Tegan & Sara Quin Find Their ‘High School’ Counterparts in TikTok Twins
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Grammy-nominated twins Tegan and Sara Quin have cast their onscreen counterparts in the IMDb TV coming-of-age series High School.
TikTok twins Railey and Seazynn Gilliland will make their television debuts in the series co-created by Tegan and Sara and exec producer Clea DuVall (Happiest Season). Cobie Smulders (How I Met Your Mother) and Kyle Bornheimer (Brooklyn Nine-Nine) will guest-star in the series as the twins’ parents.
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Written and directed by DuVall, High School is a story about finding your own identity, a journey that is made more complicated when you have a twin whose own struggle and self-discovery closely mimics your own. The series will be told through a backdrop of ’90s grunge and rave culture and weaves between parallel and discordant memories of twin sisters growing up down the hall from one another.
Railey Gilliland will portray Tegan, a gregarious, confident and extroverted teenager, who turns to music to explore her vulnerabilities. Seazynn Gilliland plays Sara, a reserved, observant and sensitive 15-year-old who, for the first time, starts to access her own self-confidence through playing music. Smulders, fresh off her surprise return in Hulu’s How I Met Your Father, will portray Simone, Tegan and Sara’s funny, sharp and supportive mother, who strives to define herself outside of her family, and Bornheimer will portray Patrick, Simone’s boyfriend and Tegan and Sara’s pseudo-stepdad, who is a gentle everyman.
“It felt kismet when I saw Railey and Seazynn for the first time on TikTok,” said Tegan Quin. “There was something undeniably intriguing about them: They were sweet and original, impossible not to watch. I felt compelled to send Sara the video. ‘Too bad they don’t act,’ I texted her. Sara wasn’t deterred. They were performers, musical and dynamic. ‘You can’t teach charisma,’ Sara said, which they had in spades. Sara was relentless — these were the twins that had to play us. We were overjoyed when they were cast, and we couldn’t be more thrilled that it all worked out.”
Production on High School will begin March 21 in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. It’s produced by Amazon Studios and Plan B’s Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner. Tegan and Sara Quin, DuVall and Kittrell will also exec produce, with the latter set to direct multiple episodes including the pilot. The series is inspired by the duo’s memoir, also titled High School, which was released in September 2019. DuVall, who like the Quin sisters is openly gay, teamed with the duo to develop it for TV in October 2021, with the Amazon-backed ad-supported streamer picking it up to series last May.
Tegan and Sara have sold more than 2 million albums and put out nine studio records. The Canadian performers launched the Tegan and Sara Foundation in 2017 to help fight for health, economic justice and representation for LGBTQ girls and women.
The Gilliland siblings are repped by the Osbrink Agency. Smulders is with UTA and Gang Tyre. Bornheimer is with Gersh, Haven Entertainment and attorney Todd Rubenstein.
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