How James Marsden Keeps in Touch with Jury Duty’s Ronald Gladden 3 Years After the Show

Jury Duty may be over, but James Marsden’s friendship with Ronald Gladden is still going strong.

Marsden, 58, revealed to PEOPLE at the season 2 premiere of Your Friends & Neighbors at the New York Historical in New York City on Monday, March 30, that he still keeps tabs on his Jury Duty costar, who served as the only non-actor in the hit 2023 series.

“I talk to him occasionally, make sure he’s… I mean, he just seems like he’s flourishing,” Marsden says.

“[He’s] having a great time and he’s proud of this new season and I think he’s become close with Anthony, the new guy,” he adds of Prime Video’s latest iteration, Jury Duty Presents: Company Retreat. “So he’s doing well.”

Marsden, who appears as Owen Ashe in the latest season of Apple TV’s Your Friends & Neighbors, also offered a message for Jury Duty’s new unsuspecting star, Anthony Norman.

“Keep being you,” Marsden says. “He’s such a pure-hearted, kind human like Ronald was. And I hope that… Sometimes fame can mess with you and the attention and everything, but I think he’s too pure to have that happen.”

The latest season of Jury Duty follows a temp worker (Norman) who embarks on a company retreat for a family-run hot-sauce company, as he gets to know the chaotic cast of characters that surround him every step of the way.

Norman has no idea that the absurd developments around him are all an elaborate prank, much like Gladden during the first season. The new season comes three years after the first installment of Jury Duty, which was nominated for three Emmy Awards and won a Peabody Award.

“Anthony’s charisma and kindness stood out immediately,” executive producer Nick Hatton previously told PEOPLE. “It was a big ask this season. We needed a hero who would not just integrate with a bunch of strangers but more importantly become the protagonist in their stories. Someone who was empathetic, self-possessed and represented how we all hope we would behave when dropped into this season’s situation.”

Hatton added, “From day one, it was clear Anthony was going to be a great hero. As for how we found him — that’s part of the secret sauce required to make the show! But safe to say there were thousands of candidates, and we’re so happy we landed the right one.”

As for Gladden, the Jury Duty star revealed after the show’s first season that he quit his job as a contractor and moved to Los Angeles. He told the Los Angeles Times in January 2024 that it was a “big leap of faith.”

In November 2023, Deadline reported that he signed with Artists First and inked a two-year deal with Amazon MGM Studios.

Since his Jury Duty days, he has appeared in a Mint Mobile ad, starred in an Elf Cosmetics commercial and has made appearances on multiple shows, including Celebrity Family Feud and Dish It Out with Tilly Ramsay. He has also shown support to Marsden, attending the premiere of Sonic the Hedgehog 3 in December 2024.

“It was really important to me, I was like, ‘I can’t end this and then go, ‘Hey, bud, that was fun, see ya,'” Marsden previously told PEOPLE. “If we’re really celebrating the guy, then we got to stay pals. And he’s such a purehearted human being — I’d want to be friends with him anyway.”

Your Friends & Neighbors season 2 premieres on Apple TV April 3.

Source: People