VIDEO EXCLUSIVE: ‘Florida Man’ Stars Edgar Ramirez & Abby Lee On Creating Chemistry, Playing With Florida Man Meme

The new Netflix limited series Florida Man follows a disgraced cop who is forced to return to his home state of Florida for a shady mission only to get swept up in a dangerous treasure hunt.

In an exclusive interview with uInterview, Florida Man stars Edgar Ramirez and Abbey Lee discuss on-screen chemistry between their characters Mike Valentine and Delly West, their favorite moments while filming, as well as their take on the “Florida Man” meme.

“Well, I think there’s always a natural chemistry that two people have and we were quite lucky. I feel like we were quite like and finding out very quickly that there was something natural and easy and relaxed between the two of us,” Lee explained about her bond with Ramirez. “We both are very passionate about our work, and we were very passionate about the roles and the show. And so, I think we just sort of found, within our mutual passion, that it sort of blended into Delly and Mike quite easily.”

Ramirez added that there was “a lot of compassion that we also feel for these characters, and we didn’t judge them. I think there’s also something that you and I have in common, you know, that we were just like observers of human nature, and we were curious.” Edgar believed their “high sense of curiosity,” and the “magical coincidence that we have so many things in common” to be the reason for their on-screen chemistry.

When asked about their favorite moment when filming Florida Man, Lee gushed about the crew and cast members, praising them for being “fantastic.” She explained that despite the usual difficulties of filming like “long hours,” dealing with weather changes and being “away from home,” the “many bright happy people on the job” were what “really held” her.

The Australian model-turned-actor was getting goosebumps just thinking about when her makeup artist would “sing to me on the way home in the bus and she’s got this incredible voice. I don’t know, I just felt like everyone was fantastic.”

Ramirez agreed, “There was this synchronicity and just a very close connection and we all connected really well, both in front of the camera and behind the camera.” He also believed that because they filmed during the Covid-19 pandemic and through lockdowns that it “created the condition for us to interact very closely with each other and luckily we, instead of becoming overwhelmed by each other, we became warm and hugged by that closeness.”

“We had the chance to become really good friends. Like Abby is in my life, I’m in her life… We became very good friends and that is beautiful. It doesn’t necessarily happen on every work or project so it’s beautiful, Ramirez explained before adding that the close connection also expands to the producers of Florida Man as well, calling it a “beautiful takeaway from a work experience.”

When asked about the show’s apparent reference to the famous “Florida Man” memes, Lee explained that the miniseries “doesn’t take it too seriously.” For Lee, the memes are “just one big Salvadore Dalí,” calling the headlines and stories “absurd” and “just so otherworldly.”

Ramirez took a moment to emphasize that the show’s purpose was “just to have fun, which is different from making fun.”

“What I love and one thing that I rescue from all the fun and all the absurdity of the ‘Florida Man’ meme and the stories in the show is that at the same time, all this awkwardness and all this extravaganza and this very strange situations are looked at with a lot of compassion as well. I mean the show doesn’t intend to make fun, to be cruel,” Ramirez explained.

“So, there is a fun to be had more than a fun to be made, you know. And that to me is very important, something that I think is very special about this show, that there is no judgment or cynicism or kind of like a distance or as I said like a judgment on people’s circumstances. It’s more like before the absurdity of life, when you are faced with the absurdity of life when you face the most grotesque aspects of life, you either cry or you either laugh. So, laugh is a way to just deal with the incongruities of life. That is something that we do in the show that is a part of the story.”

All seven episodes of Florida Man are available to stream on Netflix.