Variety’s ‘Actors on Actors’ Season 21 Makes Franchise History With Nearly 200 Million Social Video Views

Variety‘s “Actors on Actors” Season 21 is officially the most successful social rollout in franchise history.

The beloved video series, which pairs actors in conversation with each other and launches twice a year during Oscars and Emmys season, amassed over 197 million video views across social media platforms — a whopping 36 percent increase over “Actors on Actors” Season 19, which previously held the record.

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Variety’s social media team, led by editor Rachel Seo with coordinator Julia MacCary, posted over 650 static images and videos to X, TikTok, Instagram and Facebook as part of the series rollout. TikTok alone accrued over 120 million video views and Instagram over 57 million, while clips posted to X generated over 12.3 million video views.

This season featured memorable conversations between Kieran Culkin and Colman Domingo, whose witty repartee sparked much online discourse about morning routines and astrology; Ariana Grande and Paul Mescal, who came together for a buzzy breakdown on the “Glicked” phenomenon; and Angelina Jolie and Cynthia Erivo, who went deep in their discussion of their singing lead turns in “Wicked” and “Maria.”

Season 21 was executive produced by Ramin Setoodeh, Donna Pennestri, Michelle Merker and Andrew Russell, with Michelle Sobrino-Stearns serving as executive-in-charge of production and Nicholas Stango leading Variety’s video team. Conversations were moderated by Setoodeh, editor-at-large Kate Aurthur, reporter Selome Hailu and chief correspondent Daniel D’Addario.

Maris Berzins, Georg Kallert, Diana Nguyen and Rob Schroeder served as producers, with Mark Hayes as post producer and Katie Adler as associate producer. Variety senior executive producer Sydney Kramer, content strategist Lauren Ames, junior producer Tania Merlos and editor Karen Mizoguchi also contributed.

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