How 'Jury Duty' star Ronald Gladden reacted to finding out the show's twist
Warning: “Jury Duty” Season One finale spoilers ahead…
In November 2021, Ronald Gladden, then 29, was scrolling on Craigslist when he saw an ad for a documentary about jury duty. He eagerly applied, not knowing that the decision would turn him into an accidental television star and one of social media’s latest obsessions.
Gladden is the star of Amazon Freevee’s hit comedy series “Jury Duty.” The show introduces the audience to Gladden, a.k.a. Juror Number 6, who believes he has been selected to adjudicate a ridiculous court case.
Only ... the judge is fake and the case isn’t real. Plus, all of his fellow jurors — including James Marsden playing a hilariously egotistical version of himself — and everyone else involved in the courtroom are actors.
The result? They're all in on the joke, except Gladden.
In the eight-episode series, viewers watch Gladden navigate the courtroom spectacle for three weeks before he learns the truth and is surprised with $100,000 at the end.
Fans immediately became captivated with the show’s humor and Gladden’s sincerity as he bonded with the jurors. They flooded Twitter and TikTok with posts praising him. He hasn’t seen them; he’s not a social media person.
During the past two years, he returned to his normal life and is currently still working a full-time job, Gladden shares in a recent interview with TODAY.com. He didn’t even tell many people he was going to be on the show (aside from his girlfriend).
“One, because it doesn’t sound believable,” he says. “And two, I feel like this is something that’s much better seen rather than explained."
He adds, “The best way I can describe it is I got 'Truman Show'-ed in real life. That’s such a crazy thing to say.”
But he doesn’t have any hard feelings. He became friends with Marsden and the rest of the cast, whom he says he loves and is still very close to as evidenced by his multiple Instagram posts.
“These friendships are everything to me. These are just amazing people. They’re fun, they’re kind and that’s the one thing that I’m taking away from this,” he says.
He also has plenty of memories of a raucous trip to Margaritaville, crutch pants, an emoji-filled testimony and other unforgettable moments that unfolded during the season.
Read on as Gladden unpacks those scenes, reacts to being labeled a “hero” and reveals why he needed to take some extended time off after the show ended.
How did you first find the ad and why did you want to apply?
I came across a Craigslist ad. It was pretty vague in that they just said, “We’re going to pay you money for two weeks worth of your time. You’ll sit on a jury. That’s going to be essentially the work that you’re going to do. Then you’ll participate in interviews. Also, they’ll pay for everything.” So in my mind, it was a way for me to have an experience I’d never had before. I was going to be a part of a documentary. I’d never been on camera before and I also never served on jury duty, which was one of the requirements.
Did you ever discuss the documentary with the rest of the cast?
We actually didn’t discuss it hardly ever, and I’m sure that’s because the actors were nervous to talk about it. (laughs) But the way that it was approached was that there were multiple people who had signed up to be on the documentary. It was made abundantly clear to me from the beginning that there was a possibility that I may not even be selected. There were people that were decoys, as they were labeled, in there who signed up for the project. Then, they weren’t selected.
Was there any point in the experiment when you started to get suspicious?
They essentially do a photoshoot with a guard who’s being fired and they’re calling everybody up (in a deleted scene). I turned around to James. I was like, “I’m on reality TV right now. This cannot be happening.” That happened multiple times throughout the entire process. But anytime that I would seriously start to question that or I would raise concerns, that’s when they would just pull everything back. They were like, “Okay, we’re doing literally nothing for the rest of the day. Boring court talk (and) legal jargon. Nothing exciting is happening.”
What was going through your mind when you learned the truth?
So on the day of the reveal, truthfully, I could not process everything they were telling me. That was too big of an ask. It was sensory overload in the sense that you can’t just tell me that my life for the last month was fake. So they’re saying, “Hey you won all this money and all this happened.” And all I could think about was, So this entire court case wasn’t even real? I was hung up on that for probably the longest amount of time.
Once you processed that, did you start to wonder if any of the friendships were genuine?
Immediately after the reveal everybody came up to me and they reassured me. They’re like, “Hey, just so you know, yes, we were acting this whole time. But, we really did bond. Those conversations we had, those were real. The things I told you about myself, that was real.” That is what made it OK to me. I know a lot of people will question the morality and the ethics of the show, but honestly those friendships being real made it completely fine with me. Because that’s what I took away from this.
The judge (Alan Barinholtz) called you a “hero” during the reveal. How did that feel?
