Hello, my friends, Welcome back. Welcome to another episode of Love Someone with Delilah. I'm so glad you are joining me. I could not have chosen two more perfect guests to have on this springtime I have been a huge fan of the series. This is us. I don't know if fan is the right word. I'm addicted. It's my guilty pleasure. I love all of the characters, but I especially love Kate Pearson. When I heard that the actress that plays Kate Pearson was starring in a movie called Breakthrough, I
had to get in touch with her. I had to invite her to come and chat with me. Little did I know that this interview would come with a bonus guest, because the producer of the movie Breakthrough is also joining us, and he is also somebody that I am so geeked to meet. I can barely contain my excitement because though we have never met, I've actually worked for him in the past. Let's meet my guest right now with me today is Devon Franklin and Chrissy met and in the
studio is also my little dog. I have a five month old puppy Schnauzer, and I got to tell you too, when my my little puppy gets excited, chief he pitdles on the floor and I'm I feel like I'm going to do that any minute. I'm so excited.
Well, you should just.
Put a puppy pat down, right, I should right now?
Oh my gosh, oh.
My gosh, oh my gosh, Chrissy, I love you and Devon. I love, love, love you guys so much.
Well, the feeling is so mutual. I can't even tell you. I almost fell off my chair when I was like, wait, like Delilah. I'm like wait like Delilah, Slilah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, And.
I'm like Christy, oh my, Chrissy, I love you, but I hate that you make me cry so much.
You know, I know that you love to hate that and you hate it. I do. I get it.
I have not had television in my house for over twenty years. Wow, I haven't had TV in my house. So I have to have my teenagers show me how to get to you. And I gotta be honest, it's my guilty pleasure. And I save up the episodes until I'm having a really really bad day and then I just like, okay, mom is going up to the room and they're like, oh, here we go, She's gonna be cryings and the floodgates open. But oh my gosh, I
love you and DeVaan. I'm surprised if one we haven't met, because you were the executive producer in the movie that I start in.
Yeah, the Star, The Star.
Why did we not win like an Academy for that?
I don't know. Well, on the next one, we will my four lines.
I delivered them with passion.
Listen. We were grateful to get you, you know. I know it was unfortunately that our pas you know, didn't cross, but I was incredibly grateful that you would spend some time and record those lines for us, because you did a great job and we needed to and that voice, yes voice.
Well, I have to share before we talk about Breakthrough, which I don't know if I'm going to be able to talk about because it's really hard to talk about. But before we talk about that, I have to tell you this strange coincidence. I don't know who wrote my lines, if you wrote those, or who wrote my lines for the Star, And like I said, I only had a few of them. But the last line that I had in that cute little movie was come on Zachariah parties
over it's time to go home? Because I played Elizabeth, wife of Zachariah, who God had shut his mouth because he was saying foolish things. I went in the studio recorded the lines. I completely forgot about it. And from the time that I recorded the lines and the time that the movie debuted in during the holidays, God called my son Zachariah.
Home, Oh my goodness.
And I had completely forgotten that line. So the movie comes out, I pack all my kids together, we go down to see it together, and I'm like, oh, this is going to be the most amazing thing, you know. And it was literally weeks after zach had gone home and changed his address to have and then that line comes on and the whole theater, because everybody in the theater was with me, They're all like, wow, parties over time to go home?
Oh whoa, Yeah, believable, absolutely unbelievable.
But let me tell you, while he was here the eighteen years God gave him, he partied with loving his heart for everybody. I want to talk about breakthrough and what brought you two together to rip all of our hearts out again?
Oh wow? I mean, you know, listen, it was not us. A couple of years ago, when I was promoting Miracles from Heaven, which is a film I produced before I produced The Star, I was on TVN and on that program there was a Smith family, Joyce Smith and John Smith and pastor Jason Noble, and they were telling their story. And when I heard that Joyce prayed John back to life after he died falling through a frozen lake, I said,
this is unbelievable. I mean, in the medical record it says patient dead and mother prayed patient came back to life. And once I heard that, I knew that I had to bring this to the big screen. And that was just about three years ago. And you know, there is no movie without a star, and there was no other star that could do the role of Joyce but for Chrissy Metz. And when she said yes, that was the
process that really allowed us to make the film. And we're just hoping that audiences around the world are inspired.
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conversation we were just having. So, Chrissy, what was your gut reaction when you first heard about Joyce or read the script? What happened in your in your heart?
You know, I thought, oh am I capable of doing this? I mean, that's always sort of the question. I don't want to do something if I you know. Of course, my ego is like if you don't do it well, then don't do it at all. But also there's a lot of growth to have been had, and so I I just sort of how to sit with with myself and my thoughts and pray about it and you know, ask for guidance or advice from you know, my team.
And I was attached to another project at the time that wasn't really going to allow me to be a part of both, and then that fell through and I thought, okay, okay, everything I already knew was just confirmed because everything just fell into place. So, you know, trusting your gut is is a hard thing to do, especially in Hollywood, I think, but yeah, it just it was the right thing.
