‘Never Have I Ever’: Paxton Actor Darren Barnet Drops Major Hints for Season 2
There’s so much speculation about if or when Netflix’s hit, Never Have I Ever, will be renewed for a second season. The teenage coming-of-age comedy-drama has won the hearts of viewers, young and old(er), who are clamoring for more information about the show’s future.
Actor Darren Barnet, who plays heartthrob Paxton Hall-Yoshida on the series, recently dropped some big hints about what could take place in the show’s next season.
Darren Barnet on Paxton vs. Ben
The 29-year-old actor spoke with Bustle recently about the show’s success and about Ben Gross, the other male vying for main character Desi’s heart. At the end of season 1, you may recall, Desi and Ben are locking lips.
“[Ben’s] been absolutely terrible to her his entire life,” he says. “He’s very, very obsessed… with being cool. Let’s not forget guys, he has a girlfriend when he kisses Devi at the end. I don’t like that.”
Barnet’s predictions for the show’s second season
The actor suggested to Variety in Apr. 2020 what he thinks should happen in the series next season, especially between his character and Devi.
“I would . . . like to see some kind of a role reversal between Devi and Paxton in the sense of she’s been chasing him the entire first season and, now, maybe he’s too late. Maybe her and Ben do have a fling and Paxton is put in this position where he’s been able to get any girl he wants but this time, it may not happen.”
The idea of a redirection of “who’s chasing who” appeals to Barnet.
“Seeing that vulnerability and self-doubt in Paxton, like, ‘Maybe she’s too good for me’ would be very interesting. The cat-and-mouse game just completely switched over.”
Darren Barnet’s real-life high school experience wasn’t all fun and games
Surprisingly, Barnet says, high school for him wasn’t a happy-go-lucky time at all. While other students were partying and hanging out, he was laser-focused on hitting the books.
“I never went to one party, never had a sip of alcohol,” he told Variety. “Honestly, I had no life outside of academia and sports because my mom told me, ‘We can’t afford college, but you have to go. So, wherever you go, you have to get a full ride.’ So, that was the pressure on me.”
“Everyone would tell me, ‘You think you’re stressed out now, wait ‘til real life.’ Now I’m in real life and in a career that’s unpredictable and in the most competitive industry in the world and there has not been one day that I have been more stressed out than [when] I was in high school.”
