Trust the Beek: ABC’s quirky “Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23”

James Van Der Beek, Krysten Ritter, Don't Trust the B--- in Apartment 23There’s a lot to like about ABC’s wickedly funny Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23 (Wednesdays at 9:30pm ET/PT beginning April 11), from the boundary-pushing title to the quirky Krysten Ritter to a part that could only be played by James Van Der Beek.

In Apartment 23, wide-eyed twentysomething June (Dreama Walker) moves to Manhattan for a dream job, but her new company is immediately shut down by the government after a huge scandal. Now desperately in need of a job and a place to live, June finds a roommate in Chloe (Ritter). While Chloe seems like the ideal roommate at first, she’s really a con artist who takes security deposits and rent and then makes her roommate’s life hell until she moves out. But when June decides to play Chloe’s game against her, a bond forms between the roommates.

Ritter, known for recent turns in Breaking Bad and the darkly funny Gravity, is the perfect fit for Chloe. “I think that Chloe gets to say things that everybody wishes they could say and I get to,” says Ritter. “It’s fun where you get to play somebody so bold and badass and unapologetic, and I get to do dark stuff and be funny. It’s a really complex, well‑developed, amazing character and it’s really just the most fun I’ve ever had in my life.”

But the real fun in Apartment 23 for the viewer might be James Van Der Beek, who plays a fictionalized, exaggerated version of himself.

“I auditioned against six other James Van Der Beeks for this role,” he jokes, showing off his self-deprecatingly funny side. “I was lucky that four of them were not actors, and two of them didn’t speak English. So, by default, it was me.”

Van Der Beek’s character is a friend of Chloe who shamelessly uses his Dawson’s Creek and Varsity Blues personas to pick up women. But the actor doesn’t mind poking fun at himself.

“They’ve kept me around Hollywood long enough to kind of have a second coming,” Van Der Beek says, “and it’s a lot more fun not to take myself so seriously, and so this is a great opportunity just to have a lot of laughs and just be part of something that I’m really, really proud of.”

Photo: © 2011 American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. Credit: Patrick Harbron

About Ryan Berenz 2166 Articles
Member of the Television Critics Association. Charter member of the Ancient and Mystic Society of No Homers. Squire of the Ancient & Benevolent Order of the Lynx, Lodge 49, Long Beach, Calif. Costco Wholesale Gold Star Member since 2011.