My final day of ATX TV Season 15 began with breakfast at my hotel and then I headed over to the Omni Hotel to the Pluto TV Badgeholder lounge to try one final time to get a perfect score on the memory matching game, but I only managed to get 13/16. I also stopped by the Unbox BritBox activation one final time, and won yet another notebook.

Next, I headed to get in line for my first panel of the day at the State theater, “THE WAY HOME presented by Hallmark”. The time traveling drama series is currently airing the final few episodes of its fourth/final season, bringing this multi-generational tale of the Landry family to a close.

The panel opened with an early screening of the latest episode, before moderator Emily Longeretta (Variety) and stars Chyler Leigh (“Kat Landry”), Evan Williams (“Elliot Augustine”) & Sadie Laflamme-Snow (“Alice Dhawan”) took the stage.

It was a fun and emotional discussion of the series. They talked about what it was like filming this final season and saying goodbye to the series. It didn’t sound like it was totally a decision by the series creators for this to be the final season, though they did know this was the case ahead of time and could write to a conclusion. The actors also talked about how they usually didn’t know what was going to happen with their characters until they got each script—such as Elliot’s big reveal in the latest episode—and other times they filmed out of order so they didn’t necessarily know what the motivation of their character was while filming a scene, so they would sometimes do the scene a couple different ways, offering up various interpretations. The actors shared some fun behind-the-scenes stories and talked about jumping into the freezing lake—only Evan seemed to enjoy it. At one point Chyler got a bit choked up and brought to tears while talking about the family they made on set.

Next, I headed across the street to 800 Congress for the “SWEET/VICIOUS 10 Year Anniversary” panel. The series followed a pair of women, Jules and Ophelia, who become wannabe vigilantes, bringing justice to those who seem to have gotten away with abuse on their college campus. The series had first come to the ATX TV Festival in Season 6 in 2017 after the 10-episode season had aired on MTV. However, the show wasn’t picked up and never got a second season.

The panel was moderated by Samantha Highfill (Entertainment Weekly), and included Jennifer Kaytin Robinson (Creator/Executive Producer), Amanda Lasher (Showrunner/Executive Producer), Stacey Sher (Executive Producer), Emily Levitan (Producer) and stars Eliza Bennett (“Jules”) & Taylor Dearden (“Ophelia”). They talked about how they were shocked with what they were able to get away with on the series, and how it was ahead of its time, even before the #MeToo movement. They talked about how it would have been amazing to have covered this topic in that era, and discussed some of the ideas that they would have liked to have explored, including other types of abusers and abused, and not just women. They mentioned that one of the plans for a finale would have been for Jules to turn herself in and take the fall for Ophelia.

The panelists also discussed shooting the series on a budget, the evolution of the pilot, the network changes from 60 min to 30 min and back to 60 minutes, and more. One of the audience questions raised the issue of the series being hard to find—it is currently only available for digital purchase—and that perhaps a DVD release would be good during this resurgence of physical media. The panelists seemed eager and excited by the idea, but the likely stumbling block would be clearing all of the music that was used on the series under an umbrella MTV license at the time. The series is worth checking out, and can be purchased on sites like iTunes, Fandango at Home and Prime Video. Fandango at Home just recently had this and a bunch of other MTV shows from the same era on sale, so keep your eyes out.

After the panel, all of the panels stuck around to talk with fans, take photos, and sign autographs.

After getting my photo with Eliza & Taylor I headed to the Paramount Theater for the annual script reading event that closes out the festival. This year, it was the “I LOVE LUCY 75th Anniversary Script Reading”.

The event opened with a performance by a local band led by Alex Marrero. Then the cast took the stage, including Constance Zimmer as “Lucy”, Wilson Cruz as “Ricky”, Ever Carradine as “Ethel”, and Scott MacArthur as “Fred”. This was such a delight, and the most acted-out I’ve ever seen one of these script readings, likely due to the more physical-comedy laden nature of I Love Lucy. Constance Zimmer was brilliant as Lucy, especially during the iconic Vitameatavegimen sequence in the first episode, “Lucy Does a Commercial”. Wilson Cruz also put on a Cuban accent and showed off his dancing skills while doing an excellent job of portraying Ricky. In the second episode, “Ethel’s Birthday,” Ever Carradine also got a chance to shine as Ethel and Lucy have their memorable spat and make up in the theater.

(Photo Credit for some of the photos aove from the second episode performance: Manny Pandya & Zachary Salas)

Each day there are more panels than you can possibly attend, with some tough conflicts to decide between. Some of the other panels I wasn’t attend on day 4 were “Grit, Guts & Stunts: Inside CBS’s MARSHALS”, “Inside FX’s ADULTS with Ben Kronengold & Rebecca Shaw”, “AGATHA CHRISTIE’S TOMMY & TUPPENCE Preview Screening and Q&A presented by BritBox”, “Period Pieces: How TV Shapes Teens’ Understanding of Menstruation presented by the Geena Davis Institute”, “Bringing Sexy Back”, “A Nuclear Renaissance on TV: How Atomic Storylines Can Save Us from Armageddon presented by NTI”, and more.

Most of these ATX panels will eventually make their way to the ATX TV YouTube channel/Podcast, so you should be able to watch/listen to them in the near future. Unfortunately, the script reading will not be made available as they don’t have the rights to do so.

If you missed them, check out my recaps from the previous days: Day 1, Day 2 and Day 3.