Why Steve Carell Knew &x27;Instantly&x27; Charly Clive Was &x27;the One to Play My Daughter&x27; on "Rooster" Brenton BlanchetSat, March 14, 2026 at 10:00 PM UTC 0 Steve Carell and Charly Clive in HBO's 'Rooster'Credit: Katrina Marcinowski/HBO Steve Carell said he knew "instantly" that Charly Clive would be a good fit as his onscreen daughter in Rooster The pair appear as fatherdaughter duo Greg and Katie in the HBO comedy "I knew instantly on Zoom that she was the one to play my daughter," Carell said during a March 3 press conference in New York City Steve Carell is giving props to his onscr...
Why Steve Carell Knew 'Instantly' Charly Clive Was 'the One to Play My Daughter' on "Rooster"
Brenton BlanchetSat, March 14, 2026 at 10:00 PM UTC
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Steve Carell and Charly Clive in HBO's 'Rooster'Credit: Katrina Marcinowski/HBO -
Steve Carell said he knew "instantly" that Charly Clive would be a good fit as his onscreen daughter in Rooster
The pair appear as father-daughter duo Greg and Katie in the HBO comedy
"I knew instantly on Zoom that she was the one to play my daughter," Carell said during a March 3 press conference in New York City
Steve Carell is giving props to his onscreen daughter, Charly Clive.
The Rooster star, who stars as lead Greg Russo in the new HBO comedy, revealed during a Tuesday, March 3, press conference for the show in New York City that he knew "instantly" Clive was "the one" to play Greg's daughter Katie on the small screen.
"I thought a lot about the characters, but so much of the information came from the other actors for me," Carell, 63, said. "When Charly and I first met, I mean, it was our first table read, it was the first time that we met in person. And I just knew instantly. Well, I knew instantly on Zoom that she was the one to play my daughter."
Steve Carell and Charly Clive in 'Rooster'Credit: Katrina Marcinowski/HBO
Clive was "so warm and such a good actor" in their first moments, Carell said. Her being "open to anything" also won him over.
The same went for the rest of the cast, he added, which includes Danielle Deadwyler, Phil Dunster, John C. McGinley and Lauren Tsai.
"You don't know what the energy's going to be like, you don't know what each of them are going to be like as people," Carell said during the event at The Whitby Hotel. "But there was just such a pervasive kindness and generosity."
Clive, a London-based comedian and actress, added that when she sent in her audition for the "untitled Steve Carell project," she figured "no one" was going to watch her tape.
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"So I had loads of fun with it," she said. "And then a little while later, they were like, '[showrunner] Bill Lawrence would like to speak to you with Steve Carell and [showrunner] Matt Tarses,' and I was like, 'Okay.' Um, no pressure."
In Rooster, Clive plays Carell's professor daughter whose personal and professional life he somewhat encroaches on. When he adjusts his own whereabouts to be by her side amid a rough marriage, Carell's character finds himself sucked into the college life and a hilarious chain of events ensues.
While there's some new territory in the role for Carell, he said during the March 3 event that he doesn't specifically seek out character types that he hasn't played before.
"It's mostly a matter of people that I would like to work with and creators that I'd like to work with," he said. "I was a huge fan of Bill and Matt, and when they called me, I thought, 'Well, this could be something really special.' A partnership with people that you admire, that's what I'm most intrigued by. And to work with, you know, great actors."
Tarses and Lawrence previously told PEOPLE that The Office alum is "really funny again and doing a straight comedy" for the "first time in a minute" with the new project.
As Lawrence explained it as a comedy writer, "there's none of us that weren't drastically affected by the way that Steve does comedy, and I hadn't seen him do a big comedy-forward project in a long time."
New episodes of Rooster air Sunday at 10 p.m. ET on HBO and stream on HBO Max.
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Source: "AOL Entertainment"
Source: Entertainment
Published: March 14, 2026 at 06:45PM on Source: PRIME TIME
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