Niecy Nash-Betts Is Planning to See ‘Friend’ Travis Kelce Play Football After Grotesquerie: ‘It’s Personal Now’ (Exclusive)

Though she’s seen him play with the Kansas City Chiefs before, the actress tells PEOPLE it’s “different” now that she knows the tight end personally.

Niecy Nash-Betts has a date with the Kansas City Chiefs!

The actress, who stars in Ryan Murphy’s Grotesquerie alongside Travis Kelce, tells PEOPLE she is ready to return the favor and go see the tight end, 34, do his thing after witnessing him step out of his comfort zone for his first-ever scripted TV role.

“When he comes here to play, my better half and I will be at that game,” she says, referring to her wife Jessica Betts. “So yes, I’m going to get to see him, but also I saw him play in the Super Bowl. But we didn’t know each other then.”

“Now it’s different,” she says of seeing Kelce play after working with him. “At first it was just like the game and now it’s like, ‘Oh, there’s my friend Travis. Hey Travis!’ That’s different. It’s personal now.”

When Kelce arrived on set of the new thriller series, Nash-Betts, 54, says that the vibe changed completely.

“It was funny because I saw people’s reaction to him before I really could take him in. All the guys — these big guys on the set, the grips, transpo and everybody — [they] were just fangirling all the way out. And I’m like, ‘Oh my god, guys.'”

“But Travis was lovely to have on set. Very charming, very fun,” she continues. “He was very professional, always came prepared. He’s extra greedy, so he eats a lot, but just a good guy on and off camera.”

In their scenes together, the Emmy winner — who plays a small-town detective investigating a series of heinous crimes — says Kelce was “very open.”

“He was very open on if there was a note given or a suggestion given. So amenable. ‘Tell me what I don’t know. Tell me what your thought is on this.’ And I love that he didn’t come in trying to act like, ‘I know everything and I know it all.'”

Though Kelce was not able to reunite with the cast at the show’s premiere in New York City on Sept. 23 — the Chiefs narrowly beat the Atlanta Falcons at their first away game of the season the night before — his mom Donna Kelce was on hand to represent the family.