Instagram can’t handle the naked truth.
“My buddy, Tanner, wanted to post about the movie,” Powell tells EW.
“His posts got taken down by Instagram because it violated the laws of nudity or whatever.
Glen Powell and Sydney Sweeney in ‘Anyone but You’.Sony Pictures Entertainment/YouTube
It required Powell to have a sense of humor about the situation.
“I was the kid at the pool that didn’t want to even take his shirt off.
Because your body’s not going to look like that forever.
Glen Powell and Sydney Sweeney in ‘Anyone but You’.Brook Rushton/Sony
Am I going to be taking my clothes off in every movie?
But in a rom-com, I know my function in the universe.”
So, I love rom-coms.
Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell in ‘Anyone but You’.Brook Rushton/Sony Pictures
I was a script reader for her for a while.
I really had a rom-com education from one of the greats when it came to all this.
Did you feel that?
That’s one of his most iconic roles.
He told me, “Don’t shy away from being a rom-com leading man.
Really lean into it, embrace it.
The greatest gift that this business can give you is to represent love on screen for audiences.”
They make you leave the theater feeling good.
That’s a great gift to give to people.
There’s been a lack of rom-coms with scope for a long time.
They’ve settled into a budgeted streamer version.
That’s why people return to them.
How did you keep yourself from breaking with all of that happening?
The funniest part about that scene in general is that my dad’s the real method actor.
He’s stone-cold asleep.
Whereas my dad, he’s theDaniel Day-Lewisof sleep acting.
There was not a false beat in that performance.
She gets an iconic look in that scene.
She came in and killed it.
I was very proud of both of them in that scene.
just tell me that you’re a much better swimmer than Ben.
It’s serious currents and serious waves they were putting us through.
So thank God, Sydney and I can actually swim.
There was a lot of behind-the-scenes fun with this ensemble cast.
Can you tell me more about how you were building that rapport with each other?
I rented out the laser tag spot.
I love laser tag; it’s a great team-building activity.
I didn’t realize how competitive our ensemble would be.
Wait, did you get the shirt from a fellow cast member or a stranger?
And Tom Cruise is probably the only person who would leave laser tag as soaked as I was.
We have a group thread called “The Rest Is Still Unwritten.”
What was that about?
Darren always gave me sh–.
This is why I’m done taking my shirt off for a while.
I don’t need that pressure.
Darren was the first one to always give me s— right before a take.
I’d be down there doing push-ups and curls and stuff.
Ben’s “serenity” song is Natasha Bedingfield’s “Unwritten.”
Were there other songs you were playing with?
How did you end up choosing that one?
That came from Will [Gluck].
Will has the music taste of a 12-year-old girl in 2005.
It’s amazing the music that he responds to.
Natasha Bedingfield’s “Unwritten” captured that feeling.
And then you also all sing it in the credits.
We knew broad strokes about the credit sequence.
And then they’re like, “Okay, now sing the song.”
This is the most embarrassing, horrific thing.
It almost feels like when you’re in a nightmare.
You’re like, “Oh, I’m wearing no clothes and I’m singing.
I’m naked in front of a movie crew singing ‘Unwritten.'”
You’re like, “Wow, that’s a really weird dream.”
I’m like, no, that’s the reality I was living in.
Did you at least already know the words?
I didn’t know any of the words.
So, I’m like, “Okay, I think I can stumble my way through this.”
Not knowing the words in front of the crew was awful.
But over the course of the movie, everybody had to do it.
You might as well enjoy it.
It’s a metaphor for making rom-coms in general.
I’m impressed how romantic you guys made being airlifted look.
What was the trick to that?
That may have been the most uncomfortable day of the entire shoot.
No one tells you Australia gets incredibly cold.
You’re wet and cold and getting shot with a wind machine under a helicopter in the elements.
That’s funny because Sydney says it wasn’t that bad.
She’s a tiny little bite-sized human.
I’m a corn-fed Texan.
There’s a through-line about jumping off things to see a monument with a person you love.
And you recently shared thatyour parents got engaged at the foot of the Jefferson Memorial.
Did that make the movie more personally meaningful to you?
I do think that I’ve grown up romantic because of my parents.
I was also part of my sister’s proposal.
She was a fan ofThe Amazing Race, and her now husband asked me to plan anAmazing Race-style proposal.
He did not want to know what any of the challenges were.
So, grand gestures are a part of the love language of my family.
Given that, do you think Ben and Bea will go the distance after the credits roll?
That’s also one of the ways that we update this rom-com.
They fell apart before they really had a chance to get going.
The big question to this movie is: “Can love have a second chance?
We stumbled off the starting blocks.
Do you want to give this a real shot?”
It can happen once.
It can happen many times.
But there’s an undeniable thing between Ben and Bea that is what the movie’s about.
This frustrating feeling of knowing this could be something, and we never got a shot at it.
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