Cooper Raiff‘s Hal and Harper leans into the image of adults playing children by having lead Lili Reinhart smoke in scenes where her character is 9 years old.
In Us Weekly‘s exclusive clip from the Sunday, October 26, episode of the MUBI series, Hal (Raiff) confides in Harper (Reinhart) about struggling in first grade, saying, “I’m having trouble making friends.”
Harper, who is smoking out the window, tries to comfort her younger brother.
“First grade is very isolating,” she notes. “Remember how you’re more mature than the other kids. We are both old for our grades because we have early birthdays. Most first graders are only six, not seven.”
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Hal asks Harper if third grade is “easier,” to which she replies, “It is and it isn’t.”
The limited series follows two siblings whose single dad (Mark Ruffalo) is making them grow up too fast. To properly showcase on screen how grief and trauma affects someone, Raiff, 28, chose to have him and Reinhart, 29, play both the adult versions and the 7-year old and 9-year-old versions of their characters.
“I don’t think there was another way to do it. You needed to show that the children grew up too fast and that look at how much weight they had to carry of what was happening in their home life while they’re at school with their peers,” Reinhart exclusively told Us Weekly earlier this month. “It’s no wonder that they didn’t fit in or feel OK or like they could be children.”
Reinhart praised Raiff’s vision, adding, “They were grieving and confused on the show. It’s such a beautiful device that was used to tell their story and I don’t think it could have been done any other way. It works so well that way.”
While reflecting on filming, Reinhart recalled separating past and present-day Harper.
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“Young Harper is a pretty different character from old Harper. They are the same person and they have the same soul and heart but young Harper is a very emotionally frozen little girl who can’t feel her grief or her anger or feelings because she’s too busy taking care of her brother and her dad,” she explained. “So there’s resentment there and confusion.”
Reinhart continued: “There is a lot of anger at the inability to be taken care of and having to be a mother to her brother and almost like a wife to her father. So when she’s older, you understand that she’s at this point in her life where she’s sick of being a caretaker. She assumes that position — and she does it well — but you see her in her romantic relationship start to want something completely different. Because she’s just sick of being put in that dynamic over and over and over again.”
In addition to Raiff and Reinhart, Hal & Harper stars Betty Gilpin, Addison Timlin, Havana Rose Liu and Alyah Chanelle Scott.
Hal & Harper airs Sundays on MUBI.
