HBO Max series ‘Hacks,” winner of 12 Emmy Awards and recipient of 62 nominations, is back for a fifth and final season. And they’ve saved the best for last.
The show follows the wickedly funny and sometimes dark inter-generational friendship and mentorship between legendary comedian Deborah Vance (Jean Smart) and aspiring comedy writer Ava Daniels (Hannah Einbinder). Ahead of the Season 5 premiere, I spoke with cast members Rose Abdoo (Josefina), Mark Indelicato (Damien), and Carl Clemons-Hopkins (Marcus) for an exclusive junket conversation.
Abdoo and Indelicato both hail from iconic early 2000s shows with long and beloved legacies, Gilmore Girls and Ugly Betty respectively. When asked what they hoped the legacy of Hacks would be in 25 years, Abdoo responded, “I hope that the same way that people love the Rory and Lorelai mother daughter dynamic from Gilmore Girls they’ll refer to Ava and Deborah. This show captures the way generations talk to each other and can learn from each other and are frustrated with each other better than any show I could ever imagine. In my age group, I learn so much from people of Hannah’s age and Mark’s age and it’s so much fun to learn what culturally is going on.”
Indelicato added, “I think that the legacy of Ugly Betty for example, like Ana Ortiz and I are talking about on our podcast, is that we’re being kind of hypercritical of choices that were made and storylines in the early 2000s. I would like for people to look at Hacks 20 years later and have their issues with it and keep the conversation going. Good art is conversation.”
At the heart of the show is Deborah and Ava’s bond, and both have had beautiful arcs of personal growth over the past four seasons. Clemons-Hopkins noted, “Deborah’s behavior is just different. She even notes it a couple times last season and this season. That growth is very real. And Ava is a force now in a very real way. I think that Deborah has taught Ava how to be a boss and stand in her power in a way that she didn’t necessarily know how to do when we first met here.”
The first episode of Season 5 starts off in the hilarious aftermath of last season’s finale, when it was falsely reported that Deborah had died. I asked the cast what they thought the text chain would have been like between their three characters when they heard the news. “I feel like Josefina and Damien were accepting that it happened, they’re in the will somewhere,” said Indelicato. “Josefina was looking in the safe and worrying about being left with Deborah’s dogs,” Abdoo added.
As for Marcus, “I feel like he immediately didn’t believe it,” said Clemons-Hopkins. “He’s tracking her spending, he knows she’s just at the bar.”
Hacks Season 5 is streaming now on HBO Max with new episodes every Thursday, leading up to the series finale on May 28.
