Minimum Wage: Are the Actors Playing Themselves?

While the teen workplace comedy ‘Minimum Wage’ is created by Jeremy Garelick and Will Phelps, the beating heart of the story is undoubtedly the characters and the actors who pour life into them. Aidan Micho, Grace Reiter, Hyde Healy, Julia DiCesare, Luke Burke, Ryan Micho, and Tommy Armstrong not only star as Aidan, Grace, Hyde, Julia, Luke, Ryan, and Tommy, respectively, but are also co-writers for the whole project. Some fans might better know them as the team behind American High Shorts, the YouTube channel that has taken over the internet because of their relatable, teen-centric skits about highschool and part-time work experience. Given that, however, many have become curious as to whether the actors are playing themselves in the Netflix series.

The Pizzeria Crew Are Named After The Actors Who Play Them

While the main characters of ‘Minimum Wage’ are all named after their respective actors, that doesn’t necessarily mean that the actors are playing themselves. On the contrary, the Netflix series draws a fine line between reality and fiction, in which the actors are essaying a heightened, dramatized version of themselves in a completely fictional setting. The reasoning behind this creative choice can be traced back to the nature of this story itself, as it started out as a YouTube Shorts series by the same name. Actors Aidan Micho, Grace Reiter, Hyde Healy, Julia DiCesare, Luke Burke, Ryan Micho, and Tommy Armstrong, who not only star in the show but are also its co-writers, are all connected to the popular YouTube channel American High Shorts, where they do comedy skits, usually using their own names.

Over the years, millions of fans have become familiar with the cast of American High Shorts projects, especially since they use their first names. As such, it makes total sense for the Netflix series to pick up on that trend. To begin with, this isn’t an unusual thing for mockumentaries, but what makes ‘Minimum Wage’ special in that regard is the actors’ history of creating stories in the same vein and welcoming many fans along the way. Grace referred to the original web series as “very scrappy, very homemade,” explaining that the cast tried to carry over the things that had made their digital sketches work when they moved to the larger production.

The Cast of Minimum Wage Has Developed a Fictionalized Persona

Despite the lack of any apparent autobiographical characteristics in the show or in the YouTube projects, fans have often speculated about potential overlaps between the actors and the characters they portray on screen. While it’s entirely possible that they bring in a few real-life elements and personal details to enhance their performance, nothing of the sort has been confirmed as of writing. The most important distinction, here, though, is that the actors are not actually high-school students, despite the characters being written as teenagers juggling school and part-time work.

Julia DiCesare, for example, was already a college senior when American High hired her to write, act, and edit its sketches, while Grace Reiter graduated from high school in 2019. During an appearance on Passion Pod, Reiter explained that she finds it easier to perform through a persona rather than doing stand-up, describing the character as a kind of “shield” from judgment. These larger-than-life performances somehow also manage to be intensely relatable, and the same holds true for all the artists involved with the series, bringing these fictional characters to life.

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