'The Fault In Our Stars' Leading Men on Bonding Over Music

If you're just joining us, we're having a very delicious conversation here on the couch. We're going to get really quiet now.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm going to freeze up.

Yeah.

And all of a sudden it's going to get quiet. We're not able to speak.

Yeah.

We can just sit in stony silence. We don't we don't like when cameras are wrong.

Yeah, cameras are wrong. It just shuts us down.

Behind the scenes the on fire, you guys.

Um I don't know what you just said.

Yeah, what did she just say?

We're talking about Behind the scenes is on fire. That was good times.

I know you're both musicians. This is embarrassing because that was my attempt at speaking freestyle. That was music? Yeah. In the film because there are so many beautiful lines and you sort of like if I had to think of my favorite line, I don't even know what it would be because there're just so many. That's cool. How do you sort of get outside yourself in thinking about that and just let it let it be real to you and organic to you.

First of all, I I do want to just say that like it's awesome that those lines are in the movie because a lot of the times uh the lines are very over the top at times and like it's a super heightened way of speaking and it's often that, you know, the screenwriters will be like, ah, that's not realistic. We're not going to put that in there, but they put almost every iconic line into the movie, which is so important, but it's also it was sometimes challenging for actors like us because they are heightened and they are over the top. I think the most important thing for me in my performance was that I didn't like mumble over Gus. I didn't try to make Gus like too like like, you know, Gus is theatrical. He is and that he's over the top and he's like super confident and like I had to play him that way. And a lot of actors always like, oh, I want to be real and subtle. But like if Gus was real and subtle, he'd be boring. So, when those lines come out of his mouth, they make sense.

Have you guys ever egged anybody's house in real? Um This happens in the film. And the girl just does it.

I've never egged anybody's house but uh the the cool thing about doing that scene is like I was actually blind when we did it because I had put in I put in real blinding contacts and stuff. So

No, I know Shaylene had said she did you prop cuz she said it's actually a really difficult thing to do and deal with it. They were like he at times when said he'd be like, my eyes. I have to take them out. They really hurt. And I was like, I'm glad I'm not like, you know, happy with.

Yeah, but in that scene So I've never actually egged a house cuz I never saw the house what I was trying to say. I never saw the car. Like I never saw the house. So if you really nail it, you nailed it.

Yeah, or that movie magic.

It's a little bit movie magic, a little bit actually me because you know, Ansel was a push turn me towards but like when you see the egg's throwing, they like lined me up perfectly. You know what I mean? Like they lined it so I would actually hit it.

But also there's no there's no shots of like him like there's not a like full shot of him throwing the egg and it hitting the car. It's like him throwing the egg and then they cut to the car and it hits the car. So like then they just shoot we all got to throw eggs at the car. Like it was fun.

Yeah. Actually like I had to throw all them. I was like, no, let me throw some.

Yes, so I was like

We would just stand near the car and just like peg the car and they would just shoot that.

Yeah. You and Shaylene, well the three of you have been spending a lot of time together. You've gone on tour. What is sort of the experience of it's almost like a rock star sort of experience that you guys had traveling around the country this past, I think it was this past month doing press for it. I mean, it was like front page of newspapers. Girls screaming. Girls crying. There's a cool picture on the front page of the newspaper of all these girls screaming. And this one dad like this holding his ears like fingers in the ears.

Yeah, the one guy in the audience. The one man. That was responsible for all the underage girls in the audience. That's weird.

Yeah, it was it was it was it was he was responsible for all the underage girls. Um Yeah. It was

Maybe just his daughter.

Um yeah, no, no, no. I hold on. I gotta We do this to each other all the time. We make each other laugh all the time like this. And I just start crying.

So there's this scene where your girlfriend and you are making out.

Mhm.

And you get a little handsy. Was that improvised?

Um no, actually, it was it was so embarrassing. It was in this it was in the script it said Isaac honks the horn about squeezing the boob. I swear to God, it's true. And the director screamed out. The director is one of my good friends, Josh. And like he he it was like we were just hanging out the two of us, not like we were on a set and not like this girl who had just met like 10 minutes ago. He's like honk the horn. On set. And I was just like, oh my God, this is a disaster.

I want to hear about your Jared Leto story. Didn't you meet Jared Leto recently?

