On Sunday, April 25, 2021, the students of Pace University got a special experience to start finals week. Evan Peters, star of American Horror Story, X-Men: Dark Phoenix, and WandaVision, was the fourth artist and final night of Pace’s Programming and Campus Entertainment Board‘s Unleashed. Normally Unleashed is in-person and typically a concert event. Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, PACE Board had to think of a new way to bring entertainment to the student body, and thus Zoom Unleashed was born. The other nights included Pete Davidson, Laverne Cox, and Hayley Kiyoko, all Pace University students loved! However, the announcement of Evan Peters truly shook Pace University student’s hearts, including mine.
The event started at 8 pm EST, and the anticipation was extremely exciting. The event began with two executive members giving a formal introduction to Evan and his work. The chat was already going crazy with questions, dorm addresses, and Instagram shout outs. That is just what Pace students do. When Evan came on screen, my heart did skip a beat and everyone was so excited. The first half featured PACE Board President Clarissa McElroy interviewing Evan. At first, Evan seemed a bit shy and was getting used to this virtual experience with 200+ students lovingly staring. She asked about his experience on American Horror Story, covering Nirvana, his roles on Criminal Minds and The Office. Evan said his favorite season of American Horror Story was season one because it was the start of an experience. He stated no one knew how it was going to turn out because of how dark the concept was. Luckily, we all know how successful and career-defining his role was. Clarissa did an amazing job at starting the show off with Evan’s past experiences and connecting her love of AHS to help out Evan.
Around 8:30 pm the talk switched to feature PACE Board Vice President Mel Rodriguez. By this time, Evan started to loosen up and enjoy his time! Mel is known for being charismatic, going viral, bringing out the fun in PACE Board events, and being a Her Campus Pace favorite. The second half featured Evan’s time being a part of the Marvel and DC cinematic universes. When asked about his role as Quicksilver, a superhero who is frequently seen in the Marvel comics and DC X-Men Movies, he was insightful and hilarious. Evan stated that he knew from the beginning that his Marvel Quicksilver was not the true version of the Marvel universe. He stated that “It was super fun, a creative way to get the Fox Quicksilver into the Marvel universe without compromising the reality of their story”. He also shared when he found out that his WandaVision character would be called Ralph Bohner, he “started hysterically laughing because he had no idea…”, oh Evan you are such a sweetheart for not spoiling any phase 4 details. He also stated his favorite avenger was Iron Man and his favorite Marvel movie was Guardians of the Galaxy. The segment also included the chat spamming for Evan to do the Sarah Paulson scream to which he started randomly screaming. This was hilarious, and lovely to see Evan interacting with the students. He was extremely sweet and talked about his upcoming role as Jeffrey Dahmer in Netflix’s upcoming show ‘”Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story.”, he revealed they have been shooting since March and plan to end in the fall of 2021. To wrap things up, Mel began to interact with the students and encouraged Evan to pick 2-3 questions from the chat. When it was 9 pm sharp, the event ended and Evan said his sweet goodbyes.
Throughout this semester, it has been hard to see students enjoying a Sunday night together and stress-free. This event is what the students needed to distress and prepare for finals. As someone who attended IRL and virtual Unleashed, I really enjoyed this virtual one! I thought it would be awkward because it was on Zoom with hundreds of other students, but it turned out amazing. Watching Evan grow more confident as the Zoom went on warmed my heart and made me adore him more. Evan constantly apologized for feeling as if he was talking too long and detouring off of questions. I was incredibly happy when Mel reminded Evan that he was completely okay, he can talk as freely as he wants, and that the students were there to see and support Evan! I thought this was a really warming gesture that made Evan more comfortable and treated him like a normal human instead of a celebrity. Overall, this final night of Unleashed was incredibly entertaining and heartwarming. I did prefer the second half over the first due to the questions and interactions with the chat. If you are a student and debating if you should go to Unleashed next year, I highly suggest it as you will make memorable experiences and get to see your favorite celebrities face to face or virtually!
Also Evan if you see this please feel free to DM me.