'Bad Monkey:' Ronald Peet calls capuchin castmate 'an absolute star'

NEW YORK, Oct. 9 (UPI) -- Ronald Peet says several reasons exist because he was eager to play fisherman Neville in the mystery dramedy, Bad Monkey , but he was especially excited about working alongside a true screen icon -- Crystal the Monkey.

"I never had the artistic opportunity to play a Bahamian, and I am from the Bahamas, from Nassau. That was a big draw," Peet told UPI in a recent Zoom interview.

"Working with Crystal the Monkey? I was like: 'I want to do that. I want to do things I've never done before and that are maybe scary to me or just kind of have question marks around in my head,'" the actor added.

"Being part of the Bill Lawrence universe was absolutely appealing, getting to shoot in Miami and live in Miami for a while and shoot in the Bahamas was appealing."

Wrapping up its first season Wednesday on Apple TV+, Lawrence's adaptation of Carl Hiaasen's novel follows Andrew Yancy ( Vince Vaughn ), a fired police detective now working as a restaurant inspector in the Florida Keys.

When a tourist reels in a severed arm while fishing, Yancy tries to solve the case and get his job back.

His investigation leads him to one faked death, several real murders and a real-estate scheme that robs Neville of his family home in the Bahamas.

The tiny, charismatic mammal of the show's title is Neville's pet Driggs.

"Crystal is a star, an absolute star! She's been in the game for longer almost than I've been alive, so she knows what she's doing," Peet said of the monkey, who began her career in 1997's George of the Jungle and also appeared in the Night at the Museum films, The Hangover Part II and The Fabelmans .

"Working with her changed my life. She was so grounding, and it was really meditative to be with her," he added.

Peet described Neville, Yancy's reluctant partner, as a "stoic" man.

"He's quite content with the simple things in life, but does have dreams, and that resonates with me and with most people that I know, whether they admit it or not," Peet said.

"He has a really interesting moral compass that isn't super-religious and it's not super-chaste, but it's good. It's kind of pure and it's good and it was nice to be able to channel that aspect of myself."

Peet loved working with Lawrence, the creator of Scrubs, Shrinking, Spin City and Cougar Town , and praised him as "a fantastic leader."

"I think that a really successful leader is one who brings out the best in the team and can then kind of remove themselves and be like, 'I've shown you all how brilliant you all are,' maybe not even by letting you know that he was showing you that, but just by cultivating an environment in which you could be," Peet said.

The show is a professional departure for the actor known for more serious roles in Blindspot , The Meyerowitz Stories and First Reformed .

Peet said he learned a lot about comedy from sharing scenes with Old School and Wedding Crashers alum Vaughn.

"It was awesome to have a front seat to his improv master class every day on set," Peet said.

"That's not a world that I've ever really been in before, so I was really able to just soak it in with so much appreciation."

The cast of Bad Monkey includes Reese Antoinette, Natalie Martinez, Rob Delaney, Michelle Monaghan , L. Scott Caldwell, Jodie Turner-Smith and Meredith Hagner.