It pulled on my heartstrings a little bit. Throughout this entire process everybody’s calling me “hero,” and as much as I appreciate the title, I don’t feel like a hero because all I was trying to do was just be a decent human being — showing kindness and being respectful to people by default. So again, I appreciate the title but I don’t feel like a hero because I feel like that should be the default for everyone, right?
When everyone is recapping the experience, Rashida Olayiwola (officer Nikki Wilder) shares she accidentally called one of the cast members by their real name. Did you notice any other slip ups?
Noah (writer Mekki Leeper) did slip up. Ron (Song) is the name of the actor who plays Ken. When Ken spilled the cup, it was during the Tim (Brandon Loeser) falling scene. The reason Ken spilled it was so that Tim would have to go grab the paper towels. Noah slipped up. They’re asking what happened and he’s like, “Oh, well, Ron spilled the drink, so Tim had to go grab them.” I was like, “No, I wasn’t even at the table. I didn’t spill anything.”
Another deleted scene we see is James Marsden destroying Ross’s (Ross Kimball) cake and bringing a new one to smooth things over. What was the most outrageous thing he did that wasn’t shown?
I can’t believe this didn’t make it. On the very first day when we go out to the food truck, James offers to buy everybody lunch. He’s trying to get the judge’s attention. But after that didn’t work out they’re like, “Hey, you want to give us your credit card?” He turns and looks at me and he’s like, “Hey, man, you want to split this with me?” I was like, “No, absolutely not! You offered to get everyone this.”
Have you watched any of his movies since the show ended?
I know who James Marsden is. I didn’t realize how long and impressive his resume is. I just saw “Hop” on Easter for the first time. Never even heard of it before. I recently saw his movie “The D Train” with Jack Black. He has so many movies and it’s so cool just to watch them all. Because I’m already a fan and so it adds to it.
In the finale, you said being on the show made you realize you wanted to help people more. Was there a specific moment that made you leave the experience with that mindset?
I wouldn’t say that there was one instance. It was just the simple fact that they put me in these predicaments to essentially see how I would respond. Todd (David Brown) was being cast out and pushed to the side, so like they needed somebody to bring him in and make him feel included. Or James, with the giant s--- in my bathroom (laughs). In that moment, all I saw was just a human being who was embarrassed and was asking for a favor. At the end of the day when I would look back on it, I was like, Hey, some pretty weird, crazy stuff happened today, but I felt good about helping these people out who needed it.
Speaking of Todd, why did you choose 'A Bug’s Life' to watch with him?
I wish that I could say that I thought of that on my own. The way it was planned was that they thought it would be funny if they just put some really old movies in my room. Some that weren’t very popular (and) not a lot of people watched — boring titles. “A Bug’s Life” happened to be one of those movies. When I saw that I was like, “Oh, I really liked this movie!” I started realizing, Oh my God. Todd is Flik in real life. This is him. I have to show him this movie.
How did you feel leading up to the release of the show?
I was very nervous. Funnily enough, one of the reasons I was okay with doing this was because I looked into the film company, which is obviously a company that Amazon made up. But it was this small company and it looked like it wasn’t going to be very high budget. So I was like, Nobody’s even going to see this thing. Like this is probably gonna be informational. It’s going to be boring. Nobody’s going to watch this.
You have become close friends with the rest of the cast. Is there a 'Jury Duty' group chat?
No group chat. I don’t like group messages. It’s too much to deal with. I just ran across an article about Ken. So obviously I sent that over to him. If we come across something, we’ll just send it over. But it’s been amazing just talking about the success.
How has it been seeing people praise you on social media and make fan videos?
I think one of the reasons I have a high quality of life is because I’m not really on social media. I don’t have Twitter. I don’t have a TikTok. So, I don’t even see them, honestly.
You mentioned 'The Truman Show.' Was it difficult for you to transition back to real life after the show ended?
I wouldn’t say it was difficult. But after the reveal I took a month off, easily. I did not work for a month after this. Every single day there would be something that just hit me, like, “Oh my God, was that fake? Was this an actor? Was this setup?” It was an adjustment period, but it wasn’t ever difficult. Not to mention I couldn’t talk about this show. I couldn’t tell family members, friends. I couldn’t post about it. So, I just had to live like it never happened.
Why should people watch the show?
Because it’s funny. When they revealed this to me, the only thing I wanted it to be was funny. I requested that too. When I was talking to the director, Jake (Szymanski), I was like, “Look, if there’s any way you guys could somehow edit this to make it funny, that’s really all I want.” I never imagined myself being on camera before. But if I was going to be in something a lot of people saw, I just hoped that it was funny.
Interview edited for length and clarity.
This article was originally published on TODAY.com
