From playing Jackson Whittemore on MTV’s Teen Wolf to portraying Roy Harper (Arsenal) on The CW’s Arrow, Colton Haynes has been establishing a name for himself in Hollywood by consistently working and challenging himself in different projects. Besides those landmark projects, viewers have been able to watch Haynes over the years on shows like The Gates, The Look: The Series, The Grinder, Scream Queens, and American Horror Story: Cult, to name a few. He also made a splash on the big screen for playing the character of Scotty in the 2017 comedy Rough Night.
As of 2022, Haynes signed up to play Steve and Mitch on Lifetime’s Swindler Seduction and spoke to PRIDE about the challenges of playing twin characters in the movie. “Going into it, I thought that there was going to be less of a similarity between the twins, even if they were identical,” Haynes recalled. “Maybe one of them would have a blond wig, or something like that. [But] I like that we kept them really similar, because ultimately it keeps the audience on Louisa’s side. You’re not quite sure who’s who.”
Given that he was tasked to play two visually identical characters for the film, Haynes explained what his process was like for differentiating between these two individuals as an actor. “We definitely tried to distinguish the different twins either by eye twitches, or jaw clenches, or something kind of small. [Things that] maybe the audience wouldn’t necessarily catch… but that way, for me, there could be a bigger difference. There were days I’d be on set like, ‘Wait, I think I just played that as Mitch!’ It was a little bit confusing in that aspect.”
There has been a recent surge in movies, TV shows, and documentaries about these “swindler” archetypes that get innocent bystanders involved in their own lies and schemes. From Inventing Anna to The Dropout to The Tinder Swindler, Lifetime’s Swindler Seduction is a new entry within this era of storytelling in Hollywood.
But despite the delicate subject matter, Haynes felt pretty confident and prepared to tap into this kind of performance. “Especially being in this industry, I’ve been doing this for 20 years. I think I’ve met a lot of people like this,” the actor revealed with a knowing smile. “Not quite taking it to the level that… [pause] well, I guess they just haven’t gotten caught. But yeah, I definitely had a lot to pull from. It was just really, really fun to do.”
Later in the interview, Haynes talked about filming Paramount+’s Teen Wolf: The Movie, which meant reprising his role as Jackson and reuniting with his costars from the hit MTV series. “It was so wild. At first, I was like, ‘Is Jackson even going to look the same?’ It’s been over 10 years. Luckily, we’re out of high school,” Haynes joked.
“It was tricky because we’re all so close. When people say, ‘Oh, we’re close with our cast.’ A lot of them are lying. But we really, really are,” the actor noted. “We’re so close that all of us just know everything about each other. So going back to work, having the history that we all have, was hard. [Tyler] Hoechlin and I bully each other like siblings, so we had to calm that down because we’re at work. My dynamic with [Tyler] Posey – and his character Scott and my character Jackson – we are, I wouldn’t say rivals, but I’m definitely a lot snarkier and I have these really dramatic monologues, and Posey kept laughing every time I’d say one of my monologues. And I was like, ‘This is going to take a while to get used to it.’ [Posey] is used to just seeing me as me, not this pretentious snob who’s just come back from London.” Needless to say, Haynes described filming Teen Wolf: The Movie as “a beautiful experience.”
Between realizing his dream of making a movie for Lifetime and getting back together with his Teen Wolf friends, this is certainly a huge moment in Haynes’ career. For now, though, his fans better watch out for Mitch and Steve on Swindler Seduction!
Swindler Seduction premieres Saturday, October 22 on Lifetime.
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