We got a chance to chat with actor/musician Odiseas Georgiadis about his upcoming Netflix show “Trinkets.” Check out our exclusive interview with him below!
Hollywood News Source is a fan of Odiseas Georgiadis. This is our second opportunity to interview him, and this time it’s for an upcoming Netflix show, Trinkets. We were first able to interview him for his role as Murph in “The Perfect Date,” and now we have a second interview to share where we discuss his role as Noah in the upcoming series, “Trinkets.” Interviewing him was no hardship as a he is a real charmer who is destined for a great career. His positive outlook on life and humble self-confidence are evident in his answers and are just two of the many reasons we will be cheering him along his journey.
Many of you may already be familiar with the Kirsten Smith YA book, “Trinkets.” It was the source for the Netflix original series which was produced by AwesomenessTV. The official synopsis is as follows: “Trinkets” tells the story of three teenage girls from different corners of the high school cafeteria who find themselves in the same mandated Shoplifter’s Anonymous meeting where an unlikely friendship forms. Elodie (Brianna Hildebrand), Moe (Kiana Madeira) and Tabitha (Quintessa Swindell), are the imperfect picture of perfection and will find strength in each other as they negotiate family issues, high school drama and the complicated dilemma of trying to fit in while longing to break out.
Unofficially, I did my own research and people love this book because it tells the story of “real” teens who are more than just the clique they belong to or one defining aspect of the personality. It tells the story of teens trying to negotiate and fit in to the world they live in and accept themselves, and each other, in the process. Georgiadis plays “Noah,” Moe’s love interest and one of the popular kids who, according to Georgiadis, is not the typical high school popular boy jerk. As you will see in the interview he really likes Noah and feels he defies the jock stereotype typically shown in teen movies. Note, edits have been made to make the interview easier to read and follow, mostly because we talked at the same time here and there. Nothing has been changed to the alter context or meaning of what was said and there aren’t any real spoilers.
HNS: Thank you for taking the time to talk to Hollywood News Source. How long have you been in New York?
OG: I was born in Ghana West Africa but I came to the NYC when I was six years old with my brother, mom and dad. I’ve been in Brooklyn ever since.
HNS: How did you get into acting?
OG: When I came here I started first with my love of music. Then, one day I was watching TV and saw a commercial and was like, “man I want to do this.” So I started looking up programs on Google and stuff, you know, asking for acting programs in NYC. So by God’s grace I found one that was good. I was 11 or 12 so I was lucky that I found a good program because I didn’t know how to tell what was good or bad. I went to my parents and they paid for it and at the end there was a showcase and I landed a manager. I started auditioning when I was 13, just going into 8th grade. I am one that strongly believes that things are meant to be, I trust in God. Now I know I could have been scammed, but I wasn’t, or I could have not got a manager, but I did. There were a lot of people in the program, like hundreds, and I think only a handful got managers or an agent. So it was a blessing from the start. I started auditioning for commercials and it was very slow and a learning process. This industry is a big teacher because you get rejected a lot, but I believe those early projects just weren’t for me. I learned that I wasn’t ready for those projects and I used the time and the rejections to grow. So I was ok with many no’s before I got to a yes because then the project was meant for me. I really learned on the job by auditioning and self-taping. My acting skills evolved.
HNS: That’s a really good attitude toward the business and also for life in general.
OG: Yeah
HNS: I will be honest, I don’t know a lot about your character in “Trinkets,” can you tell me about him?
OG: I think he’s one of my favorite characters I’ve ever played. He’s a very complicated, yet very simple, young man. He’s about 17 or so; he’s a young dude who although he’s “in the popular part of high school” and plays soccer and is kind of a jock, his dynamic is treating people with love and respect and actually thinking about putting others before himself. Still, sometimes he also makes mistakes. He’s not a perfect kid but he has a dynamic I love. For Noah, he doesn’t just choose people who are like him to be his friends. This is not the stereotypical jock.
HNS: It doesn’t sound like it.
OG: The stereotype is that the popular kid doesn’t have to be nice or that he’s trying too hard to be cool. Noah is never trying to be cool. He’s very vulnerable actually. He always puts himself out there in terms of how he feels. He knows how to express himself. He’s not the kid who doesn’t know how to show a girl how he feels or stays quiet all the time. Noah is like, “I like you, I feel like this. Let’s stop hiding it and let’s show the people who we are.” I feel like he’s the type of kid who is the same around everybody. He’s got a lot of integrity. This is the reason he is a fun character because of all these nuances.
HNS: I was thinking it sounds like he has a lot of self-confidence in who he is. He sounds like the person you’ve expressed yourself to be so far in this interview.
