In Suite 901 at The London West Hollywood, Matthew Law is awaiting his moment. It’s a brisk May afternoon in Los Angeles, less than two days before the debut of Nemesis, Netflix’s latest crime thriller. The series’ 34-year-old lead actor—along with costar Y’lan Noel—has commandeered a massive hotel room for this publication’s cover photoshoot. But Law can't quite stay still.

He darts toward the balcony wearing a salmon-colored suit and a fully buttoned white dress shirt, looking out at the Hollywood Hills. Then, the man also known as Abbott Elementary’s tech whiz O’Shon drifts back to the center of the living space, which has been stripped of its furniture in favor of seamless photo backdrops, camera equipment, shoot personnel, and bystanders (including Law’s and Noel’s mothers). Minutes later, he’s back on the terrace, staring off into the distance, hoping to catch a glimpse of his scowl amongst the lush tree canopy.

“It’s rotating right now!” Law announces, referring to a dynamic billboard off in the distance that couldn’t possibly cycle any slower. “You know, we still working our way up,” he adds with a smirk.

Eventually, an ad for Nemesis comes into focus. Within days, the Courtney A. Kemp and Tani Marole-created series will hit No. 1 on Netflix in global markets far beyond the Beverly Hills skyline. The eight-episode series blends the underworld ambition and familial drama of Kemp’s Power universe with the existential cat-and-mouse chase of Heat.

Noel plays Coltrane Wilder, a prominent businessman who moonlights as the mastermind leading a small but cunning crew of thieves. Today, the 37-year-old star appears stoic in a mustard suit when cameras aim his way, as 50 Cent’s paranoid 2003 classic “Many Men” blares from someone’s small speaker like an unofficial theme song. The First Purge and Insecure alum says he reveled in depicting a principled man who just happens to catch a few bodies along the way. Meanwhile, Law portrays the tenacious Isaiah Stiles, a corner-cutting detective whose life and career unravel as his obsession with capturing Coltrane deepens.

These sworn enemies are walking contradictions who force viewers to reconsider easy binaries around morality and masculinity. Off-screen, however, Noel and Law’s chemistry feels palpable. Before cameras began snapping, the two men sat down with LEVEL to unpack the deeper themes behind their now-breakout hit Nemesis, going deep on grief, purpose, accountability, generational trauma, and whether Wilder and Stiles could ever become as friendly as the actors who play them.

LEVEL: How did you prepare to take on the roles of Isaiah Stiles and Coltrane Wilder?

Matthew Law: It was a lot of body work, chakra stuff, and woo-woo things. Getting out in the field with a bunch of tough dudes, shooting guns, and working those mechanisms. The challenge was [discovering] the human underneath this. What's the architecture of the pain that [shaped] how badass or tough he is? There are so many layers underneath. What’s in the soil?

Y’lan Noel: It was important for me to get as close as possible to Coltrane’s energy, because he's so still and restricts himself so much. One of his leadership characteristics is being calm, collected, and composed in the chaos. So you gotta fill that with enough angst, anxiety, passion, and enthusiasm so there’s still something to read there. It’s just filling the ancestral DNA of feeling entitled. Of wanting to take the land back. Of saying, “F**k you.” That was my study. Documentaries. Anything I could read.

Physically, I was loading weapons every day. I like opportunities where I can become more dangerous. My idea of peace is being dangerous enough that you never have to manifest danger upon anyone. You have an energy about you where people say, “I'd rather be peaceful with this guy.”

What do you remember about your first chemistry read together?

Y'lan Noel: There were a few guys up for the role of [Stiles]. It really was just whoever decided they would take it that day. That's what it came down to. It was fun for me to see, because I was already cast and they were looking for who would play opposite Coltrane. Who was gonna bring it? It was kind of hard to find. Matt walks in, like, “Yeah, this is mine.” [Laughs] I saw it happen. He might've been last on that particular day.

Matthew Law: I wasn't on the casting slate. Courtney Kemp saw me in something and said, “I think there's a lot of darkness in that man. I want to bring him in." And Tani was like, “The IT nigga [from Abbott Elementary]?” [Laughs] All of us have these dimensions—these peaks and valleys, shades and colors. I just really saw Isaiah. I was like, “I know him. I can bring something to it.” I think you flew in from New York.

Y'lan Noel: Yeah.

