Stephen Colletti: Returning To Laguna Beach Was A “Full Circle” Moment

Stephen Colletti was a teenager when he became one of the stars of MTV’s Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County.

More than 20 years later, Colletti helped corral his friends and castmates into reuniting for The Reunion: Laguna Beach on Roku, which he said was a “full circle” moment for him.

The original series, which premiered in 2004, focused on the private lives of Colletti, Kristin Cavallari and Lauren Conrad as well as many others in the fancy Southern California suburb.

He told Deadline’s Reality TV Summit that a Covid Zoom and the Back to the Beach podcast that he hosted with Cavallari paved the way for a full-blown reunion.

“Surprisingly, for me, it was an easy yes, but for so many years, it was an easy no,” he said. “When we got cast, we didn’t really know what we were getting ourselves into and once it came out, there was quite the shock, and we weren’t prepared to handle the recognition that came with it. We were just regular kids that didn’t really know what reality TV was at that point. It took me a while to process it. Eventually, as time has gone on, you’re old enough to revisit it and you move into that part of your life as we mature into a more comfortable place.”

He joked that Laguna Beach was an “odd social experiment”. “Let’s pull kids out of high school and shoot their lives like a scripted drama, right? Don’t have them talk to camera, just have them existing, and we’ll put the pieces together. Then, 20 years later, when everyone’s married and has kids and new lives, let’s get all the old flames back together and have them discuss what happened in high school.”

The reunion, which is being submitted for the Emmys, was produced by Damsel Media, which is run by Liz Gateley, who worked on the original. Colletti, Conrad and Cavallari were all exec producers on it.

He said that this was the only way that they would do it. “We wanted to make sure we understood exactly what the creative was, and the creative control was a very powerful term there. We wanted this to be a safe place for everyone, where we could celebrate the show,” he said.

There was no table flipping on the Casey Wilson-hosted reunion. “There might be some elements that are similar to the reunions they’re used to seeing for the shows that just aired, or for maybe a scripted show, like Friends, but ultimately this should stand on its own as something a little bit unique, because we haven’t hung out all together in 20 years,” he added.

Roku’s Head of Originals Brian Tannenbaum said that it was personal for him because Laguna Beach was the show that he grew up on and reason he works in entertainment.

He said that it was part of its strategy to “dig into this world of fandom”. “How do we tap into that? When Stephen, Lauren and Liz Gately, the original creator, came into our offices, it felt like a no brainer. Not only could we celebrate the original show through a special but then we can leverage the power of our platform and build a unique experience where our streamers could also dive right into the original show,” he added.

Tannenbaum wants to do more reunions across non-scripted shows, scripted shows and movies, but would not be drawn on which ones.

Talking of scripted television, Colletti will next be seen on Netflix after the streamer picked up the first two seasons of his original comedy Everyone Is Doing Great.

Created by One Tree Hill’s James Lafferty and Colletti, Everyone is Doing Great is a coming-of-age story following former costars, friends and lovers Seth (Colletti), Jeremy (Lafferty), Andrea (Alexandra Park) and Izzy (Cariba Heine) as they are pulled back together to grapple with the absurd and the uncertain.  

Netflix acquired the rights as part of a deal with Sony Pictures Television. “This is an independent show. We’ve partnered with Sony. Sony helped get us into to Netflix, which has been massive for our little show, we’re a little mom and pop shop. We crowdfunded the first season, and now we’ve got two seasons, and we’re about to premiere worldwide on Netflix, which is massive,” he added.