OG: Thank you. Yeah, I relate to him a lot. I think that’s one of the reasons I enjoyed him because I love playing characters that either are really not like me at all or are like a certain part of me that I can pull from to express who the character is. He was a great guy to do that with. I felt like I fit in this role more than any other and it was really just fun. I could really let loose and the cast had amazing chemistry and there was a lot of patience on the set. I could feel that everyone wanted to do their best and push themselves to their best and work their hardest on the whole thing.
HNS: I’m reading about the three girls who were the main characters in the book/series and how they go to Shoplifters Anonymous and all the stuff that results from that, how does Noah relate to these girls? Does he learn anything from them or does he teach them something?
OG: I feel like people may watch this and perceive him as the good guy. I think they might perceive it as that but I don’t want to tell people what to feel about him because I love when people come with their own ideas. They come with things that I haven’t thought of, you know I can learn something new from that. But for me (not Noah), I say he plugs into the girls as the love interest for Moe, who is one of the three girls. Noah and Moe are very different but also very alike. Most of my scenes are with Moe, Kiana Madeira, who is an amazing actress. His dynamic with her is that they help each other. They are a good balance for each other. They are both what each other needs, but not in a cliché way. He brings out parts of her when she is getting into her “very Moe” self, but then who she is helps Noah to grow. If feels uncomfortable for him but that’s when he grows.
HNS: The book and the series are mostly from the perspective that these three girls, right? So if Noah was telling me about this story, what would his perspective on the events be?
OG: Hmmmm, I don’t really know. Noah really doesn’t know any of the girls well except Moe. He does not know too much except the surface stuff about Tabitha or Elodie. In his eyes, Elodie would be perceived as like an outcast and kind of just the new kid on the block, kind of awkward and stuff. And then Tabitha is a popular girl who has certain things about her and she’s like, “I’m that girl, I’m the popular girl.” So from his perspective, he’s looking at Tabitha as a girl he goes to and she just happens to be the popular girl. He’s actually cool with her because he’s very cool with Brady (Brandon Butler), who is Tabitha’s boyfriend. He looks at Brady and Tabitha as friends. There’s not so much interaction between Elodie and Noah in the show, but he doesn’t think any less of her because of the shoplifting, because like I told you, he looks at people for who they are. As for the whole situation I think he would look at it as they are just three girls in school, and in life, trying to do the best they can. But he’s very blind to all that’s really going on in terms of the three girls. With Moe, I feel like he really does have huge love for her because he feels he knows more about her than nobody else knows. She shows him what she wants to show to the world. He doesn’t take it for granted. He feels good around her.
HNS: So he really only has the viewpoint of his relationship with Moe.
OG: Right.
HNS: So what I’m hearing and what I’ve read about this story is a lot of people feel it is different from usual teen stories. They like it because it does a good job showing acceptance of all different kinds of people and also that what you think people are going through isn’t necessarily what they’re going through at all. That there’s more and more to a situation than meets the eye. When I hear you talking about these characters in this situation, I can really hear that that’s possible, just in a different ways that the high school characters are being played out for instance. For the kids that will be watching the show, what would you think is the bigger message the series is trying to send?
OG: One thing is that you don’t really know everyone and that one-off judgments shouldn’t be made on anyone, for good or for bad. Because you just don’t know people, I mean it’s as simple as that. This show is kind of taking stereotypes and flipping them and I feel the story shows that there’s not just one kind of person. You know I feel the story takes the people and makes them very real because no one is just one thing. People are very mixed up and complicated! You can’t just judge people on their outer self, you have to look within. This story will show that because it’s where you’re going to be surprised by some of the characters! People’s mistakes are just mistakes, they are not the whole person. You can always be redeemed from what you’ve done in the past, and that what you may have done in your past is not who you are.
HNS: So people will learn something important.
OG: Yeah, I hope so. The shoplifting thing, I guess people will look at that in different ways, but for me it just happens to be what the girls in the story are going through, but don’t look at the series as just about that, it is about kids really. About kids trying to connect with one another and with what they care about in life. I hope people give it a chance!
HNS: I am excited to see it! It sounds like it is something I can have a conversation with my kids about too.
OG: Exactly! And it also shows kids that you don’t know who you will end up being friends with you don’t know, from the surface level, who is for you or against you. You may end up marrying someone you didn’t expect. I think people will see to keep and open mind and look deeper at people they are getting to know.
The 10-episode series, “Trinkets” begins on Netflix Friday, June 14th. It sounds like a “Netflix and chill” night is happening in my immediate future, I hope you will join me!
