'Jury Duty: Company Retreat' Star Anthony Norman Says Life After the Show Feels 'Surreal' (Exclusive)
It's been a month since the finale of Jury Duty: Company Retreat aired and Anthony Norman is still wrapping his head around the entire experience.
The Nashville native, 26, spent weeks filming what he believed was a legitimate documentary for a new temp job, only to discover his "coworkers" were actually a cast full of actors. It's a high-stakes premise that worked pretty brilliantly for the first season of the franchise, which became a massive hit and earned both Emmy and Golden Globe nominations. Now, as the face of the second installment, Norman is navigating a new reality where fans frequently recognize him in the wild.
"A gentleman stopped me in the airport, and he was so excited to see me," Norman tells Men's Journal in an exclusive interview. "He was just like, ‘Me and my wife and my daughter, we were watching the show, and you made us cry.' Basically, he was just sharing with me that they bonded as a family over a show. Just as a family man, that really touches me."
For Norman, the reaction has been both unexpected and humbling. Despite being labeled a "hero" for the gracious way he handled himself during the (very manufactured) corporate chaos, he's still adjusting to the praise. "It is a little weird, just because I don't feel deserving of it," he admits. "I don't feel like I did anything that anybody else would do."
The attention of course ramped up after the finale, when it was revealed to Norman that the Rockin' Grandma's Hot Sauce "company retreat" was all fake. "Now that the finale is out, it's starting to happen a little bit more," Norman says of the public recognition, adding that the reaction has been "really all positive things."
That positivity hit home when his mother and young son attended the premiere with him. "Before the end of the first [episode], she was crying from laughter, just joy," he explains to MJ. His sister followed up with a heartfelt text, telling him that "everything that people are saying in the comments is so true, and how lucky she is to have me."
While audiences see Norman as an unlikely hero, he views his actions as pure common sense. "I do think that a lot of people would have got to the same conclusion as me," he says. "We like to say that the world is so ugly, but I refuse to see it like that. I know there's a lot of beautiful people and a lot of good souls out there."
He insists nothing about his performance was manufactured, either. In fact, at no point did he feel pushed by production to react a certain way. "I just feel like I was being myself," he says. "I wasn't ever pushed to do anything that I didn't really want to do."
And even when the curtain was finally pulled back, the truth took a moment to sink in. "In that moment, you're still really trying to collect everything," he says. "You're doing mental gymnastics, just trying to plug everything and trying to make everything make sense."
Looking back, Norman–who grew up playing sports–compares the experience to reviewing game footage. "As an athlete, I kind of look at it as, like, watching film," he explains. "You always see your improper-‘Oh yeah, I should have did better'-but overall, it was just a cool experience to see yourself on a big screen like that."
Despite the sudden fame, Norman isn't planning a massive move to Hollywood anytime soon. "I'm definitely open to it," he says. "But if opportunities come, I'm open to them. I would more like to see myself maybe just doing, like, small commercials or brand deals."
For now, he's simply enjoying the fact that his son gets to see his dad in a positive light on screen. "He definitely was like, ‘Oh, Dad, that's you on TV,'" Norman says. "It's something I could be proud of."
Jury Duty Presents: Company Retreat is available for streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
Related: Amazon's ‘Jury Duty' Unveils New Trailer & Season 2 Release Date
This story was originally published by Men's Journal on May 5, 2026, where it first appeared in the Entertainment section. Add Men's Journal as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
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This story was originally published May 5, 2026 at 1:55 PM.