Paul Reiser Doesn’t Mind If Kids Only Know Him From ‘Stranger Things:’ “It’s A Fool’s Errand To Pretend You’re Not What You Are”

Children of the ’80s know Paul Reiser best from his NBC sitcom Mad About You, or his roles in ’80s movies like Aliens and Beverly Hills Cop (a role he’s reprising in Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F, coming to Netflix this week).

But if you ask anyone born after 1995, and they’ll likely say they know Reiser as Dr. Sam Owens, the friendly suit from the Hawkins lab in Netflix’s cultural juggernaut, Stranger Things.

“It’s a fool’s errand to try and pretend that you’re not what you are,” Reiser told Decider in a recent Zoom interview, when asked how he felt about this new generation of fans. That said, it does bother him a teensy bit when his friends come to his stand-up shows, and tell him that their twenty-something kids are asking, “Wait, the doctor from Stranger Things is going to try to be funny?”

Said Reiser with a laugh, “It’s like, ‘Would you explain to your kid that this is what I do?'”

But the 68-year-old comedian is taking this new phase of his career in stride. “It’s been nice,” he said. “I’ve actually seen the audience grow.”

In the most recent Stranger Things season, which aired in 2022, Reiser shared most of his screen time with Millie Bobby Brown and Mathew Modine. Together, the three of them worked to restore Eleven (Brown)’s supernatural abilities—though Dr. Owens took a far more human approach than Modine’s character, Brenner (or “Papa”). Brenner died at the end of Season 4, but Dr. Owens seemingly survived, and may very well be back. Reiser was tight-lipped when asked if he was filming for the fifth season, which had been delayed due to the strikes, and is now back in production.

“I’m not at liberty to discuss that, because they’ll have me killed,” he said. “I’m not shooting today, clearly. But it remains to be seen.”

The fifth season will be the show’s last. Reiser’s happy to have been a part of the series, but he’s not sad to say goodbye. “From the beginning, the brothers said it’s going to be five years,” he said. “So it’s not sad, it makes sense. The artistic vision was: We know what we want to do for five years. And that’s a lot. Especially towards Seasons 2 and 3—they were movies. They were big budget movies for each episode. To do 10, 15 of them? Those are 15 movies! It deserves to come full circle and move on. “

Plus, he added with a wry smile, “the kids are 42 and 43, so it’s harder to get them dressed up for Halloween, at this point. It’s remarkable. I keep seeing on Instagram, things will pop up—Millie’s married. Caleb [McLaughlin] and Finn [Wolfhard], they’re doing model shots. Look at these guys! They’re men!”

Jokes aside, though, Reiser recalled feeling uncertain when he first joined the cast in the second season, in 2017. “I was a little bit the new kid on the block. Where do you sit at lunch, you know? But the kids were all so sweet, and they remain so. They continue to be just nice, young people, even with this ridiculous amount of success and visibility. Hats off to them. “