This sounds like the title of a YA book from the 2000s– Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist, Naomi & Ely’s No Kiss List, Dash & Lily’s Book of Dares… 

 

I used to read them compulsively and haven’t had that much time over the last few years, maybe I should get back into it, even though the ultimate sweetness of those stories doesn’t seem like it has a place in this movie starring Zac Efron and Phoebe Dynevor. 

 

Here they are shooting Famous in Malibu yesterday and it’s not a teen rom-com but psychological thriller about celebrity in which Zac plays two characters – an actual famous star, James, and his lookalike fan, Lance, who would do anything himself to become just as famous. Lance has studied everything about James, even his movements, and then relocates to LA to, I think?, Single White Male his doppelganger.

It’s timely, given our increasingly parasocial relationships with celebrities and the increasingly disturbing ways we cosplay them on social media. And it’s also a great fit for Zac who’s been famous for so long, started so young, to channel his experience into these characters. Especially at this point in his career. 

 

He just turned 37 years old and after taking some time away from the spotlight is coming off a really great career pivot after his acclaimed performance in The Iron Claw. He followed that up with A Family Affair, with Nicole Kidman and Joey King, in which he also plays a big movie star, satirically. Is this how he’s working out his relationship with his own celebrity? 

It'd be an interesting conversation to have with him, when and if he’s ready for an extensive profile with, say, GQ, to explore why he might be exploring fame – through comedy in A Family Affair and thriller, it sounds like, with this new film, Famous. 

Famous, by the way, is an A24 film, so there might be a prestige opportunity here to market Zac in these dual roles. I’m very curious to see how the press tour for this film will go. And there definitely will be one. If they put an awards campaign behind it too, well, imagine the irony of him contending for his performance in a film that examines the two sides of celebrity itself embodied by these two characters.