Stranger Things Star Gaten Matarazzo's New Part-Time Job Is Another Netflix Series

By Lauren Rearick


The third season of Stranger Things hasn’t even arrived in our Netflix queues although, nevertheless luckily, fans of the sci-fi series will get to like a little bit more screen time with one of the show’s lead actors. The streaming service reported the launch of its own concealed camera prank show, and Gaten Matarazzo, 16,  was selected as host.


Gaten, who Stranger Things fans know as Dustin, will guide viewers through Prank Encounters, a show centered on a pair of strangers that “think they’re their beginning day at a new job. It’s organization as typical up until their paths collide and these part-time jobs turn into full-time nightmares,” Entertainment Weekly reports. The teen will also serve as executive producer of the series.


Prank Encounters is scheduled to debut later this year with an eight-episode run. Unfortunately, we’ll have to wait and visualize whether any of his Stranger Things costars make a visitor appearance on the series (fingers crossed for Joe Kerry), however Gaten is already prepared, sharing an in back of the scenes picture on his Instagram. “Who is ready for my new show with @netflix,” he wrote. “So excited for you to be able to see Prank Encounters.”


Along with his upcoming duties as a television host, Gaten is touring the United States in a musical group with his sister, and he’s preparing for a role in the Hollywood Bowl’s musical production of Into the Wild, Deadline reports.


The rest of his Stranger Things cast members have also been keeping busy ahead of the show’s July 4 return. Finn Wolfhard was selected because the face of a new Saint Laurent campaign ahead of the fall release of his film The Goldfinch, Millie Bobby Brown was named a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, and Caleb McLaughlin teamed up with Planet Fitness to provoke teenagers to workout. Meanwhile, Joe Keery keeps it up and continues to have the world’s greatest hair, and was cast in the film Free Guy, which stars Ryan Reynolds and Jodie Comer.