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AE: One of the criticisms aimed at the show is that the characters are based on stereotypes. How would you respond to that?
RC: My thing with that is the story is about our set of four friends, and there are a lot of people out there who are like the four of us. I think, in general, with the show, there are some things you're just not going to get. Basically, the show is geared towards the four of us … and some people may not be able to relate because they don't feel like any of this set that we've brought together matches what they think it should be. What we're doing is showing a friendship between these four friends and what we bring to the table as individuals within our group.

AE: As the first season progressed, it seemed like the cast really gelled. Are you guys friends offscreen as well as on?
RC: Oh yeah, for sure. I danced with Christian [Vincent], who plays Ricky, and I knew Darryl [Stephens, who plays Noah]. I'd never met Doug [Spearman], who plays Chance, but I think as time went on, we had moments together when it was just the four of us, and we sat down and talked, and we got that energy together where it comes across where we are what we're trying to portray onscreen. I think in general, we're all really nice people and we all want the same thing — for the show to be great — and we have great energy together, and we knew that you had to have that. We're supposed to be best friends, so you have to have that energy both on and off, I think. It just makes it easier. We definitely get along outside of work.

AE: Correct me if I'm wrong, but when you first started filming, you didn't know where the show would end up, right?
RC: Oh, we had no idea. Initially, the show was supposedly going straight to DVD. When Patrik first approached me with it, it was all going towards DVD. Once we did the episodes online, people started getting interested and started investing, then HRC came in — which is a wonderful organization, the Human Rights Campaign — and they sponsored us to go on tour. We took that pilot on a tour, and Logo happened to be in New York at the screening.

AE: Oh, wow.
RC: You didn't know that?

AE: Well, I knew it was originally going to be on DVD. I remember reading about that at the time, but I didn't know about how Logo picked it up.
RC: Yeah. The whole stepping thing of how the show progressed, and how it's moving, and how we got the second season, I mean, we were just going for the ride. We liked the project; if it went straight to DVD, that was fine. We were happy with it. Once it got to a network, it made us really go in-depth with the characters … be a little more on our game, make things work better.

AE: Seeing as how the pilot episode was a bit racier than the broadcast version, has Logo been a good fit for the show?
RC: Oh, of course. For sure. I don't know if you remember seeing clips from the very beginning; there were definitely some racy scenes. I think Patrik did that just to get the attention. Then with the pilot, there was a love scene at the end that was racy, but once we got picked up by the network, just like with anything, there's so much you can say and so much you can't. You still have to get the meaning across of what you're saying, but I think Logo coming in and doing that just makes it cleaner and better. I think the imagination is better than just having it all out. Actually, I think, collectively, all of us are really happy about that. You know, you only want to show so much!

At some points, character-wise, there are some things that they don't want you to say that you would like to say. In our African-American community, there's certain lingo that you would hope could be said, but it can't. It's censored, just like any show.

AE: I remember from the deleted scenes in Episode 7 or 8 that you had to change from calling it a sex party to a hook-up party, and I thought that was such an odd, silly change to have to make.
RC: Honestly, you look at it and you go, “Wow. OK. We can't say that?” I mean, the powers that be say you can't say it, so it's just like, “OK.” We know there are certain things you can't show and stuff like that, so you just kind of have to go with the flow. Some things are surprising … but I guess they have people on their back also. They have an image they're trying to portray for the network, and we're a part of that network, so we have to follow those guidelines. Which is fine. It's not like it's a big deal.

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