“[After Boots, People Said:] ‘You’re So Nice, I Can’t Believe That You Play Such A Freaky Sociopath’”: Angus O’Brien Is Marching On

The cancellation of Netflix queer hit Boots in December caused fan uproar, but, thankfully, for one of its emergent stars, Angus O’Brien, the best is yet to come.

Angus O’Brien wasn’t sure that people would recognise him, out in the wild, following his hard-won breakthrough role in Boots. The critically acclaimed Netflix gay military comedy-drama spent four weeks in the streaming service’s Top 10 following its release last October. However, the induction buzz cuts and camouflage utilities, naturally, sported by O’Brien’s Hicks – an oddball, exuberant 1990 Marines recruit – and his onscreen platoon-mates, were a departure from the 29-year-old’s expressive everyday style. 

And yet, drop earrings back in, his warm blonde hair grown into a textured chop, and colours once again in rotation in his wardrobe, and people have, in fact, been approaching the New York resident on the street. A few with surprise, exclaiming sentiments along the lines of: “‘You’re so nice, I can’t believe that you play such a freaky sociopath,’” he tells me. “I always take that as a huge compliment.” 

Based on Greg Cope White’s 2015 memoir The Pink Marine, Boots was centred on the outlier experience of lead character Cameron (Miles Heizer): a gay serviceman furtively trying to blend in, in an era where being gay in the US military was illegal. Hicks’s struggle to conform to group dynamics isn’t due to sexuality, however – O’Brien was the only one of Boots’ five openly-queer cast members to portray a straight character. 

Instead, it’s because he’s the uncontainable live wire of the barracks. In one scene, Hicks ends up standing behind Cameron, reaching his arm in front of him, before simulating a razor slitting his throat. The impish smile on his face as he does it means the moment, somehow, straddles menace and endearment, encapsulating the character’s general presence, as someone you might find yourself rooting for and running from if you happened to land up in that merciless South Carolina camp. Hicks embodies the misunderstood profile of a rogue rescue dog, but one you know never really means any harm. “I haven’t quite had a distinct typecast growing up,” O’Brien explains, “but it feels like with my characters, there’s always something that’s a little bit off about them, something mentally or some dark secret.” 

We meet over Zoom, the mid-morning after Thanksgiving. O’Brien’s sat in his bedroom – an antithesis of the desolate dwellings of the barracks, the room is painted in what he describes as “bright dark red” but, with the masterclass in mood lighting overhead, glows through the screen as a fuchsia pink. He decided to decorate after returning from filming Boots in New Orleans. “It was just so colourful and beautiful there that when I came back to my apartment in New York, I just felt like I needed a little bit more colour in my life,” he explains.

That warmth correlates with O’Brien’s real-life personality, too. Gentle in conversation, thorough in his thoughts, with smiles deployed liberally, the show’s fans’ remarks about the stark contrast between him and Hicks stack up. “With Hicks, there was something where I could just, from the very beginning, so clearly imagine myself in the role and the types of things I would want to do with it,” O’Brien continues. Part of that clarity of vision came from O’Brien’s tendency to find the good in his characters, regardless of their weak spots. “Rather than lean into this sinister performance of a person, I like to lean into the parts about them that I genuinely love, and there’s something about Hicks where he was very gregarious in his own bizarre way. He really was wanting to entertain and connect with [people].” 

When O’Brien was cast in Boots, he was leading a 2023 Off-Broadway revival of Samuel D Hunter’s A Bright New Boise, playing Leroy, an unpredictable employee of real-life arts and crafts chain store, Hobby Lobby. It was on opening night that he got the call to tell him Hicks was his. That role, alongside his drama training at NYU, a lead turn in 2022 Cannes-selected short film The Pass, and his experience of large-scale TV production (thanks to a small part in Hulu’s late ’10s cult-centred drama The Path), meant that by the time Boots was enlisting, O’Brien felt “very capable of taking something on of this size.”

