Paul W. Downs fought for Megan Stalter to have pay parity on 'Hacks': 'I don't want to be paid more'

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Set us as preferred In 2021, when HBO Max’s “Hacks” first introduced us to fading Vegas comic Deborah Vance (Jean Smart), we briefly met Vance’s hyper-devoted young talent manager Jimmy LuSaque Jr.(Paul W.

Downs) and Kayla Schaeffer (Megan Stalter), the braying, inept assistant foisted upon him.Over the years this turbulent pairing found its groove, opening their own agency while Kayla discovered boundaries (sort of).

By “Hacks’” fifth and final season, which concluded this spring, a growing Jimmy-Kayla fan base was clamoring for a spinoff.“We’re not doing it, but I wish,” says Stalter as she sits beside Downs during a video call from Hudson Yards in Midtown Manhattan.

“I think it would work.”These days, Stalter, who is nominated for supporting actress in a comedy, is making her Broadway debut as the campily reimagined Mary Todd Lincoln in Cole Escola’s “Oh, Mary!” Meanwhile, Downs, who is also co-creator, co-showrunner, writer and director on “Hacks,” is nominated for supporting actor, writing and comedy series (as executive producer).Is there a dream of a future project in which he wears just one hat? “I love doing all the jobs,” says Downs, who started out as a writer-performer.

“But I’d love to do a superhero so that I could just work on my nutrition, my fitness and my lines.”Paul, one early Megan sighting was her stand-up act at Echo Park’s Little Joy.What about her made you think you’d found your Kayla?Downs: She’s so singular and funny.

It’s like stream of consciousness and yet also material.We’d written the part before we’d seen Meg, but [after seeing] her in person, I came back to my co-creator, Jen Statsky, and I said, “It’s hers to lose.” There’s something about her that’s fearless, uninhibited.Meg, correct me if I’m wrong, but your first “Hacks” audition involved a dark, blurry self-tape.Stalter: It wasn’t that well shot.

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