‘Old Guy’ Star Peri Gilpin Praises YouTube Series for ‘Perfectly’ Capturing the ‘Humanness at This Moment’ (Exclusive)

For more than a decade, actress Peri Gilpin starred as the quick-witted Roz Doyle on Frasier, making audiences laugh and helping the show earn multiple awards, including a Screen Actors Guild Award in 1999 for their ensemble cast. Over the years, Gilpin has appeared in a plethora of beloved TV shows, but now fans can watch her in the short-form YouTube series, Old Guy. Starring as the somewhat straight-shooter agent, Winnie who helps her octogenarian client, Harry (Roger Burton) finds work that isn’t of the stereotypical “old guy” role, Gilpin tells PopCulture.com exclusively how her character is someone she appreciates thanks to her relatability.

“I loved Winnie because I just feel like Winnie is every agent, every agent at heart because agents aren’t producing things necessarily, especially someone like Winnie,” Gilpin told PopCulture. “She really only can be a conduit between an actor looking for a job and a production looking for an actor. So she’s not making the job, she’s just helping them find each other and also I think that he’s breaking in at 80 years old, so she doesn’t have a lot to go with except just the humanness at this moment.”

Old Guy was created by Five Sisters Productions, comprised of Burton’s daughters, Jennifer, Ursula, Maria, Gabrielle (Jr.), and Charity. They created the show in 2013 with intentions to have their parents starring in it, including Burton and his wife, Gabrielle Burton. Being friends with a few of the Burtons, Gilpin said she was thrilled to join the project when that asked her to be involved. Yet, over the years, the Burton sisters never found the right time to release the episodes as they were always busy with their personal lives and professional projects. Finally, they decided to put them out on YouTube during the quarantine period of the coronavirus pandemic.

Gilpin shared some thoughts on how Old Guy captures the relationship between an agent and their acting client so perfectly: “I know so much with actors and agents relationships are about kind of talking each other into things or talking each other out of things. The agent team is a big part of how you couch something, how you frame something that you’re trying to get them to do and especially as he lets feelings known about the direction she’s doing in, I just don’t think she has a lot of choices.”

She further detailed how the nature of this show is not about older stars, like Grace and Frankie‘s Jane Fonda or Lily Tomlin, but rather “about somebody who’s just entering the business at 80 years old.” The way Gilpin sees it, Winnie is “trying so hard” to find “exciting” roles for Harry, but he’s also “trying to get him to see the reality of it” at this stage of his life. The Texas-born actress goes on to gush about working with Burton, calling him “so charming” and “a delightful person.” She shares how she wanted to play her role as Winnie, who “really wants to work as hard as she can to find him those things that will make him happy because she does think he has stuff to say.”

Gilpin finally enthused over the speculation that she and her show have been put up for Emmy nomination consideration. “[I’m] so excited for everyone involved,” she said, adding how she is also very “proud” of the Burton family for putting so much into the project. “I’m happy to have been a part of it and I’m happy that they’re taking it to this next step.”

Viewers can stream all six episodes of Old Guy here, on YouTube. Fans can also check out the Old Guy Comedy website, as well as all social media links here: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram. For more on your favorite shows on network television and streaming platforms, keep it locked to PopCulture.com for the latest!