Matthew Law: Which he didn't have to do. But because he had such care for this and wanted to see it succeed, he showed up. When I walked into the room, he was so warm. I was a fan already. But I could feel that when the bell rang, he was gonna come out swinging. Mario [Van Peebles] was in the room. I met Courtney and Tani for the first time. I just saw this dynamic that called my spirit into action. It was easy because across from me was somebody making me rise to the challenge.

Y'lan Noel: I just happened to be the person with the role first. It would've been the exact same thing if Matt had been cast as Stiles before I was. But he was formidable. And that's the idea behind Nemesis. Someone sees O’Shon, and another person thinks, “O’Shon has a darkness.” You got a cop who's f**king explosive and sometimes reckless, but he has this passion and desire that could teeter on the other side of the law. You have Coltrane, who is supposed to be this smooth criminal but is navigating his own pain and doesn't necessarily know what to do at all times. Everybody has range, whether a librarian, an astronaut, or a reporter. The show makes people see there is some of us in all of us.

Matthew Law: And those things that we think we can keep hidden are screaming to get out.

The conversation between your two characters in your first scene together, in the third episode, feels like a contrast of two different ideas of masculinity.

Matthew Law: These are two men who are running to something, running through something, and running from something. Their views of what it means to be strong are linked to the wounds behind them and underneath layers of armor and paint. Both of them have a hard time confronting the inner enemy, so they find an external enemy—there’s always this externalizing of blame. All they know how to do is punish it, eliminate it, and win at any cost.

How do you think Coltrane perceives manhood?

Y'lan Noel: His father was a great role model in terms of his virtues and nobility. And his being a criminal has everything to do with circumstance. His father was that. Obviously, there's still residue of that time—we live in a land designed to exclude Black people. As a Black man, he fashioned himself to be a Robin Hood. In that same sense, Coltrane is like, “Yo, I’m taking everything that was mine and [belonged to] my ancestors. This is the life I want to live. You get to create your own rules.” It’s interesting because he also has integrity. How do you align being a criminal and potentially putting other people's lives in danger with being a man of integrity? Some of the most interesting tensions are when you see those contrasts.

Personally, I'm no authority on what masculinity is. I just kind of try to live with that similar integrity every day and take these types of opportunities to discover and be curious about what that means. I love playing characters who have that sort of defined masculinity. I love seeing what it's like to be tender and masculine. To shed a tear. To not know how to be in control when everybody's looking to you. Coltrane experiences a lot of those moments.

It seems like Coltrane and Isaiah are two sides of the same coin. 

Matthew Law: There’s a terror to feeling understood from across enemy lines. Maybe these are two men who have never felt understood their whole lives. It's isolating. They're both hunters and gatherers. They have to go through these [lifestyles], whether it’s for their communities, their families, or their legacies. Then there’s this very warped reflection that they start to find. It's weird to see yourself in your enemy. These are two men who know how to make war but not peace.

Y'lan Noel: Particularly with each other, and whatever it is they see in each other. Whether they fear each other or the ability of another man to potentially dethrone them. What does that mean while still trying to find peace? I don’t know. For Coltrane with his wife, what does that mean? He's trying to run towards that.

Who do you see as the good guy in Nemesis? And do you think your character would agree?

Matthew Law: I see Dominic Lombardozzi’s character (Detective Dave Cerullo) as a good guy. He has a good scope on things. Stiles is self-centered. He only knows how to fix things with his own two hands. He's myopic in that way. One-track mind. I don't think he's able to zoom out. He's got some things to answer for.

Y'lan Noel: You're saying he's not a good guy?

Matthew Law: No, he's a great guy. The way I saw him is like he hit the rearview mirrors off a Lambo. [Looking forward] is the only thing he feels connected to. He's getting a lot of good advice, but he ain't listening. He’s not seeing the carnage behind him.

Y'lan Noel: It's hard for me not to see Coltrane as a good guy, but that's obviously biased. I don't really buy into the idea of good and bad—unless you're just a terror who has impacted humanity in such a catastrophic way that we might completely castigate and discard you. But most of us tend to blur lines, which these characters do. Someone runs a red light and gets into a crash. That same person might go home and love on his wife and baby. So [Coltrane] could check the box of a good guy, but I'm not so interested in that.

Matthew Law: I think Stiles is afraid of not being a good guy. I had that as part of his foundation. There was a lot of fear with his father and seeing his brother die by going down this [criminal] route that he started to [internalize] some of these binary ideas. I was like, “Why would he become a cop?” I think it was to be a good guy. He's trying to be a good husband and father. And then he's torn off all these layers. These ideas of good and bad have fallen apart. It forces the audience to rethink that binary.

