Stranger Things’ David Harbour waltzed into the room like a dashing protagonist, hamming for the photographers with ease. This was Tuesday, a red-carpet event that was part of an opening bash for Netflix House, the 21st-century entertainment hub hoping to turn the brand known for chillin’ with your honey on the couch into a family-friendly destination. Nestled in the Galleria, in a Philip Johnson structure originally designed for a Marshall Field’s, Netflix House has been transformed into a pop-culture palace of art and neon and diversion; every nook and cranny will play well on Instagram.
The biggest draw might be the Stranger Things adventure room, where visitors try to solve a mystery in the haunted woods of Hawkins, Ind., in the 1980s. (Squid Game also has an adventure room.) The journalist beside me asked Harbour how the room compared to the actual set.
“We have those same exact vines,” he told her, and he was so close I could contemplate his neatly trimmed facial hair, which had transformed over his journey as heroic father figure Jim Hopper. The stubble and bushy cop mustache in Season 1 became the scraggly mountain-man beard in Season 5, and I was opening my mouth to ask him about this when he was briskly escorted out of the room.
Plot twist: There would be no David Harbour interview.
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‘Stranger Things’ galore
Cara Buono, who plays Karen Wheeler on “Stranger Things,” poses for a photo during red-carpet opening of the new Netflix House, on Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025, at Galleria Dallas.
Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer
Co-star Cara Buono proved more accessible, and it was hard to believe she was 54. Her skin looked ageless, a trick you can’t pull off with Botox and fillers without distorting your smile. Hers was natural.
“Let me tell you something about sunscreen,” she said. “So back in the ‘80s when no one was really talking about sunscreen, my lovely father was way into nutrition and wellness, and he was not a doctor. He was a truck mechanic.”
We got to chitchatting about Gen X tanning fads, girls slathering themselves with Banana Boat and baby oil. The nostalgia felt appropriate, since Buono plays suburban mom Karen Wheeler on Stranger Things, whose teased hair and shoulder pads mark her as a tragic victim of ’80s fashion. Karen gets her own hero’s journey, though, including fighting off a Demogorgon in her kitchen and daydreaming about hunky lifeguard Billy Hargrove.
When I spoke with the actor who plays Karen’s husband, Joe Chrest, he said if he had to play another character on Stranger Things, he’d choose Karen. “You get to flirt with the fabulous Billy,” he joked.
Joe Chrest, who plays Ted Wheeler on “Stranger Things,” poses during red carpet opening of the new Netflix House, on Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025, at Galleria Dallas.
Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer
The last Stranger Things star to appear was the youngest, Jake Connelly. Born in 2012, four years before the show debuted, Connelly became a breakout star in the fifth season as Derek, a bully turned ally. He worked the red carpet in a natty burgundy-and-black suit with a bow tie, and he had that child-actor way of making ordinary sentences sound adorable. “I gotta say, I would love to be Dustin,” he responded, when I asked who else he’d like to play. Dustin is one of the four boys at the heart of the show’s drama, a lovable oddball brought to life by Gaten Matarazzo.
I asked each of the Stranger Things cast members about their Netflix guilty pleasure. Buono was hooked on the soapy Texas-based drama The Hunting Wives, Chrest was a fan of the coming-of-age comedy Big Mouth and Connelly taught me about a 2023 animated sequel. “I gotta say, my favorite movie of all time, it’s kind of a weird one, is Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget.” Adorable.
Jake Connelly, who plays Derek Turnbow on “Stranger Things,” poses during red carpet opening of the new Netflix House, on Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025, at Galleria Dallas.
Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer
‘Love Is Blind,’ ‘Selling Sunset’ and Michael Irvin, too
The talent roster for the red carpet was chockablock with bold-face names, and I couldn’t have been the only sucker hectically scanning the stapled cheat sheet to figure out if these folks were from Squid Game: The Challenge (siblings Jeffrey and Perla Figuereo) or Love Is Blind (Season 8 couple Daniel and Taylor Hastings and Season 4 couple Brett Brown and Tiffany Pennywell, a Houston native who attended University of North Texas).
I had no trouble identifying Christine Quinn from the real-estate reality show Selling Sunset. She sauntered in like a Barbie doll on stilettos, with the crimson lipstick and long platinum waves of a golden-age Hollywood vixen.
Christine Quinn from “Selling Sunset” poses during red carpet opening of the new Netflix House, on Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025, at Galleria Dallas.
Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer
Quinn recently moved from Los Angeles to the Dallas area. “A lot of people don’t know I’m from Texas originally,” she said. “I went to Southlake Carroll.”
When I asked where she headed for a girls’ night out, she told me, “I’m a Billy Bob’s sloppy drunk. Jell-O shots? Absolutely love that.”
Michael Irvin served as the evening’s unofficial finale in a camel-colored turtleneck with a sharp plaid suit, fly as ever. Jada McLean and Claire Wolford, two Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders (technically alumni, but whatever), shimmied their pompoms on either side of Irvin as he posed for the camera. The cheerleaders skipped the media line, but Irvin dived in.
“I got some stranger things that no one knows about,” he told me, smiling and nodding at his own joke. Stranger Things: The Playmaker Years does have a nice ring. Irvin’s current guilty pleasure on Netflix is Squid Game, by the way, but he can’t figure out why the guy who won in Season 1 came back again in Season 2. Maaan, that’s crazy.
Dallas Cowboys Hall of Fame wide receiver Michael Irvin poses with Cowboys Cheerleaders Claire Wolford and Jada McLean during red carpet opening of the new Netflix House, on Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025, at Galleria Dallas.
Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer
Reeling in the crowds
Outside the exclusive red-carpet room, the party was hopping. Hundreds of guests angled for couches in the dining area, munching on pickle pizza or grilled cheese or sliders or (my favorite) tater tots drizzled in aioli.
Most celebrities were gone by the time I made it out there, but a few had stuck around. The Love Is Blind couples were chatting as a group (but were they compatible?), and the female duo from the romantic drama Virgin River unwound in a booth. Alexandra Breckenridge and Zibby Allen had walked the red carpet as a pair, goofy and giggly in a way you can only be when you’re best friends.
Alexandra Breckenridge (left) and Zibby Allen from “Virgin River” pose during red carpet opening of the new Netflix House, on Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025, at Galleria Dallas.
Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer
“I’d never done a red carpet with her,” Allen told me, placing a hand on Breckenridge’s shoulder. The two are so close they co-host a podcast, I Like You Very Much, and unlike many actors roped into these awkward interactions, they seemed to be having fun.
“We were!” Breckenridge said.
I’ve never seen Virgin River (confession: I’d never heard of Virgin River), but watching those two women crack each other up made me want to. Netflix House may be a bold new venture, but celebrities are still one of the best ways to reel in the crowds.
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