BET’s The Game newcomers Lauren London and Jay Ellis aren’t fazed by the comparisons to show’s beloved couple Melanie and Derwin (Tia Mowry-Hardrict and Pooch Hall) who abruptly left last season. “I never felt that we were filing their shoes,” says Ellis. “I feel like we’ve got our own pair of shoes and we did what we had to do with what they gave us. It’s so fresh and so different.”
Adds London, “I think there’s a whole vibe to the show now because there are two new people and we do add something new; it’s just a whole new air.”
We’ll find out lots more about the new couple, a former child star (London) and a football player (Ellis), on season six of The Game. For now, we wanted to find out a few interesting tidbits about the actors.
1. What they did with their first major paychecks
LAUREN LONDON: I bought a car, a BMW X3. [Laughs] I read that Bob Marley would only drive BMW’s because the name resembled Bob Marley and the Wailers.
JAY ELLIS: Nothing; I banked it.
2. What they can’t live without
LONDON: [Laughs] I cannot live without a good good tan and my eyebrows and edges done.
ELLIS: Sunshine
3. Their first celebrity crushes
LONDON: Jonathan Taylor Thomas from Home Improvement. He’s still cute!
ELLIS: Stacey Dash in the Richard Pryor movie, Moving. She was like 14 or 15 years old at the time and for whatever reason she was just gorgeous to me.
4. Their guilty pleasures!
LONDON: Reality shows like Love & Hip Hop New York and Bad Girls Club — just all those things.
ELLIS: Brownies
5. The item they wear so much that friends have to say, ‘It’s time to put that away!’
LONDON: My Jordans, or these black Giuseppe Zanotti boots that I have that I’m going to probably be buried in. They’re awesome.
ELLIS: A black t-shirt. I typically wear a black t-shirt whenever I leave my house.
6. On repeat on their iPod
LONDON: Kendrick Lamar. His album is a classic. Also, Drake’s ‘Started from the Bottom.’
ELLIS: A$AP Rocky
Lauren London and Jay Ellis star on BET’s The Game tonight at 10pm.