Y'lan Noel: Both these men are trying to deal with their environments. Stiles is in this very regimented world as a cop. There are a lot of rules and guidelines. Whereas with criminality, the presiding characteristic is the opposite. It’s chaos. Lawlessness. No church in the wild. So [Coltrane] needs control. His regimented personality comes from saying, “If they zag, I have to zig.” That's the way to win in that field.

Matthew Law: They're both playing in a world where the rules are used to imprison them, literally or in culture. It's fascinating. Jeff Pierre, who plays Los Angeles district attorney Malik Jacobson, embraces that system. From a moral point of view, you could say that's a good guy. I think he's the biggest asshole! [Laughs] But once again, these people don't exist in a vacuum. I think Courtney, Tani, and the writers have placed them wonderfully. How are they responding to a game that's unfair? How do you win at a game where the laws are used to injure and hurt you? I think you break them on both sides.

I kept thinking about how Stiles’ character would read if he were white.

Matthew Law: Whiteness is used as a badge in the [real] world—there's freedom from any sort of accountability. In our show, there's never a moment where these men are not a second away from accountability crashing down. Whether that's plans falling apart, the way Stiles ends up in handcuffs, the presumptions of guilt. And also the lineage of where they come from. Why was his father a criminal? Where does gang life come from? Our show is playing with Los Angeles history that is linked to what it means to be Black in America.

Coltrane is a successful businessman and has completed so many successful heists. What do you think drives him?

Y'lan Noel: His identity is wrapped up in being great at what he does, and that’s haunting. He fears what life would look like without his sense of purpose that he found and cultivated.

Matthew Law: I sometimes ask how characters rest. I can't imagine Coltrane or Stiles ever resting. There’s always something around the corner. Always tomorrow.

Y'lan Noel: For Coltrane, he was going to have a baby, but then the pregnancy was terminated. It's like, “Okay, I don't have that excuse anymore to quit. So I double down. I’m going to give it everything.” I don't think those are things he's intentionally thinking, but that's what his spirit is doing. 

He’s grieving.

Exactly. I'm going to put it all in my work and my passion, as so many people do. There’s nobody I could talk to, so I'm going to work.

Fatherhood is a big theme here. How do you think Isaiah’s relationship with his dad, Amos “Nightmare” Stiles, informs the way he parents? 

Matthew Law: For myself, not having a father growing up, I was raised by my mother and she taught me everything I needed to know about kindness, strength, all these things. When it came to fatherhood, I started to imagine an outline of a man. Everybody [else] already has [a dad], so I get to pick what [characteristics] I want. For Isaiah, his father being out in the streets, being locked up, being the reason he lost his brother, he started to say, well, I get to choose what a father looks like. So he paints this idealized version of what a father could be. He finds that a bit in [LAPD Captain James] Sealy. But I think he stepped into this outline and realized he painted an impossible picture. So now he's making all the promises to his son that were never fulfilled for him. “The sins of our fathers” is definitely a [theme].

Based on Coltrane’s character, how would he show up as a dad?

Y'lan Noel: That's potentially his only saving grace. Because, in contrast to Stiles, he had a great father he wanted to be like. A father he could learn from, whose journal he’s still carrying around with his mantras and philosophy. The idea of not being a good father would be the opposite of [how he lives] his life. He's probably afraid of becoming a father and leaving the game, because then his identity would be somebody who has to instill the values his father left him with.

It's operating in the same way for me. I also didn't grow up with a father, but part of the reason I've been intentional about who I'm going to bring a child into the world with is that I intend on being a great father. And also timing. I'm like, “Damn, there are so many things I'm trying to do and be there for.” I know what ideal I have in my head in terms of being a father and actually being there—the opposite of what I experienced. It’s gonna mean everything. I'm staying fit so I can run around with the chil’ren.

If Nemesis is greenlit for a second season, do you think there’s a future where Coltrane and Stiles ever find themselves with a common enemy? Could they ever work together?

Matthew Law: Nahhh. [Laughs] I put nothing past Courtney and Tani. I love that the internal worlds are so rich to explore. The family dynamics. But where the season leaves off feels like halftime to me—and Stiles is down. On the other side, Coltrane’s whole world is crashing down. I mean, maybe if there was an extraterrestrial threat or something. [Laughs]

Y'lan Noel: I agree. It’s a draw. Will the sun and the moon ever decide the victor of the 24 hours?