Ella Bright had all but prepared herself for a normal college experience.
After spending her adolescence on the British children’s series Malory Towers, the London teen found herself at a crossroads. Should she keep acting or take some time to focus on passing her A-level exams and the prospect of college?
Bright decided she’d go on a few auditions before taking her break, with a new Prime Video romance series, Off Campus, being the last. The then-18-year-old was reading for the lead character, college music student Hannah Wells. She never managed to take that break.
“I did the audition, I got the part in this whirlwind month process,” Bright tells The Hollywood Reporter on a Zoom ahead of the show’s premiere. “It was like, OK, we only got two A-levels [done], and I’m not going to college anymore. Here we go.”
She adds, “It was just a really daunting experience, but I just feel like I went with it full force because this was just a dream come true for me in so many ways.”
Based on the Elle Kennedy books of the same name, Off Campus follows a college hockey team and the women in their lives at Briar University. The show tackles the typical college woes, along with some heavier topics. Taking a page out of Netflix’s Bridgerton strategy, Off Campus will focus its first season on Bright’s Hannah and Belmont Cameli’s Garrett Graham. Hannah and Garrett’s story encompasses the first book of Kennedy’s series, The Deal.
“When [the part] first came through, I did a skim read of the book, and I fell in love with it immediately,” the 19-year-old actress says. “Hannah is such a cool character that I feel so honored to be able to play her. She knows who she is. She’s not defined by her past.”
Thanks to the success of BookTok and other online book-centered spaces, the romance genre, particularly sports romance, is booming. Kennedy’s considered the original hockey romance writer, and Off Campus her masterpiece in the genre — so it’s no surprise that the series has a dedicated fanbase.
“I wasn’t expecting or aware of how popular this book series was,” Bright admits. She recalls being on the Tube in London after the casting announcement hit, not even 24 hours since her role was announced, and being approached by a fan.
“This lovely girl comes up to me and says, ‘Oh my God, Ella, you’re going to be Hannah in Off Campus. I’m so excited,’” she says. “I was wondering, ‘What is going on?’ My friends were telling me how crazy it was. I was really not expecting that so early on in the process.”
Bright says that experience continued into filming: “It was very surreal to have people come up to us, but it was also so heartwarming to see people say they’re so excited.”
Off Campus was full of new experiences for Bright, not just on the fan front. The actress, who refers to herself as a “loud child,” doesn’t come from an entertainment family, so her career has been a learning experience for everyone. “I’ve been working ever since I was 8, which has been really random, for lack of a better word, but I’ve just fallen so in love with it. I couldn’t imagine my life without this job,” she explains.
Prior to Off Campus, Bright spent years on Malory Towers, set at a girls’ boarding school in post-World War II England. “I grew up on that show, from 12 to 18, my whole teenage years. I was with a cast of girls, who are all my age and they are, to this day, my sisters for life,” she explains. “It’s such a found family on that show, which I was so beyond lucky to find again on Off Campus. I went from one really strong ensemble to another.”
A strong ensemble they do have. Due to the evolving leading couple model, Off Campus has a solid cast of young, rising actors. “Everyone in this cast, particularly, I feel like we’re all in similar boats,” Bright says.
The actress says the actors would help each other and have been a major support system during the production and press tour. “We are always giving each other advice,” she says. “Everyone’s there to talk to each other and be there for each other.”
Much of the first season lives and dies by the chemistry between Bright and Cameli (Peacock’s Saved by the Bell update). “I met Belmont in the chemistry reads, and it was an immediate, obvious answer that it was him,” Bright says. “I think what really helped us build our teamwork was that we both really and deeply care about each other’s characters and our own characters.”
The pair have since become close. “Even for the more intimate moments, it was just like any other day on work — we were laughing throughout the whole thing. We would just get donuts and pizza afterwards,” she says. “We both share a real love and excitement for this show that we can just feed off of each other in a really special way.”
As a hockey romance show, it’s no surprise that many online have drawn comparisons to Crave-HBO Max’s sleeper hit Heated Rivalry. Despite the Jacob Tierney-helmed show coming out months before Off Campus, the Prime Video series had been in development long before Heated Rivalry, and the shows shot around the same time — Heated Rivalry in Toronto and Off Campus in Vancouver.
Bright says she’s grateful that the world is so open to hockey romances. “I’m such a big fan of Heated Rivalry,” the actress says. “We actually got to meet [Heated Rivalry star] Connor Storrie at a party that we all went to, and he was just like, ‘I can’t wait to watch the show.’”
The actress says she hopes fans of the Storrie and Hudson Williams show will enjoy Off Campus as well. “I think they’re very different. The only the thing that they share is this sport,” she says. “I think I’m grateful that we filmed before that, and our show was in production way before I’d even heard of [Heated Rivalry].
“Even when people think [we’re] copying or whatever, they’re very different separate shows, which is really cool. Honestly, it was just exciting [to see them blow up],” she adds. “I’ve loved watching their story unfold and just how people have our show in the same orbit has been really awesome.”
Looking ahead, Bright and the rest of the cast will return to Vancouver to shoot season two of Off Campus. The actress, who still lives with her family in London, had her first experience living alone during the filming of season one.
“I’m looking to move out maybe in the next year or so, but I’ve been really enjoying spending time with my family. Between filming and school, I never really got a lot of time to be with my sisters and my parents and my dogs,” she says. “It’s been really a special moment for me.”
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