Trivia / What Would You Do?

• Actor-Shared Background: The show is fond of Meta Casting to give Reality Subtext to their scenarios.
• Descended Creator: John Quiñones himself occasionally turns up in scenarios.
• Disabled Character, Disabled Actor: Ableism-related scenarios certainly involves actors of the corresponding condition.
• Enforced Method Acting:
  • Sometimes, an actor playing in a scenario will be profoundly moved by people getting involved, and will have a cry while still in character. One notable incident was when a waiter berated a lesbian couple in front of their children and a fellow restaurant patron later approached the couple with a lengthy handwritten letter. One of the actresses was herself a lesbian parent.
  • The scenario of a woman stealing a man’s money at the mall caught the attention of a former cop, who immediately jumped in to hold the thief in place until authorities arrived. While the actress was a little shaken afterwards, she still respected the woman for taking immediate action.
  • In the “purse snatcher” scenario from 2007, the actor playing the culprit, Brian, was punched in the face by a bystander. They later discussed this moment when he came back to redo the scenario a decade later; he thankfully wasn’t attacked the second time around.
    Brian: Thank god we now live in a kinder, gentler world!
  • The “car robber” scenarios provoked similar reactions from citizens, with one man nearly striking the actor with a chair. Luckily, security intervened before anyone was hurt, and the actor simply rolled with it before making his exit.
  • From the “racist hairdresser” scenario: one customer, a professional diversity trainer, took the hairdresser aside and calmly taught her to be more accepting towards the interracial couple, even convincing her to hug it out with the woman she was bullying. The actress, Rachael, was genuinely moved to tears by the customer’s loving spirit, and incorporated that reaction into her character.
  • The "abusive grandparents" scenario upset an onlooking mother so much that she burst into tears while confronting the fake grandparents. The grandfather (still in-character) genuinely apologized for upsetting her, while the grandmother admitted to getting emotional herself once the scene ended.
• Hey, It's That Place!: Watch the show long enough and you'll notice that they repeatedly use a few of the same neighborhoods and businesses in the Connecticut/New York/New Jersey area. So far, no marks have noticed, but one wonders when they're going to start.
• Irony as She Is Cast: An episode about a homophobic baker not wanting to serve gay and lesbian customers has said baker being played by a gay man.
• No Export for You: Although WWYD? occasionally hits the road and travels to other states, there are certain places they'll never be allowed to film (such as California or Florida) due to laws against hidden camera and microphone taping of the public.
• Queer Character, Queer Actor: Gay Aesop scenarios often feature actors who are members of the LGBT community.
• Playing Against Type: The show reuses a number of actors in particular roles but more often than not cast them in opposite roles. An example would be tenured cast member Traci Hovel, who frequently plays antagonists, sometimes turn up as the victim in certain scenarios.
• Promoted Fanboy: This often happens during the part in each segment where John Quiñones comes out to reveal that the scenario is staged. Usually, the person will react in an excited manner and might even tell John they've seen his show.
• Real-Life Relative: The show has often used actors/actresses who are family members in certain scenarios. John Quiñones' son even appeared one time in a date-related episode.
• Reality Subtext: Some of the actors and actresses talk to Quiñones about how they've dealt with the scenario themselves in Real Life.
• Series Hiatus: After 16 seasons, the series stopped production in 2020 as a result of the COVID-19 Pandemic. ABC gave the green light for more episodes in May 2023, with Season 17 premiering on February 18, 2024.
• Similarly Named Works: Not to be confused with a Nickelodeon show from the early '90s, although both use hidden cameras.
• You Look Familiar: They tend to reuse several of their actors, and so far no marks seem to have noticed.
  • This is frequently the case with an actress named Traci Hovel, who appears in several roles that require a woman in her thirties (her roles have ranged from beleaguered waitress to supermarket con artist to lazy EMT). Sharp-eyed viewers might also notice that Traci occasionally gets Demoted to Extra whenever WWYD runs scenarios in restaurants or stores, and in those cases she usually takes on the minor role of clerk or waitress (or even fellow patron) just in case a customer needs someone to vent to. And from the looks of things, the poor woman actually works the job itself for the day.
  • This is also the case with an actor named Jeremy Holm, who like Traci participates in a wide range of scenarios, and frequently takes on waiter roles. Quiñones mentioned in one narration that Jeremy works as a waiter in Real Life whenever he doesn't have an acting job.
  • Quiñones lampshades the trope in one episode, when he identifies one actor playing an anti-Semetic store clerk as having played a racist clerk in two other WWYD scenarios.
  • The Utah episode provides an info pop-up on the bottom of the screen that points out that this is the 17th time the actor playing the abusive husband/boyfriend has played a villain in such a scenario.
  • In a scenario where two young men in fatigues went into a bar, supposedly just back from deployments in Afghanistan, and tried to order drinks despite being underage, one mark turned out to have been in the “guy tries to buy beer to celebrate one year of sobriety” scenario.

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