Light spoilers for Season 3 of Ted Lasso ahead. If you aren’t caught up, be sure to check out the 2023 TV schedule hit out with an Apple TV+ subscription, and catch new episodes every Wednesday.
One of the best story arcs of Ted Lasso’s third season, in my opinion, has been the budding friendship between Roy Kent and Jamie Tartt. From riding bikes together in Amsterdam to hilarious training montages in Richmond, the two characters have really evolved into quite the pals. So, to talk about the evolution of these two Richmond team members Phil Dunster, who plays Jamie, opened up about why his love for Brett Goldstein, who plays Roy, has affected the character’s friendship on the show, and let me tell you, it's so wholesome.
While Jamie and Roy were sworn enemies during Season 1 and most of Season 2, over the years their hatred has started to melt away, and they really reached a turning point in Season 3. As Jamie tries to better himself, and Roy teaches him how to do so the two have become bros. Using the bike sequence in Amsterdam as an example, Phil Dunster spoke about how his love for Goldstein has affected his performance and the character’s arc, he said:
It was a total joy. All of it was brilliant. I was really excited to film Jamie having this sort of step forward, or at least us having more of a view into his life and his mental process. And being able to do that with Brett was so good. Not just because I love him, like a deep deep love, [I] romantically love him. It was so helpful that he knows this show intimately. He's a writer on it, he is a story exec on it. He's been with it since right near its inception. And so it's really helpful to sort of speak to him as well as speaking to Jason [Sudeikis] and Joe [Kelly] who were there to bolster that.
Dunster continued to gush about how much he adores Goldstein, and explained how he helps him within the scenes. The two Ted Lasso cast members have a clear love for each other, as the actors made clear in a conversation they had with Apple TV+. Dunster spoke about how he wanted to work more with the Emmy winner following Season 1 in that interview, and while chatting with us the Jamie Tartt actor used that bike scene as an example to illustrate how much fun they have together. He said:
But also I feel incredibly present with him. We have a lot of back and forth on and off screen and I think that really, really helps. Shooting that, I think, if I may be so bold as to say that people really enjoyed it, I feel like I probably enjoyed filming it just as much as people did watch it. It was a real treat to do.
While it feels like this friendship was meant to be, Dunster admitted that he didn't know if Jamie and Roy becoming BFFs was always in the cards. He explained that he knew, the show’s creators, Sudeikis, Kelly and Brendan Hunt always had an end goal in mind, but he also said there was room for “jazz-ing” in between. That element of surprise allowed him and Goldstein to “live in the moment,” and really respond to the story as it unfolded. Though the actor did mention that there were little “breadcrumbs” that alluded to Jamie and Roy ultimately getting to a place where they got along, as he said:
Jason would drop little sort of seeds along the way, a little breadcrumbs along the way, when you were doing certain scenes. So you did have a bit of an idea about maybe what they want in this scene where they want to go. But yes, it wasn't something that was always sort of written in the stars certainly.
Even though it wasn’t a predetermined storyline, at least to Dunster’s knowledge, Jamie and Roy’s friendship, along with Jamie becoming a likable character, has become a fan-favorite arc, and it's their evolution has been a joy to watch. I think the two actors’ clear love for each other makes their on-screen chemistry undeniable, and every week it’s such a treat for all of us, Dunster and Goldstein included, to watch Roy and Jamie slowly become besties.