“I had put in my dues,” he says. “I had been working over the years and booking jobs and growing the size of the parts [I was doing].” Personally, his headspace had also never been more primed to tackle a gig of such magnitude. Six months ahead of the show’s production, O’Brien had made the decision to go home to LA for a month to get sober from drugs and alcohol. Subsequently, “I just felt so much more able to give 110 per cent of myself to the audition process and really make sure I was taking care of my side of the equation,” he tells me. “It meant that I knew that whatever happened, I had put my all into it.” 

O’Brien’s experience of alcohol and substance misuse were shared by other members of his family. “I come from a family of addicts,” he explains. “Everyone’s sober now, and I’m very close with my entire family. However, when I was younger, people were still in the process of getting sober. So my home life was a little bit more chaotic.” It meant that, growing up, he tried to fit into a “golden child” mould. “I was trying my best to be the child who had his shit together, who studied in school. I was just a sweet, earnest, shy kid.” The life experience that came with navigating and overcoming his own addiction challenges is something he now utilises to understand those of his characters, whether or not addiction intersects with their stories. “I went through some of the lowest lows I can imagine when I was using before I got sober. What I felt during that time and the experience of getting through it contributed a lot to a character like Hicks or others that I audition for.”

From a physical perspective, the months leading up to O’Brien’s arrival in Hicks’s combat boots also lent themselves to embodying his physique – a burlier silhouette than some of his fellow fledgling comrades. After becoming sober, O’Brienleaned into his longstanding love of working out, which had also seen him, in the past, personal-train clients in between acting roles. “After I got sober, it was a helpful replacement, just to have some structure in my life, and to use my somewhat addictive personality for something that felt like more of a positive thing.” 

His departure to New Orleans to commence shooting – first in summer 2023, before a seven-month break induced by the SAG-AFTRA strike – wasn’t without apprehension, however. For one, it would see O’Brien leave behind his primarily queer New York milieu to join an ensemble which, despite the plotline for Boots’ lead character, was comprised mainly of heterosexual men. “I’m so used to being around queer people in my day-to-day life, so I had some preconceived notions about what that would feel like, especially just because a lot of the cast come from all different walks of life. I was kind of anxious, because I don’t really shy away from acting like my true self in any setting.” Thankfully, any nerves were without cause. “Everyone was just coming together with so much love and positivity and excitement to tell this story that I felt a really big sense of admiration for these guys.” The same applied for the military advisors that the show’s team consulted to strengthen the depiction of the era’s accuracy. “Even with them, I think I had a lot of assumptions about how a military guy acted or behaved, but they were just such warm and generous, kind, funny people.” 

The task of merely fitting in with the group aside, O’Brien would also end up leaving Boots’ production with a new best friend to depend on, in the form of its lead, Heizer. His and Heizer’s quick rapport was such that people around them assumed their bond predated the shooting schedule. “We met doing this job, but I think you just get so close with someone so fast when you’re spending so much time with them.” Despite their friendship now operating on a bicoastal basis – Heizer lives in O’Brien’s home city – they maintain connection by “just sending stupid memes to each other constantly.” 

Said memes often stem from the wellspring of digital brainrot born from RuPaul’s Drag Race. “But they’ll have been warped through four layers of mutation into some horrible amalgamation of 30 different memes,” he laughs. “It’s just really dumb things most of the time. But also when there’s something going on in each of our lives, we usually text or call each other to talk about that. And whenever I’m in LA, I’m staying with him on a blow-up mattress, and it’s like a week-long slumber party.” 

