Noting that this is the most challenging thing he’s done thus far in his career, DeVon Franklin is stepping beyond his work behind the scenes into the role of Pastor Jefferson in Tyler Perry’s Divorced Sistas, the new BET+ series.

“Being very new to this, and, you know, having to learn those lines and get into character and deliver, you know, when Tyler called action, it was challenging,” Franklin said during an interview with Blavity’s Shadow and Act. “While we were shooting this show, I was also producing. I was in prep for a film that I’m doing for Amazon called Relationship Goals with Kelly Rowland and Method Man. So, it was just unbelievable to act in the show while producing a big-budget movie. So the challenge was to just not worry about any of that, to learn the character, learn the lines, and then take the direction. Tyler was very clear on what he wanted. He was very clear on what he liked, what he didn’t like, you know, when it came to my performance, and so, you know, being able to take the notes and make the adjustments, all of it was a challenge, but extremely rewarding.”

What is ‘Tyler Perry’s Divorced Sistas’ about?

According to the official synopsis, “Five friends, Rasheda (LeToya Luckett), Geneva (Khadeen Indréa), Naomi (Porscha Coleman), Tiffany (Briana Price), and Bridgette (Jennifer Sears) support each other through divorce, marriage, dating, healing, and friendship struggles while their loyalty and sisterhood bonds are tested.”

“When I was building out Geneva’s character, I realized that this was deeper than who she was,” Indréa said during the BET+ Presents Closure + Cocktails with the Cast of Tyler Perry’s Divorced Sistas in Atlanta on Tuesday.

“We learned in the very early stages of acting school that you’re not supposed to judge your character for who they are and how to feel. So, I don’t judge Geneva for who she is. I try to empathize with her, and I understand her, which I’m hoping everyone will as we move forward, but Geneva is a lot,” she continued.

DeVon Franklin on balancing his real life with what we see on screen

For Franklin, stepping into his character was quite the balancing act, as he notes how they’re from two sides of the same coin, although they share the similarity of being a faith leader in the community.

“It was a beautiful thing, the way that Tyler wrote the character. So it actually made that part of it not too challenging because he wrote the character certainly with flaws, and certainly with areas of improvement,” he said. “When I read the script, I was like, ‘Oh, OK…this is very different than how you a lot of times see pastors portrayed,'” Franklin continued, adding that his goal was to render that character taken from the pages. “So people have been seeing the first few episodes, they’re like, ‘Oh my,’ and those that know me, they’re like, ‘Oh my goodness, this is so different than how you are.’ And I said, ‘I know, that’s the character.'”

He continued, “At the beginning, he and Rasheda, his wife, played by LeToya Luckett, are going through challenges, and he’s kind of fed up in some ways, and doesn’t feel seen and heard by her. And then she feels the same way, and it kind of…reaching a boiling point in those first few episodes, where what’s kind of kept private starts to bubble over a little bit in the public, and we’re trying to figure out how we’re going to make it work, but bringing those complexities wasn’t challenging. That part wasn’t challenging because it was on the page. And then also, it’s like, I think we all have dark and light, and we all have a shadow side. So for me, just tapping into that was fuel for the character.”

The biggest lesson he’s learned in the process

In the process, Franklin said he’s learned that there’s “nothing he can’t do” amid his involvement with Tyler Perry’s Divorced Sistas and is looking forward to all that lies ahead.

“You don’t grow when you’re not challenged, you know? And so for me to allow myself to be challenged, I learned that I can respond to the challenge, that I can rise to the occasion, that there are more dimensions of my talent that I haven’t even seen, let alone other people,” he concluded. “So many people who know me, or know of me, one of their main comments is, ‘Oh my goodness, I didn’t know you acted.’ And I said, ‘Well, I didn’t either, but here we are.'”

He added, “I also want people to take away that don’t allow your perceived understanding of yourself to create a box from which you can’t expand beyond. You know, if I was just so caught up in my identity of like, ‘I’m a producer, and I’m an author, and this is what I am, and I’m not an actor,’ I could have never took on the identity of an actor to be able to play this character and be successful in this series. So, we know what we know, but there’s so much about ourselves that we don’t know, and opening ourselves up to be challenged, to grow, that’s when we start to discover even more of who we are.”

Tyler Perry’s Divorced Sistas is now streaming on BET+.