John Reynolds Talks High School Comedy ‘Never Change!’

For John Reynolds, the experience of premiering his film “Never Change!” at the Tribeca Festival was terrifying and horrible. And he means that in the best way.

“In the sense of, I want everyone to have a good time, and it feels like hosting a big party,” he says a few days after the premiere. “But obviously, it was insanely gratifying to see people laughing, to be able to hear that. And then seeing the cast watch it and appreciate it and light up with it was definitely the highlight. Knowing these comedians — a lot of them for so long — it was fun to have a big reunion.”

Reynolds wrote and stars in the film, directed by Marty Schousboe, which subverts familiar premises of high school films. In “Never Change!” the entire class of 2008 is called back to finish their senior year and graduate due to a legal loophole, leading to an extended reunion with their thirtysomething peers. The film was released on Hulu shortly after its festival debut.

Reynolds and Schousboe originally developed the story as a series, and then distilled the concept into a feature when Hulu greenlit the project as a film.

“The original genesis was, honestly, Marty and I just wanted to have fun, and felt like a lot of comedies these days are sort of cynical pressure cookers,” says Reynolds. “We were missing an old-school high-concept campy movie,” he adds. “We didn’t want it to be this straight-up satire or parody of ’90s teen comedies that we grew up loving, but wanted to see if we could make a campy, earnest version of it that could enter the canon.”

Also: Reynolds and the comedians he wanted to bring onboard are too old to convincingly play teenagers. Reynolds wrote several characters with specific comedic actors in mind — including himself — and fielded input from the cast. The ensemble includes Sofia Black-D’Elia, Carmen Christopher, and Zach Cherry. 

“There was in general a shorthand from working with each other in some capacity over the years,” Reynolds says. “ So I’m really comfortable writing for them, and the easiest thing is that I just think they’re the funniest people on the planet. And then also being able to go to them and be like, ‘What do you wanna do with your character?’ Like, Gary [Richardson]’s entire plot is basically because I asked him what he wanted to do in the film, and he said, ‘I don’t know — be abducted by aliens?’  So I was like, ‘OK.’ When we’re deep into shooting and he’s covered in goo and singing in a musical, I had to go up to him like, ‘You know you asked for this, man.’”

The film brings in recognizable high school strata — the theater kids, the loners, athletes, cool kids and geeks — although the lines between each are blurry. “We really wanted to lean into the tropes and subvert them — because honestly tropes are fun, and they’re fun for a reason,” says Reynolds. “We wanted to try to do a new spin on those and have it be familiar for people.”

For the film, Reynolds wrote himself the role of former jock Sunny Football, who reunites with an old flame that he ghosted into adulthood. But Reynolds’ own high school identity is more closely aligned with the performing arts kids: he started doing improv during his late high school years, and honed his comedy in the Chicago improv scene after graduation. He went on to star in series including “Stranger Things,” “Search Party” and “Yellowjackets.”

Reynolds is getting ready to start filming for “Sex Criminals,” a “big, high-concept” comedy series for Amazon that he leads along with Imogen Poots. The show, an adaptation of the comic book, was co-created by Emily V. Gordon, Kumail Nanjiani, and Tze Chun. He also stars in “Seekers of Infinite Love,” which debuted at SXSW earlier this spring, and “Purgatory” with J.K. Simmons and Abby Elliott, currently in post-production. 

In high school parlance, Reynolds is getting ready to HAGS: have a good summer.

“It’s a lot of nerves at this point,” he adds. “You never know until you get on set really how it’s going. But so far it’s been really pleasant and exciting.”