Riverdale is a town like any other town…until you look closer. As our narrator Jughead told us in the first moments of the new series, this is a story about a small town and the people who live in it….people with a lot of secrets.
RIVERDALE introduced us to modern versions of Archie, Betty, Veronica, Jughead and more — all of whom will become embroiled in the murder mystery involving the recently deceased Jason Blossom.
During a visit to the set of RIVERDALE in Vancouver, we spoke to the cast about what’s to come in the next episode and beyond.
The Scene of the Crime. The fact that the Blossom twins were out at the river at dawn is not a coincidence. Madeline Petsch (Cheryl Blossom) hinted that the reasons for this “will be clear later in the season. I wish I could tell you. It’s a major plot point.”
Two Queen Bs. We saw in the pilot that Veronica (a former mean girl herself) went toe-to-toe with Cheryl and come out on top….at least for a little while. But, like with Betty and Cheryl, the hostility between Veronica and Cheryl may start to fade according to Camila Mendes (Veronica Lodge): “I think there’s going to be some mutual respect for each other. They’re very similar in many ways. They both come from money. They’ve both been on top. But the difference between Cheryl and Veronica is that Veronica has come to her senses, and I think Cheryl still hasn’t. But I think Veronica relates to Cheryl, and actually, in some ways, is going to feel protective about her for that very reason.”
Trying to Solve Her Brother’s Murder. Fans would be remiss if Cheryl wasn’t their prime suspect in Jason’s death. After all, it seemed like she was the only person around him at the time of his murder. But Petsch said that Cheryl will start coming across less bitchy and more relatable as time goes by: “They want her to be a real person. So of course she’s psycho. I mean, her brother was murdered, and it’s been awful for her. But they really allow you to see not just like her psycho side, but her like emotional side of, her ‘I lost my brother’ side, and her real side, and her coming to people and saying, ‘What do you think happened? And what do you know?’ It becomes more of like this give-and-take between trying to be in charge and being the bitch and then also trying to get information out of people and getting them to understand where she’s coming from and trying to convince them that she didn’t do it.”
The Truth About Polly. “The Cooper family, I think, is the most interesting family in Riverdale,” Lili Reinhart (Betty Cooper) said. “God, there’s a lot going on there. There’s kind of a divide between Betty and her sister. Betty and her sister Polly are on one team and her parents are ganging up on one another. It’s a very divided household. Alice, Betty’s mom, cares about Betty so much and loves her so much and wants to keep her in this little bubble and not expose her to the evils of the world that she thinks Veronica is and Archie is. With her sister Polly….we know she’s in a group home because of something that happened between her and Jason [Blossom]. Betty actually doesn’t know what happened between them. As the season progresses she tries to dig deeper and find out what happened between Polly and Jason and why her sister got send away. Her parents are being so secretive about it and Betty does start to uncover that. It becomes a huge arc for Betty’s character. We just finished [filming episode] 1.06 and that was a big episode for Betty in regards to finding out more about what happened with Polly.”
Related: The cast introduces their RIVERDALE characters
The Blossom-Cooper Feud. We saw a lot of anger between Betty Cooper and Cheryl Blossom in the premiere — which primarily revolved around a relationship between related between their respective siblings, Polly and Jason. But as Petsch explained, the situation may come to resolve itself: “It’s very interesting because it’s not just because of our siblings. It actually goes back a very long time with our families having a feud. So it’s not just that. And then it’s the fact that I’m so in love with Jason, and Polly kind of took him away from me. Then you see as the season unfolds that there’s a common interest that both of us have and in order to get to that goal, we have to work together. I think you’ll see more of a mutual respect between the two of them, because I’m certain Betty will start to understand where Cheryl’s coming from and she’s not just this bitchy villain. She kind of already does see that as the season is unfolding currently, and I think that will kind of help us work together in that moment.”
Meanwhile, Reinhart said that “Cheryl looks at Betty as the easy target, which she kind of is. She’s the nice girl and doesn’t really stand up for herself necessarily. Especially in the first episode, she kind of lets Cheryl walk all over her. But the dynamic changes once Betty uncovers more information about Polly and Jason’s relationship in Season 1. It kind of brings them closer together once Betty finds out more information and brings Cheryl into it. They’re trying to work together a little bit, even though they’re very different and Cheryl kind of hates Polly and the Cooper family, they do end up working together in a way.”
Not BFFs Anymore. One big twist on the RIVERDALE mythology is the fact that best-buds-forever Archie and Jughead aren’t really friends in the show. Or, at least, they were friends before something terrible happened. Cole Sprouse (Jughead Jones) explained that “the original treatment that I had read of the show – that didn’t happen. Apparently they were quite good [friends] at the beginning, but I think the creative [producers] thought would be more interesting to have either a a repairing of their relationship over time. It is stated in the show that Archie and Jughead were once very close best friends, just like the were in the digest and in the comics and so that still holds quite true for the origin stories as we would call them. But, we thought it would be more interesting if there was a little tension and we could talk about it and we could have a story to build off of that and that would be more fun. Episode 1.02 is a deeper exploration of why they’re upset at each other, what happened and what could happen in the future if they should choose to be OK and forgive and all of that.”
The Parents and Their Secrets. Thanks to the premiere, we know that there’s history between Fred Andrews and Hermione Lodge. Future episodes will also reveal a complicated relationship between Hermione and Alice Cooper. As Luke Perry (Fred Andrews) revealed to us, “Again, with Roberto [Aguirre-Sacasa, the executive producer] getting to create so much of the universe here in the show, all the parents went to high school together. And we were all in the same graduating class, or a year or so apart. So we’ve got all that stuff still cooking from the time we were in high school. And I guess what happens is some of these old high school rivalries and things….they never die, they never go away. Especially when you all stay in the same little town and you just kind of keep seeing them over and over and over. And I’m the kind of guy who…. I didn’t really think past Riverdale. Fred Andrews is absolutely and completely happy, everything I want need, or could ever think of is right here in Riverdale for me. So to be there with everybody that I grew up with is the curse and the blessing.”
Don’t miss an all new episode of RIVERDALE airing on February 2 at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT on The CW.
