This Is Us stars reveal the OTHER character they'd love to play

It’s hard to picture Milo Ventimiglia as any other character on This Is Us than proud patriarch Jack, or to imagine Mandy Moore in any other role than fiercely protective matriarch Rebecca. But you’re about to. Enter this alternate Pearson universe as we ask the stars of the heartfelt NBC family drama to do some role-playing — specifically to choose the one character that they’d love to play if they weren’t able to play their own, gender be damned.

"Randall would be the first person that I would connect with and would like to do," says Jones. "Sterling [K. Brown] is so brilliant in that it makes you think about the challenge and he’s met that challenge five stars and deserves every accolade that he gets for it because it’s a hard character to do. He’s taken a very, very difficult character and humanized him in a way that’s so universal…. It’s such an interesting and well-thought-out and complex character. It’s one of those characters that’s an actor’s dream and I know Sterling feels the same way. And also because [Randall] is African-American there’s an immediate connection to that character. The things that he’s going through and the stuff that we did in ‘Memphis’ and the connection that we had together. So there’s a lineage connection as well as a cultural and historical and ethnic connection."

"When he explains the painting to my daughters, what I love is that he seems like he doesn’t have the level of depth and insight that he does, but then he has this profound, articulate, and beautiful explanation of life that he shares," says Brown. "I just found it apropos that it came from him, and that he couldn’t make up his mind which woman he wanted to be with. Ultimately he finds Sophie again, but in the midst of all of that — in the midst of his fears about his career and whether or not this play is going to bomb or not — he had this journey from childhood to adulthood, to where he left his brother alone and on an island by himself when they were kids, to where he knew in his heart that his brother needed him and came to his aid. I know it caused some flack in people. They’re like, ‘Would he really leave his opening night?’ I was like, ‘Just take the journey for a second, because that level of self-sacrifice is something that I find incredibly heroic.’ And it makes me weep like a baby. Kevin’s an actor, and so I can relate very easily to his journey.”

“Beth is one-half of my fave TV couple — mostly I’m just obsessed with all things Susan Kelechi Waston," says Moore. "But beyond that, I love how layered and dimensional Beth is: all at once loyal, compassionate, protective, open, funny, ambitious, she’s a caretaker, a fantastic wife and mother, but she also doesn’t hold back or sugarcoat things. She quietly makes everyone around her step up and be better. She’s the real hero of the show, in a way. She an outsider in that family and she can really hold her own. You can feel the history between her and Randall, but I’m most interested in who Beth is outside of the marriage — who she was before — and that would be so much fun to play."

“I like the romance that Kate is having, and I like the music career she’s trying to pursue — and her relationship with her brother," says Watson. "That whole twin thing is a really cool dynamic, to have that person in life that you guys kind of can always read each other’s thoughts and you’re just there for each other in that way. Yeah, reincarnate as Kate.”

“That's a dynamic woman who has her own thing going on," says Hartley. "And then she's got this husband who's obviously loving and caring and wonderful, but there might be some demons there, and she's dealing with it. Everybody sees him as this supportive, amazing father, and the truth of the matter is she might be the strongest person in that whole family. I think she's just a little overworked and underappreciated, and so it'd be fun to explore that.”

“Part of the reason is because of the performance that Gerald McRaney gave, and that I wish I could give a performance like that," says Sullivan. "So, in my head, I think that if I got to play Dr. K, I could give a performance like that. But obviously I’m not Gerald McRaney. I’m not a legend. I’d like to play that role of somebody closer to the end of their life than their beginning, with all of that history behind them, and exploring the things that it takes to get through all that stuff.”

“The character that I connect with the most is William," says Ventimiglia, excluding Jack from the equation, of course. "Just his appreciation of the world and the small moments — and that’s maybe just me as me. But I strangely have no desire but to fill the shoes of Jack. I like being Jack.”

“Rebecca is such a kick-ass woman, and she’s resilient and selfless, beautiful, and talented," begins Metz. "But I think I might say Kevin because I know what it’s like to be judged on my appearance negatively, but I don’t know what it’s like to be judged positively. And while, of course, he has issues and people thinking that he’s just a beautiful face, there is so much depth to him.”