It was meant to be obviously, so it got to me on many levels, obviously as a mom, but also as a mom who has adopted kids, because that's a piece of the story. I don't know how many people are going to talk about, but we need to talk about that because you playing Joyce the mom, are praying back your son John, who you adopted. And I think a lot of times when well, I know, when people talk to me about my children, they're like, well, which ones are your real children?
All of them?
Right, they're all your yeah? Yeah.
And the character, the role you play, you make it very very clear and all of us adoptive moms are saying thank you.
Yeah.
The level of love and intimacy and commitment and just undying love you have for that child mountains.
Yeah.
Well that's Joyce Smith for him.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that is how she really is in real life. I mean, just a powerhouse, doesn't take no for an answer, but she does it with love and
the way that she loved John. I mean, that's really one of the reasons why I wanted to do the movie was when I found out that, you know, she had adopted him, her and her husban Brian adopted him when he was six months old from Guatemala, and you know, just the idea that he struggled with, why wasn't he wanted And you know, she would try to affirm that, but it wasn't until he went through this incident and came out on the other side of it and saw that it was his mother's prayers and the prayers of
the community and the love of the community and his mother that really helped save his life. That he began to understand that he had a purpose in a place. And I think that's just so powerful and we really wanted to portray it in the way that they experienced it, and we're just grateful that Joyce and John really feel like we got it right.
So how much backlash Devone did you get when you said, well, you've been doing this for a long time. You've been getting backlash because you have been involved with movies, powerful movies about miraculous faith since your career began. But when you said, Okay, Christy, let's do this, did you guys get you know, backlash from people or are people being really supportive?
You know? I mean as far as I don't really read comments and whatnot, but from what I can tell you having screened the film and been across the country in multiple screenings with all different types of audiences, there have been any backlash. I mean, people love Chrissy Metz, They love her portrayal of Joyce. It is so emotional. No matter what your faith journey is, you can find something relatable in Breakthrough. I think we all, you know, are searching for our place. We all want love, and
so there really hasn't been that kind of backlash. And when people see Breakthrough, I mean they I think it's all worth it. So whatever conflict there may be, or whatever backlash may come, it's all worth it because they are lives that will be changed for the better because of a film. I don't like it.
So, Chrissy, I got to ask you after watching you for hundreds of hours on three seasons of This Is Us, where your character sometimes is a little self centered. Yeah, I was so happy to find out, because I after I watched the first season, I researched you, like at nauseam to find out that that you are not that character, but you play her very well. But the character you play in the movie Breakthrough Joyce is so other focused and yet both characters you play with such tenacity.
Well, thank you.
So I'm guessing that tenacity is the real Chrissy Metz.
Yes, I mean I didn't pursue acting for twelve years of eating ramen noodles without that tenacity, you.
Know, And I know one hundred and one way to cook ramen noodles, by the way, you know, let me tell you, after you've been fired twelve times in radio, you you and your ramen noodle recipes.
Right, and then it's very delicious. Yeah, absolutely, But yeah, you have to be tenacious in that pursuit. And I always was really cognizant of why was I doing it? Because it wasn't about fame and fortune. That's sort of just.
Like a nice byproduct.
Yeah, but like what is it that I'm supposed to be doing? And how do I How am I an instrument? And how am I a conduit?
And so so answer that question with this movie, how are you a conduit? What do you feel God called you to do?
I think to portray Joyce and and this Smith family, there's their story in how you know even in the most uncertain times, that you you can ask for what it is that you want and that you need. And I hope that is conveyed through through the message and through the story because that's exactly what she did and she had no qualms about it.
And do you think you'll carry that into your life? Oh?
I definitely have. I definitely have more show than I ever have before.
Devon. What do you hope folks will be talking about once they go see I'm going to tell everybody because take your family, take your friends, everybody to go see Breakthrough. It's so perfect, especially during you know the season of renewal and new life and new birth and springtime and Easter Sunday, what are you hoping, Devon? People will be saying as they drive home and talk about breakthrough right before they turn my radio show back on.
Well, you know, Delta, I really hope that people, you know, go and see this film and they have the experience that audience is around the country are already having, which is, you know, we hold so much in you know, day to day, and what's happening is people see this film they're able to release and let go. It's very cathartic.
Audiences are walking out of the theater with their own breakthroughs, you know, breakthroughs of emotional healing, breakthroughs of love, breakthroughs of finding or feeling like they have a place in life. And so my hope and prayers everyone who sees the film will experience their own breakthrough in an area of their life, so that it goes beyond just being entertainment for two hours, but it becomes a catalys for change in their life.
Well, thank you, thank you, thank you for spending this time with me. I hope someday I can just squeeze you and kiss you and tell you how much I both love you.
Yeah and not wait wait wait o, nice to meet you.
Thank you. Make sure you take the time to go see the movie Breakthrough when it comes out on the seventeenth of this month, and make sure you subscribe to Love Someone with Delilah. I'll have new episodes on the second and fourth Tuesday of each month, and sometimes more often if I find somebody that's fascinating and I just can't wait to share that with you, so we we
sometimes surprise you and have more than two episodes a month. Anyway, subscribe to Love Someone with Delilah and tell your friends to join us as well.