Spencer James is a high schooler caught between worlds in All American

It’s Spencer James’ birthday, but he’s not home with his family. Instead he’s on speakerphone as his mother tells him that she loves him “to the moon and back.” Or more specifically in his case, to Beverly Hills and back.

Based on the real-life story of former NFL player Spencer Paysinger, the new CW drama All American follows Spencer James (Daniel Ezra), a high schooler from South Central Los Angeles, as he’s recruited to play football in Beverly Hills by Billy Baker (Taye Diggs), a former NFL player whose (very nice) office is decorated with old jerseys and Coach of the Year trophies. Coach Baker’s thinking is simple: Beverly High will offer Spencer a better shot at his dream of playing professional football. But for Spencer, Beverly High means going back and forth from a world he knows to one he doesn’t. “He’s very much straddling those two worlds and feeling like he doesn’t belong in either,” says April Blair, who wrote the pilot and served as showrunner until October 2.

And each world comes with its fair share of problems, something that Spencer Paysinger — known as “Real Spencer” on set — wanted to make sure the show addressed. “It’s easy to look at South Central and say, ‘That’s a bad place,’ and it’s easy to look at Beverly Hills and say, ‘It will be a cakewalk,’ but it just exposed me to a different set of problems,” Paysinger says. “Both sides relate to each other more than they think.”

All of those issues come together to create a show that Blair describes as “90 percent drama and 10 percent soap opera,” as they aim to have fun while also tackling difficult issues, such as racial identity, sexuality, and gang life. “We’re going to talk about stuff like: Do black men need to leave their community and enter the white world to succeed? How does the community look at Billy’s character for marrying a white woman?” Blair says. “There’s a lot of hot-button topics we want to talk about.”

And that’s not including the drama that will play out on the field. Producer Robbie Rogers says the show is “Straight Outta Compton meets The O.C. with a touch of Friday Night Lights … or maybe a lot of Friday Night Lights.” After all, the one thing that ties Spencer to this new world is his love of the game. “Some of the most exciting scenes happen within the football games,” Ezra says. “Football is a naturally pressurized environment. It’s a show about relationships and family, but it’s playing out on one of the most exciting stages in America.” And that says a lot coming from a Brit, who still hasn’t mastered the perfect spiral. But with Paysinger as an executive consultant and another former NFL player in the writers’ room, Ezra will have every chance to learn. As for Spencer, he’s got Coach Baker to help him both on and off the field. “There are so many different dynamics between them,” Diggs says of Billy and Spencer. “The obvious is coach/player; there’s father/son; and there’s brother-to-brother because they come from the same place.”

And that place is South Central, where Spencer can be found celebrating his birthday. After a long day at school, the football star is happy to put down the phone and return home to his family. (The cake doesn’t hurt either.)

All American premieres Wednesday, Oct. 10 at 9 p.m. ET on The CW.

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