Sean Kaufman portrays Steven in The Summer I Turned Pretty, based on the book series by Jenny Han. New episodes of the third and final season premiere weekly, every Wednesday on Prime Video. I caught up with the actor to discuss why the accident was such an important wake-up call for his character, Steven’s different relationships, all of the drama from episode seven, and more.

It’s the end of her junior year of college, and Belly’s looking forward to another summer in Cousins with her soulmate, Jeremiah. Her future seems set, until some core-shaking events bring her first love Conrad back into her life. Now on the brink of adulthood, Belly finds herself at a crossroads and must decide which brother has her heart. Summer will never be the same…

We’re talking right after the most recent episode, so my emotions are everywhere because of that ending. It really was crazy from start to finish.
Sean Kaufman: Absolutely insane, I’m really glad people got to see this one. This is one that I think we all had so much fun shooting. It was one of the few episodes, up to this point, where we’ve all been together. So, it was really, really fun to shoot and get that experience. I’m glad people were able to see it, and obviously, yeah, the end, everything, the heartbreak.

Oh my gosh, “loml” by Taylor Swift — you crossed a line with that one. What is one music moment that, as a viewer, you were like, ‘Really? This is what we’re pulling out here?’
Oh, this is such a cheap answer, but you haven’t seen it yet. I’m excited for you guys to hear it. It was one that I think we were all like, “Oh, that’s a good one.” The best is yet to come, that’s all I gotta say.

We did get to see Conrad find out that Jeremiah cheated, but your character was not in that scene. Since I can’t ask you if Steven’s going to find out, how do you think Steven would have reacted if he were present for that interaction?
I actually don’t know. That’s a really interesting question because that’s… oh, that’s such an interesting question because I think the way that Steven versus Conrad would have dealt with it in that moment is like, oh, I don’t know. I haven’t thought about that.

Conrad, obviously, had to kind of feel that on his own, and I feel like having Steven there, whether he was off to the side with him or in that group with Jeremiah, would have been a very interesting thing to explore…
Honestly, I feel like if he had found out in that moment, I don’t even think Conrad would have been a thought. I think he would have dealt with that another time. I’d like to say he would have, in that moment, beat Jeremiah’s ass. I don’t know, I’d like to think so. You might have seen a bar fight at that point.

Steven agrees to take this big leap with Denise, who wants to start her own company with him and his idea. Do you think this is something he would have considered if not for the accident? I know your character has said that it was a wake-up call for him.
Yeah, no, he would not have considered that without the accident. The accident is the big kind of turning point for him, I think, in all three seasons. I think that it’s this moment where he kind of looks around, and he looks at the people that he’s with and the job that he’s in, and he realizes all of this grinding, working hard, and everything he’s done, what has it been for if he can’t enjoy himself? And I think that the wonderful thing about Denise is that they’re working on this opportunity that he actually feels passionate about, and I think that was a big, important note for him after the crash, where he’s like, I was about to die, and I was doing stuff that I wasn’t passionate about, I need to, God forbid, I leave the earth tomorrow, at least be doing what I know I love. I think for him, Denise pushes him to do that in this beautiful way, and that’s why the two of them really get along because he’s passionate about her and passionate about his game, and the start. Yeah, so I definitely think the crash influenced that a lot.

At the bridal shower, Steven and Taylor agree to be just friends, and then in this episode, she’s offering to be his wingman and actually goes through with it. He and Denise have that conversation where she’s like, “Taylor just wants you to be happy.” Can you talk me through what that meant to Steven and what his headspace is right now in terms of how he views Taylor, especially given all of their history?
Yeah, I mean, I think his headspace is super confused. I think his head is spinning right now because there’s a difference between what he wants to believe and what he probably knows he believes, and he knows that he loves Taylor, and he knows that he wants to be friends with her. It’s one of those things where I think he’s in a whirlpool right now, because he wants to be friends with her, but he’s constantly second-guessing, there’s no way this could actually work as friends, you know? I think that’s why he brings up the no contact and everything. It’s interesting, it’s just pulling him apart in so many different directions and really messing with him about what he can do, and just in general, like, this is his first time in a love triangle. I was literally just talking about this, I was like, yo, now he gets Belly, because people make it sound like it’s so easy to just choose one of the two, and it’s probably the right thing to do, just choose one of the two but like, man, your emotions and feelings are all over the place, every second, every time you look at one of them. So, he’s really tossing and turning in his sleep, you know?

Where we started with Steven in season one is so different than where he is in season three. In season two, we built up Steven and Taylor, but now, you have him thrown into this love triangle. Did you ever imagine that for him? How far in advance to Jenny tell you, and what was your reaction?
I don’t know when she told me. I honestly think I found out while I was reading the scripts, while I got them individually. I don’t think there was any kind of heads-up about it, and I think that it was definitely an interesting one. To see where he came from in season one, especially to even see where he ended in season two, it was such a flip, and I was just like, ‘Wow, this is interesting. This guy is confused.’ It’s definitely fun to play with, though, like reading it and then getting to play with that stuff is so much fun.

