The year 2022 is the year Sean Kanan, who plays Deacon Sharpe on The Bold and the Beautiful, revisits shows and roles from his past. Not only is the actor headed back to The Young and the Restless later this month, he’s also reprising his role as Mike Barnes on Cobra Kai, the Netflix series based on the Karate Kid films.
Sean Kanan Joins Cobra Kai Season 5
Kanan created the role of bad boy Mike “Your karate’s a joke” Barnes in 1988 and is set to play him once again when Cobra Kai returns for Season 5 tonight. Recently, Entertainment Tonight’s Matt Cohen (ex-Griffin Munro) visited Kanan on the B&B set and talked to him about revisiting Mike.
Remembering That Fateful Day
Today’s modern world seems to record our every waking moment, but even back in 1988, there’s a record of Kanan’s trying out for the role that set his career on a new path. “I got the role of Mike Barnes through an open call,” Kanan told Cohen. “There were 2,000 people standing in line to audition for John G. Avildsen, who directed the first Karate Kid film and the second one. He won the Oscar for Rocky. He picked me out of the line.”
Kanan recalls walking onto the soundstage to screentest with series star Ralph Macchio and seeing lots of media outlets present. “I vividly remember doing an interview with Entertainment Tonight,” the actor shares. “I was like this kid from Pennsylvania, and I just did this interview with ET! This is insane!”
Sean Kanan the Lost Interview
“We are going to find that interview,” Cohen told Kanan, who quipped, “That’s what scares me.” ET did indeed dig up the footage, and you can see it by clicking here or watching below. As for revisiting Mike Barnes, Kanan shares, “It was amazing to go back…it’s a role I did 35 years ago. As an actor, you don’t think that you’re going to reprise a role you did that long ago, let alone one that is going to have some relevance and that the fans will still be interested.”
Kanan adds that one of the best parts of the experience was reconnecting with Macchio. “[We] were just looking at each other [as if to say], ‘Can you believe this?'” Kanan says. “The thing I love about Ralph and Billy is that they’re terrific guys. It was great to go back there and reignite our friendship as adults. They’re so in awe of what has happened — the juggernaut that Cobra Kai has become. It was fun for me to go back and dust off the old black sleeveless T[-shirt] and mix it up.”
Cobra Kai Season 5 is streaming now on Netflix. The Bold and the Beautiful (BB) airs weekdays on CBS. Check your local listings for airtimes. For more about what’s coming up in Los Angeles, check out all the latest that’s been posted on B&B spoilers, and for an in-depth look at the show’s history, click here.
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