shot a short film and I worked with friends and made things. I like working behind the scenes,” Josh said. “For the actual show, I get to use a steady cam a lot and I got pretty good. At the end, the camera guys were like, ‘Wow, dude. You actually know what you’re doing, man.'”

“UnREAL” airs Mondays at 10/9c on Lifetime.

— Jolie Lash