‘The Game’ Star Hosea Chanchez Details His Reaction to Show Returning After 6-Year Hiatus (Exclusive)

The Game was one of the more popular shows on The CW and BET. The series, which focuses on pro football, ended in 2015 but has been rebooted and new episodes can be seen every Thursday on Paramount+. PopCulture.com recently caught up with Hosea Chanchez, who plays Malik Wright in The Game and is a producer in the series. He shared his reaction to the show returning after being off the air for six years. 

“Well, my first initial instinct, and this is something that had been in the works for about three years now,” Chanchez told PopCulture. “We had actually been talking to different networks and different homes for the show and a few other ones they were going to happen, they fell through based of whatever the reasons are. And so to fast forward to the Paramont+ days, where we get an opportunity to do this here, this was a really unexpected world, though.

“This way that we’re doing it, it is a really unexpected way to do it, in my opinion. Because it kind of, it shifts the world on its head with the way we’re shooting the show now. But the familiar, the familiarity of it is these characters that we’ve grown up watching Tasha and Malik.”

Initially, The Game was going to return on The CW, but those plans fell through. In September 2020, it was announced that The Game was returning on Paramount+ and the season will include 10 episodes. Some of the original cast members are back, including Chanchez and Wendy Raquel Robinson who plays Malik’s mother and agent Tasha Mack 

“You can’t half step in the scene with Wendy Raquel Robinson,” Chanchez said when asked about working with Robinson. “She rumbles with the best of the best, from the comedic to the dramatics. Like she holds her weight. So she makes everybody around her better just by being herself, being her magnificent, wonderful, magical self. So for me, although Wendy and I are family and we have been for the longest time and we see each other all the time, we talk all the time, we text, we’re very present in one another’s lives, outside of work and have been for 20 years now.”

Fans are happy that The Game is back for another run. But for those who didn’t watch the series on The CW and BET, why should they check out the rebooted version on Paramount+? “The show is set in the world of football,” Chanchez explained. “Football is the fabric of American culture and even despite everything that the agency is going through and has gone through, we are still a country that loves respects our players and the game and the sport in general. So why the show should be watched, is because the represents the culture, the fabric of this country, and not just the culture and the fabric of this country, but the relationships and lives of every single player.”