If last night’s highly-anticipated (well, mostly by Jax Taylor) series premiere of The Valley left you with more questions than answers, you’re not alone. Does Kristen Doute think West Hollywood is a “concrete jungle”? What sane person would hire a tattoo artist for a birthday party with an open bar? Why did Jesse Lally have a bottle of champagne ready to go at 9:59 in the morning and where can we apply to be Isabella’s nanny if he’s sharing? These will remain mysteries for the time being. But one question we can actually answer is why Danny Booko probably looks familiar, at least to those of us already booted from our parent’s health insurance.
About 12 seconds into Danny’s opening interview he humbly informs us that he’s been “a professional working actor for 18 years.” Considering we’ve heard similar claims from other esteemed SURvers such as Tom Sandoval and Scheana Schay whose combined IMDb credits make Heather Dubrow look like Meryl Streep, it wouldn’t be surprising if Danny was clout-chasing.
But by the time Jax — a 44-year-old man — pantsed Danny for leaving the party early, I was convinced I really had seen his face before. When I finally laid eyes on Danny’s IMDb page, I gasped more dramatically than Nia cried because everyone saw her husband’s “pee-pee” (Jax’s words not mine).
For the record, Danny goes professionally by Daniel, but, unlike his wife, I will not be calling him that. Danny has appeared in the holy trinity of 2000s kids’ shows: The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, iCarly, and Hannah Montana, on which he played celebrity bad boy Stavros. In the episode, Danny (as Stavros) gives Hannah’s brother Jackson (who in a bizarrely Freudian plotline has been confused as Hannah’s hot new boyfriend) a crash course on how to cash in on sponcon as a celeb. Ironically enough this is a lesson that could be v useful to Danny if Bravo keeps the VPR spinoff around long enough for Nia to get a DM from Sugarbear Hair Vitamins, or whatever.
Danny also had guest spots on The O.C., Entourage, and my personal favorite Desperate Housewives, where he played very convincing variations of a douchey frat boy type. Imagine how good his performances would’ve been if he had Jax and Jesse around to help him method act.
My first impression of #TheValley is that most of these people are terrible humans and kind of unhinged. It almost feels like the early seasons of VPR when literally no one was likeable pic.twitter.com/9vk0rwDHwo
— Baby gorgeous (@babygorge0us) March 20, 2024
Honestly, after scrolling through Danny’s credits, I’m kind of impressed? He even has more recent appearances on bangers like Shameless. Anyone who’s hung out with Jeremy Allen White is low-key cooler than me. Judging by the level of dysfunction in this friend group Danny’s toughest gig yet will be pretending any of the other couples are going to last.
