Wilmer Valderrama recalls ‘friendly rivalry’ with Ashton Kutcher on ‘That ‘70s Show’ in new memoir
nypost.com“An American Story: Everyone’s Invited,” Valderrama discussed the dynamics of the popular Fox sitcom, from auditions to landing the role of Fez and sharing behind-the-scene relationships with Kushner.“Ashton was far more intelligent in real life than the character he played, and he was far more serious about the craft of acting than it appeared,” Valderrama, 44, wrote on Kutcher, 46, who played Michael Kelso.The “NCIS” actor compared himself to Kushner, saying that his co-star “always came to set extremely prepared, just like I did.”At some point, the two young adults started to have fun challenging each other.“He and I soon developed a friendly rivalry to see who could get the biggest laughs from the audience on the first take,” he wrote.Valderrama was 18, and Kutcher was 19 when they both started the comedy show.The actor explained that the audience’s “laugh is always bigger” on the first run, according to US Weekly. “If you mess up on the first take and try for a huge laugh on the second, the joke never lands as powerfully.
If you need to do a third or fourth take, you might as well forget it.”The “two-takers,” a nickname Kushner and Valderrama gave themselves, means that they would “always try to land the first perfectly, then do the second take just for fun.”When he was sent to audition for the show, Valderrama wrote that he didn’t put much effort in the beginning.“I vowed to give it my all, just like everything else,” he explained. “But after you’ve been auditioning for a few years without much success, you learn not to get your hopes up.”During the audition process, the “Handy Mandy” voice actor was against Topher Grace, who was later cast as Eric Forman.
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