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Riverdale has recently aired another of its flashback episodes, with the cast yet again getting to play the younger versions of their off-screen parents.
In "Chapter Eighty-Eight: Citizen Lodge," streaming now on The CW in the U.S. and Netflix around the world, we learn the story of how Hiram Lodge (usually played by Mark Consuelos) went from a humble shoeshine boy to the big bad of Riverdale Season 5.
Many fans will have noted that the casting of young Hiram Lodge was almost uncanny. Here's why young Hiram Lodge looks so much like the older version.
Young Hiram Lodge on Riverdale is played by Michael Consuelos
That name might be unfamiliar to many viewers of the Archie Comics series. After all the actor has only appeared in one short film (The Bensonhurst Spelling Bee in 2012) and provided voices for kids shows Go, Diego! Go! and Duck Dodgers.
What might be more familiar, however, is the actor's surname. The reason young Hiram is the spitting image of the older one is is because Michael Consuelos is the eldest son of Mark Consuelos.
The 24-year old actor is the first of three children that the elder Consuelos had with wife Kelly Ripa. Their second child Lola was born in 2001, while Joaquin was born in 2003.
Michael Consuelos previously played the younger version of his dad in another Riverdale episode. In 2018, he starred in Season 3 episode "The Midnight Club."
Riverdale has become somewhat of a family affair for the Ripa-Consuelos family. In 2019, Kelly Ripa also cameoed on The CW show as Mrs. Mulwray, the mistress of Hiram.
In the lead-up to "Citizen Lodge" airing, Michael Consuelos posted a picture of him and his father on set on Instagram, captioning it, "Dad telling me to go home and change before anyone notices we're pretty much matching."
Asked by Decider how he got into his father's role, the young actor said: "I worked on my voice. That was a big thing for me, speaking with confidence, because Hiram, even as an unsure, young guy, he's very firm. He stands for what he believes in and he makes you believe what he's talking about. I needed to work on that.
"I threw my dad in there, but tried to make it my own just to show that Hiram isn't exactly the same guy. He became who he is. He's kind of Archie-ish, I think, in the beginning. Kind of like the boy next door, nice guy type. He's Archie if he went down a really dark path."
Michael Consuelos is not the only Michael set to play his father's gangster character on screen this year. This episode comes out a few months before James Gandolfini's son Michael Gandolfini appears in The Sopranos prequel movie The Many Saints of Newark as a young Tony Soprano.
Riverdale airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET / 7 p.m. CT on The CW and Thursdays on Netflix.
