-Welcome to the show!
-Thank you. Thank you for finally having me.
-Yes, and I´m sorry it took me this long to have you,
but I also want to apologize for something else.
-What´s that?
-Your co-stars, Lili and Camila, right?
-Mm-hmm.
-They came on the show, Betty and Veronica,
and I was excited to talk to them
about some of their co-stars on the show --
Luke Perry, Molly Ringwald, big deals to me,
being the age I am.
And we had this exchange,
and you´ll understand why I owe you an apology.
When you found out you were working with them,
did those names mean anything to you?
-Of course. I mean, everyone -- Yeah.
-They meant -- Yeah, I mean, I didn´t know who Luke Perry was.
-Okay.
-For me, it was more like Cole Sprouse.
-Yeah, for us, it was like, "Cole Sprouse?"
"Suite Life," we grew up with that.
-Okay. Now, tell me something real quick.
Who is Cole Sprouse?
[ Laughter ]
I´m so sorry.
But it would have been slightly creepy if I knew who you were.
Right?
-Whatever helps you get to sleep at night.
-But I am so -- I apologize. -No, please, come on.
-But, you know, I wasn´t watching a lot of Disney Channel
in my late 20s.
-Still no? -Still no. Still even less.
But I have a kid now, and so as long as repeats are happening --
-They´re going to show it till I´m old and gray.
-Yeah, exactly. -I guarantee it.
-So I think, like, you know, five, six years from now,
I´m going to come into the full bloom of your early work.
-I´ll finally have a bit of a mustache in five or six years.
And you´ll still be seeing those episodes.
-So you -- you were somebody who liked comics.
-Big-time, yeah. -Worked in a comic book store.
Is that true? -I did, yeah.
I worked at a comic shop called Meltdown Comics.
I used to go to Meltdown Comics all the time on Sunset.
-Yeah, those guys are killing it.
-I didn´t know you from Disney Channel.
I knew you as the guy who sold me comic books.
-Right, right, how the tables have turned.
Making me feel a little more in power now.
-There you go.
So, but this is sort of, obviously,
a re-imagining of "Archie" comics.
Were you drawn to the idea of doing it in a different way?
-At first, if I´m being completely honest, no.
It seemed a little scary to me.
Because when you come from a comic background,
which I´m sure you get,
you also come from a background of, like, purity and purism.
-Adhering to the source. -Right, right.
-When you start to see people
mess with that really nostalgic property you love,
it can be quite incendiary.
So when I first read it, I was a little bit wary.
And then I-I did my audition just like Rod Serling
when I went in.
Because he´s the narrator in the show.
I read it like Rod Serling.
And I kind of knew from there
it was going to be a little stranger, a little weirder,
a little more "Twilight Zone."
And I figured, "Okay, you know, this could be fun.
Let´s give it a shot."
-I heard you had an argument, though,
about the purity of Jughead´s dog.
-Right.
-And so this is about the casting of a physical dog.
You had an issue with one of the show´s creators.
-Right. -What was your iss--
What did you think the dog should be?
-Oh, man. Okay. Now that you´re calling --
-You´re a very method actor.
You want to work with the right kind of dog.
-I need the right -- I need to live with the dog
and breathe with the dog.
No, so Jughead´s dog in the comics is a dog called Hot Dog.
And he´s undoubtedly the worst part of the digests.
Hands down, he´s the scariest thing
and adds really not too much.
But for some reason, I was addicted to the idea
of having an English sheepdog like he is in the comics.
And he was originally pitched as, like, a pit bull.
-Oh, so you were very upset with that.
-And, you know, I thought,
"Okay, well, we got to try and figure out a way
to get an English sheepdog."
So for a week, a week,
I was trying to wear Roberto down about this.
And we got this dog.
And this dog was the worst actor I have ever --
-The sheepdog? -The sheepdog, yes.
-Yeah. I grew up with sheepdogs,
and they are lovely creatures who are dumb as rocks.
-So dumb. So dumb. -Yeah.
So, yeah, I can´t imagine any of my dogs
growing up being able to, like, hit a mark.
-It barks the whole time. It didn´t hit its mark.
It broke fourth wall consistently.
-Yeah. -It was just no good.
-All right. Well, I´m glad you´re owning up to that.
-I made a mistake.
-All right, good. Thank you.
You do something that I love.
-Finally. -You´re very active on Twitter.
-One thing that you love.
-No, no, I love a lot about you.
And, um... -Go on.
-But this is great. So you take advantage of --
People post about you and your twin brother, Dylan, a lot.
And your responses to them, I have to say,
are really, really funny, because you are --
-Were these, like, the news articles?
-Yeah, news articles.
So there´s one, a picture of your brother that says,
"10 child stars who are completely broke,"
and then you wrote to your brother,
"Did you hear the news?"
-Right.
-I really like that. -And he did.
He did hear the news. -He did.
This one wrote, "Cole -- I hate wet, sloppy kisses."
And your response to that was,
"I´m also wearing a plaid train conductor´s hat,
so why are you trusting my 10-year-old opinion?"
-Geez. -This is my favorite, though.
-This was a look.
-This is a very -- Because you see these all the time.
They´re, like, click bait.
This is "32 child stars who died shockingly young."
A photo of you shockingly alive.
-Right.
-And you wrote, "Dead on the inside counts, too."
[ Laughter ]
Which is excellent.
It´s excellent. -Thank you.
[ Applause ]
-But --
-That was my Twitter peak.
-No, I think I´m about --
This, I think, is your Twitter peak right here.
And I´m going to -- This is a poem that you wrote.
You posted a poem you wrote to your mom.
But instead of showing, letting people read it,
I would love for you to read it, ´cause it is --
You wrote -- And you did write,
"I was a psycho baby before it was hip."
-"I love you, Mom. You are the best.
You´re better than all the rest.
And if anyone ever takes us apart,
I´d repeatedly stab them in the heart."
-Wait.
Look at -- Now look at the handwriting!
Look how young you were!
[ Laughter ]
That´s fantastic!
Was that very in line with your thinking back then?
-Right, I just brought that angst
all the way into "Riverdale."
-Yeah, exactly.
-I´ve been method forever.
-Yeah, here´s what you need to know about Jughead.
-Right.
-Congrats on the show. Really lovely to have you here.