Gaining a friend like Heizer meant that the fortunes of Boots could have nosedived following release, and for O’Brien, the experience would have still provided a net gain. However, when we sit down in late November, the show is being wholeheartedly embraced by fans and reviewers alike. The season is later reported to have had over 30 million views by the end of the year. Such a reaction means that expectation and appetite for a renewal are growing strong. “I know for a fact that all of us are desperate to revisit these characters and each other,” O’Brien tells me with a cautious optimism.“Because we love each other so much. And I think there’s so much more story to be told. However, I’m trying to keep my expectations at a neutral place for now. Sometimes you’ll see a show that is incredible, has amazing reviews, and then for one reason or another…” He’s right – the likes of 2024 Greek mythology comedy Kaos, starring industry titan Jeff Goldblum, was just one Netflix production to become a one-and-done offering, cancelled despite sizable success in its first outing. The paranormal escapades of YA drama Dead Boy Detectives, in the same year, seemed primed to acquire a dedicated Gen Z fandom for its stars, however the plug was also pulled before its phantom characters could uncover any more mysteries. 

But Boots feels different. The way its success appears to be augmenting, when we chat, rather than timing out, the broad audience enthusiasm for its ensemble cast, as well as the track record of queer hits in the last decade (Heartstopper, Pose, Overcompensating), means it’s easy to envision it being a three- or four-season gem in the LGBTQIA+ TV canon. So when it is announced, some three weeks later, that O’Brien and his castmates would not, in fact, have their opportunity to continue the story, fan reaction is one of audible confusion. There had been conservative backlash to the show following release, not least by the Pentagon, whose press secretary, Kingsley Wilson, released a statement describing it as “woke garbage.” Fans are quick to link the criticism with the outcome of renewal conversations, something that Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos countered. 

When I re-connect with O’Brien in the following spring, he is, as his castmates have been, candid about his disappointment. “I remember the weeks after all these really positive reviews and great numbers, when we still weren’t getting a word about renewal, I was very confused,” he says, “because the response was as positive as we could have hoped for. But I feel like what I take away from it and something that I’m really proud of is how much the show was watched and how well reviewed it was. That is available for all of us to see and look back on. There’s no mystery around that. So I can chalk [the cancellation] up to something that is beyond my pay grade.”

He’s reluctant, generally, to autopsy the motivations that led to the show’s end, instead resolved on building on the career milestone. “What happened happened, and it doesn’t mean that it wasn’t the most incredible experience of my entire life.” His road to sobriety gives him a layer of perspective he can use to buoy him through the unpredictable tides of any actor’s career. “Once you’ve got through a really, really tough part in your life, every experience that I get to have through my job just feels like a bonus to me.” 

And he has a lot to be optimistic about. One boon of Boots was the way it introduced him to queer audiences, following years of being put forward, primarily, for straight roles with limited overlap with the community. He hopes to reap those rewards – “There is something appealing about being able to play someone who I connect with in a more personal or intimate way.” Nevertheless, O’Brien’s future career looks set to see him travel far and wide when it comes to characters’circumstance and identity. “Part of the fun for me is playing roles that are wildly different from my own personality,” he enthuses.  

His next genre terrain sees him travel south – geographically, at least –  entering the noir-driven world of SA Cosby adaptation, All The Sinners Bleed,  which he’s been filming in Atlanta in the weeks around our second sit-down. As an ardent fan of Southern Gothic hits like True Detective and Sharp Objects, “I’m excited to leave my own small mark [on the genre],” he says. “It’s another chance to play someone totally different from Angus and totally different from Hicks.” It also sees him side-by-side with legends of his craft – not least, recent Oscar winner Amy Madigan, as well as Murray Bartlett (The White Lotus, The Last of Us) and Giancarlo Esposito (Breaking Bad, The Mandalorian). “I’m really getting the opportunity to work with some incredible veteran actors.” Former Man About Town cover star Ṣọpẹ́ Dìrísù is leading the ship. “He’s incredible, we’re so lucky to have him.” 

With Boots now in his rearview, O’Brien’s mindset is gratitude-heavy and resoundingly future-facing; the show simply a triumphant moment in a career that is unstintingly building pace. “I feel very fortunate and lucky that I can look towards the future and just be excited for what’s next,” he says. “And what’s next is really only possible for me because of the experience that I had with Boots.” 

Boots is available to watch now on Netflix