For four seasons, actor Jaren Lewison has played an overachieving love interest in Netflix‘s “Never Have I Ever.” His character, Ben Gross, has academic inclinations that resonate with him IRL.
For almost the entirety of the show’s run — the final season debuts on Netflix June 8 — Lewison was juggling acting with being a student at the University of Southern California.
He graduated summa cum laude in 2022 with a bachelor’s degree in psychology with a minor in forensics and criminology, finishing his studies in three years.
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“It was originally not my plan to be in school and on a show at the time,” Lewison said. “I never in my wildest dreams imagine I’d book a show a month and a half before I started college full-time. A lot of people kept telling me I didn’t realize what a huge time commitment doing both would be, but I’d rather try and fail than never try at all. There’s people in college doing school full-time on top of three jobs, so I was up for the challenge.”
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Balancing school and work was no easy feat, but Lewison said he had the support of “Never Have I Ever” creators Mindy Kaling and Lang Fisher, as well as the assistant directors who helped to work shooting around his school schedule. Plus, his college roommates would have dinner ready for him when he came home from a long day of shooting.
“Never Have I Ever” was the actor’s first big break after years as a child actor (his first role was on “Barney & Friends.”)
His character on the show, Ben, started out as the rival to main character Devi Vishwakumar, played by Maitreyi Ramakrishnan. In season one the character came off as brash an unlikable, but he transforms throughout the series, Lewison said.
“There are massive differences between season one Ben and the Ben we will see in the upcoming fourth season,” Lewison said. “I give so much credit to the writers for taking Ben on this journey and giving me so much material to work with as an actor.”
“If you look at Ben in season one, especially in the pilot episode, he is pretentious, loud and somewhat annoying. A lot of fans of the show were put off by Ben in the beginning, but then you go through the series and you see these moments where he starts to show you who he really is and it’s like peeling back the layers of an onion. Throughout the series, we see him mature through his different high school experiences, which I think is very normal and representative of high school. I’m proud of him and his journey.”
The character’s multifaceted nature is what drew Lewison in in the first place — Ben goes from name-dropping desperation to emotional breakdown. “After seeing how brilliantly he was written, I was like, ‘please let me get this job,'” Lewison said.
After four seasons on “Never Have I Ever,” Lewison is debating what to do next.
“Films are something I love, and there are tons of directors I dream of working with, from Damien Chazelle to Greta Gerwig, but we might have a ways to go there,” Lewison said. “I don’t know if another comedy is in my future, or if I’ll be in a drama or limited series, but after this last season airs I’m just hoping for something new with incredible writing.”
Lewison describes what he looks for in a script as sort of a “flow and dance.” He wants to take a script and effortlessly turn the pages, become invested in the characters and be fascinated by a complex plot, he said.
“‘Never Have I Ever’ really showed me what good writing can be, especially in terms of comedy,” Lewison said. “It can make you bawl your eyes out, but at the same time, it can also make you belly laugh. I am looking forward to the future film and TV writers I meet and learning from them.”
Over the course of his career, Lewison, a fan of sci-fi movies, is hoping he’ll get to portray some darker and more villainous roles or star in a thriller. He cites his biggest acting inspirations as Robin Williams, Steve Carell, John Krasinski, Heath Ledger and Timothée Chalamet.
“Those are actors who I really look up to and admire, who have simultaneously been able to make me both laugh and cry,” Lewison said.
In addition to Lewison and Ramakrishnan, “Never Have I Ever” also stars Poorna Jagannathan, Darren Barnett, Ramona Young and Lee Rodriguez.