DisneyXD’s new show “Lab Rats” premieres Monday, and we couldn’t be more excited! We have lots of interviews with the cast to share with you and first up, our recent Q&A with star Billy Unger.
Billy plays Chase on the show and his character is gifted with super senses and super intelligence. We chatted with Billy about working on the show, doing his own stunts and lots more. Check it out!
What made you want to start acting? As a young kid, I always loved entertaining people. It was something that I didn’t really know when I was younger could be turned into acting, singing or dancing. I knew I just loved always putting a smile on people’s faces. If I could do that for the rest of my life, that’s what I wanted to do.
I started doing some local work in Florida, which is where I’m from, and they kept saying ‘wow, your kid has a lot of talent. Why don’t you take him out to LA and see what happens,’ so that’s exactly what we did. We came out to CA when I was about 10 years old and I haven’t been back since.
You’ve already worked with some pretty big names like Betty White, Sigourney Weaver, etc. Who is someone you want to work with? I’d love to work with Leonardo DiCaprio. That’s my dream co-star right there…I would probably take anything, I’m not going to be picky, but if I got to choose, I’d love to do an action film with him.
You do martial arts too, so you could even do your own stunts. That’s right! I love doing martial arts and I love action films. It’s my favorite genre of movies. I just recently saw ‘Mission Impossible 4’ and I loved it. Loved it! Tom Cruise is another one I’d love to work with.
Everyone is excited for “Lab Rats,” including us. What makes this show different from those other superhero/superhuman shows? What makes “Lab Rats” different is that we’re not…I don’t think we’re super heroes. Like I just told you, I just saw ‘Mission Impossible 4’ and I think we’re more like that. More like super agents that have super abilities. We go on these missions that are ‘do or die’ time and we’re sent on these missions because humans couldn’t accomplish these missions on their own. We like to use the term superhuman.
You play Chase. How would you describe him? The three superhuman children, each of them have their own unique abilities. Chase’s unique ability is that he is super intelligent and has super senses. Basically, you think about how every human has 5 senses, Chase’s senses are enhanced so he can hear conversations from across the room, later on we’re going to introduce that he can see through walls. His sense of smell is phenomenal. He’s super intelligent. Anything that has to do with figuring things out…Chase is the guy to go to. He’s also a martial artist. He knows how to defend himself. You’ll get to see a lot of that in the show. Chase gets to show his martial arts, he does a lot of flashy flips and stuff like that. It’s very fun. I think kids are going to love it.
If you could have any of your senses heightened in real life, which would you want? I would want my sense of taste to be better. Just so I could taste things that other people couldn’t. It’s kind of goofy, but that could be cool…I’d want to be super intelligent though for sure.
We love your cast. What’s it like working with Spencer Boldman, Kelli Berglund, and the cast? They’re great. They’re like a brother and sister to me. I’ve known Spencer for a long long time, same with Tyrel. We’ve known each other for about 2 years now. Kelli is great too, she’s awesome. We get along so well and we’re always hanging out together on and off set. We go to movies on our weeks off. We all get along really well. We’re like a family.
Do you have a favorite episode we can look forward to? We just recently did an episode where we go into a simulator and you step on this little platform and it zaps you into…like a ‘Tron’ sort of thing where it zaps you into a holographic world. My storyline was about the simulator and how you go into this thing and it trains you for this mission and all of a sudden ninjas come out of nowhere and you have to fight them off. I loved that episode because we got to do a lot of stunts. That’s probably our most stunt packed episode.
Do you get to do a lot of your own stunts? There are a few stunts where it would just be insane if I did it, because If I got hurt then they would have to stop production. For the most part, I do pretty much everything. They pretty much let me do my thing which is great that they trust me to do that. It’s awesome. I love it. I love that they let me do my own stunts because that’s my favorite thing.
Can we expect any guest stars this season? I’ve been lucky to have a lot of my good friends guest star on the show. Madison Pettis has been on the show. She was on just a few weeks back and she lives right across the street from me so we basically carpooled to set. We’ve had a lot of guest stars. Some that I didn’t know, some that I did.
Who would be your dream guest star? I guess if we had a Disney star who is no longer on Disney, I’d say Selena Gomez. That would be pretty cool. I’ve heard that she’s really nice.
You’re now joining the Disney family. Do you feel any pressure or are you excited to be one of the new faces of the channel? I am definitely excited to be one of the new faces of the channel. I don’t know if there’s any pressure. I try not to thing about it. I do know that I feel very honored to be part of a family like Disney. I’ll try to take advantage of the next 2 to 3 years, however long “Lab Rats” is on, because I’ve never been happier.
When you’re not acting, what do you like to do? I love to hang out with my friends, play guitar. I love to go to the beach and just spending time with my friends.
We know you’re musical. Any chance we’ll see that on the show? We haven’t filmed an episode where I play guitar on the show, but maybe in the future. That’d be cool.
Any other projects we can look forward to? I have a feature film called The Lost Medallion: The Adventures of Billy Stone that should be coming to theaters within the next year. It’s basically Indiana Jones for kids. It’s about Billy Stone searching for this lost medallion that he’s never seen. It’s an action film. It’s the first of three and I play the role of Billy Stone so I’m excited for people to see it.
“Lab Rats” premieres February 27 at 8:30pm on DisneyXD.
