Watch: The Stars of ‘KinnPorsche: The Series’ Discuss Their Journey To The Top
The actors opened up about their characters, building chemistry, and saving the hit show from cancellation
A couple of weeks before the final episode of the Thai hit KinnPorsche: The Series aired, some of the cast members joined Rolling Stone India‘s assistant editor Riddhi Chakraborty for a conversation about the show’s creation, success and future.
In addition to discussing KinnPorsche: The Series‘ massive global acclaim, actors Mile Phakphum Romsaithong, Apo Nattawin Wattanagitiphat, Bible Wichapas Sumettikul and Jeff Satur opened up about how they developed their characters, the secret to building chemistry with their co-stars and how they saved the show from cancellation back when it was under a different production company instead of Be On Cloud.
“I saw that many team members were putting a lot of effort into it and I didn’t want them to lose this,” explained Mile who plays one of the titular leads, Kinn. After creative differences between the show’s writer duo Daemi and the previous production company led to KinnPorsche: The Series almost getting shelved, Mile took matters into his own hands after seeing the cast and crew’s love for the story. “Another thing is that I think the plot is interesting and it has a lot of potential. It would be great for the audience to watch this. So I thought about the person who can continue to do it, which is Pond, the current director who is my friend. And he knew the story from the start so I contacted him. Then it turned out to be a good thing as we expected. This is how we continued the journey up to today.”
The actors also shared their hopes for what the show’s impact can mean for the Asian entertainment industry and moving beyond stereotypes and the BL (boys love) category. “I just want the film industry in Asia to, actually let’s just start within Thailand, in general, to view this sort of entertainment as just a good piece of content,” said Bible. Apo, who plays the other titular lead Porsche, added, “We just want [people] to know that we are hard working and we wanted to make a love series in Thailand. We have never labelled, ourselves that what we are, what we going to be. It’s just love story series in Thailand.”
Each member of the cast also shared their favorite scenes from the show, with Bible choosing his character Vegas’ incendiary interactions with his partner Pete (played by Build Jakapan Puttha), Apo choosing the scene at the pier in episode three, Mile the emotional and intimate scene between Kinn and Porsche at the end of episode seven and Satur choosing his action sequences. “It’s the first time that I did action,” said Satur. “Action it’s pretty hard for me because you have to remember all the blocking, the character’s feelings and everything. And you have to [act like you] don’t know that someone’s going hit you… It’s pretty hard, but after I did that and I finished it, I was pretty proud of myself.”
Chakraborty and the actors also discussed the importance of queer representation and normalizing the presence of queer characters in plot lines as serious as KinnPorsche: The Series‘ complex mafia setting. The show puts characters through the wringer because of the fact that they’re involved with the mob, focusing on the mystery and action rather than making queer characters spend the duration of the episode questioning their sexual identities. They are all confident in who they are, the situation takes precedence, and no character has any qualms about romantic relationships between two men. It’s tremendously refreshing to see. “I think what we should really focus on is freedom of mind and decision, as well as the courage in expressing oneself,” said Mile. “Like this series that has the courage in representing the story in different ways. For me, if we talk about Kinn, I like that Kinn has the courage to decide and express himself. I think a person’s charm is to be oneself and to be honest with oneself. Everything that I have mentioned is the charm. So, identity is one thing. But what really matters is the thing beyond that, which is the charm that everybody should have.”
The conversation wrapped up with the cast asking about their fandom in India and what they have in store for audiences with their upcoming world tour. “Well, there’s definitely going to be more than 16 of us actors, for sure,” shared Bible. “The production quality and the amount of effort that’s put into the show is definitely on another level. It’s held at Impact Arena, which is one of the largest, if not the largest stadium in Thailand. I don’t know how much more I can say!” Apo expressed his desire to bring the tour to India, stating, “We wish that we would have a chance to go to India. Because we have several small details in every country that that we will go to. We hope that you will promote us to have a chance to go to India.”