Yeah, I feel like we’re all confused, so it’s fine. That’s why we relate to the show.
Exactly, the show is messy, and that’s why people like it because everybody’s messy. Everybody’s lives are messy.

I have loved seeing Steven wanting to help out Taylor and her mom, despite the fact that they’re not together anymore. He even leaves Denise to go and help Lucinda, who’s clearly struggling. I feel like it really gives us a new perspective, not that we didn’t know he was family-oriented before, but we’re seeing how much he values it in a new light with Taylor and her family. What does it mean to get to show that side of him? They all reacted differently when they lost Susannah, but I feel like a lot of the focus was on her boys and Belly.
Yeah, I think family is one of the more important things to Steven, and I think that Taylor and Lucinda are his family. They’ve known each other forever. Lucinda has known Steven since he was a baby, you know what I mean? One thing I love about Steven is that he will never hesitate, ever, to care about the day ones in his life, like people that have been there, and whether it’s just offering $5,000 to Taylor or helping Lucinda drunk, if he sees someone that he loves in need, he will immediately jump into action when it comes to that. I think that’s what I love about him. It’s interesting, like you were saying, grief works in so many different ways, and in season two, to watch Steven deal with his grief in a way that conflicted with Belly’s was really interesting, and there’s no real right way to grieve, obviously, but now to see just how much he actually does care about family, and that it’s not a front and it’s not fake, it’s kind of beautiful. I’m glad we were able to kind of delve into that more this year.

We touched on this before, how the accident has changed Steven and what he wants out of life. It’s such an important lesson for audiences, and even for yourself, I’m sure. What has that been like for you to portray?
Yeah, I mean, I remember reading it and kind of figuring out why everything happens and what the arc is, and I just remember being like, ‘Oh, this is, hopefully, telling all the viewers and telling me as an actor, you got to go for it.’ It’s really hard and scary sometimes to quit a job that you don’t like or break up with the person that you don’t necessarily gel with; it’s really hard because change is scary. But I think that at any point, God forbid, something could happen and you could not be here on this earth and to think that you would have gone your life without doing what you actually would have loved to do and being with the person you actually would have loved to be with, it’s a heartbreaking message and one that Steven got very lucky with because he came out the other side. And I think, hopefully, the audience can kind of take that and run with that, and be like, I am going to do the thing that I’m passionate about, not the maybe easiest path in the world, but the thing that I know that I will be happy with, like the Van Gogh way of life; I don’t know, maybe he wasn’t happy, but just a happier way of living with yourself at the end of the night, you know?

One of the relationships that I know fans have really loved since season one is Steven and Conrad’s, and we haven’t gotten to see too much of them this season. We did get that conversation with Steven thanking Conrad for making the phone call, but are we going to see them rebuild that closeness that they previously had before the series ends?
I just don’t remember, is the thing. We shot it so long ago, I really don’t remember. I will say, though, I think one of the things that Chris and I talked about, and I saw it on the internet a little bit, was people being like, “Oh, it’s so heartbreaking seeing Steven and Conrad’s relationship,” and “The show feels different.” I think that it’s very intentional. He went off to California, and they haven’t talked in years. They might have been best friends at the end of season two, but they’re their own people now with their own lives, and everything is different, kind of. So, to see that awkwardness while still trying to be polite is definitely heartbreaking, but it just is reality, and it happens a lot to people. You know, it happened to all my high school friends, and I think that, hopefully, they are able to reconcile with each other in whatever way and come closer, whether it’s through this season or past the show, like in the future, in their own lives. I just think their bond is very special, and I think that’s why it was so heartbreaking to watch that scene in the season, especially.

You have officially had a dance number in every season, so which has been your favorite, your most challenging, and the one that you were most excited to see the final version of, if you had to give each of them a title?
Okay, favorite: Steven and Taylor, “Party in the U.S.A.” Favorite. So much fun, Rain’s amazing. That was incredible. The one that was the most challenging was this one in episode seven, this dance one. It was just in this really tight room, and it was like, we were supposed to be acting like we didn’t know what we were really doing and we were all messing up. We had to do that worm thing, and it was really, just like, what is going on? That was crazy. And then, the one that I was most excited to see come out was the season one Deb [ball], the male dancing with Steven and Jeremiah. I remember filming that, and I was like, I cannot wait, I want to see how this turns out.

And you had just started the show, too.
Yeah, that was crazy to me. That was the one I was most excited to see, and I think it came out pretty well.