Yeah, well, it was basically like that that uh, I met

Is there like a Van Halen moment meeting Van Halen?

Yeah, I mean the thing that I love about Jared Leto is that like he's able to do music and I mean he's such a good musician, such a good actor. You know, I'm in a band and I'm a brother, so it's like the hardest thing in the world is scheduling. Like it's an almost impossible like with my brother's schedule and and mine like trying to keep up our band. So so I saw him at a screening for Dallas Buyers Club and like after and I was talking to him and we got we were getting along so well. Um and we you know we were I was talking to him basically about his movie and then finally I started saying like, you know, I'm in this band. And he was all wanting to know about the band and then I was talking to him as an awesome actor and I was like, how do I schedule it? Like how do you do it? How do you schedule? And then this like this beautiful blonde model walked up to us and he was like, he was like, hold on one second. And I was just like, well, I'll never talk to Jared Leto again. And I never did. I haven't seen him since. And the rest of the party I was like, trying to get it. I was like, no, not going to happen.

Yeah. hasn't seen you since in public.

Yeah, she hasn't seen you anywhere.

So on set, did did any of that happened? Did you guys talk about? Would you ever make music together?

It was fun. Like we lived right next door to each other in our apartment. So I would play on like rock music that he hadn't heard and play my music too and then he played me EDM which I really didn't know anything about and I grew to really like when I was on set with him and he played me some of his tracks and I played him some of my tracks. It was nice.

Yeah, it's fun. We we like I think that that's why we get along so well like we both are very passionate about like not only acting, like music and uh like always all a lot of creative things. Now we're talking we want to score a movie together.

Yeah. That'd be so cool. Like just, you know, blend the electronic and the and like the like, you know, good like real instruments and stuff and like we I think it could be really cool.

You guys, I have a quick little like just like first thing that pops in your head. Oh, okay. Um Imperial Affliction is the book in the movie that's supposed to be a perfect book and it's like Shaylene's like holy grail. What is your what is your Imperial Imperial Affliction movie?

Hmm On the Waterfront.

Oh.

Oh, good.

Um Good stuff. Taxi Driver.

Band?

It's a weird movie.

Favorite Beatles.

The Beatles.

Matt Zo. He's not an he's a producer.

What kind of music is he?

film producer. No, you know, like EDM like production.

Yeah. Okay. Okay. TV show?

Um right now I like Game of Thrones a lot. Um I've been I really like uh New Girl. It's really funny.

Item of clothing?

Sneakers.

Jeans.

Um athlete?

Uh Victor Cruz.

Magic Johnson.

Actor or actress?

Dustin Hoffman.

Joaquin Phoenix.

You guys have good taste.

Just popped in my head.

Okay. I've never heard you talk about him. I don't know. Just come in mind.

Before I let you go, what is this about Shaylene convincing you guys not to wear deodorant? And you

Yeah, I mean Shay somehow always smells great. And so do some girls always seem to smell good even if they're not wearing deodorant. But like Ansel and I start to smell really bad on set.

Yeah, cuz we're wearing deodorant. It doesn't work. It just doesn't work.

And we found out later that like Shay has like special crystals that make her smell.

Yeah, so like she wasn't wearing nothing. I told Ansel he was like, by the way, are you still not wearing deodorant? And I was like, uh I went back to him. I was like, you smell bad. And she

Yeah. No, I didn't ever smell that bad. I mean, no.

No, never that bad because we kind of like we stop we started wearing deodorant again about. So I told like my friend from childhood I was like, yo man, like I haven't been wearing deodorant recently and like I don't smell bad anymore. I think it's a thing that like if you don't wear it, you stop smelling bad. like. You smell like whatever you stop smelling bad. It goes away. And then and then he was like, no, you're just used to yourself smelling. You smell bad right now. I was like, oh, okay. So you know what I do now? I put on like just a tiny bit because that cuz Shaylene always like comes and hugs me and then she's like, Ah, she's like or if I'm wearing deodorant, she's like You're wearing deodorant. And I'm like, Yeah. So I just like I put on like a happy medium. Like I don't like some people go like this for like an hour. It's disgusting. So I just put on like a few swipes.

I've never heard of anybody saying like the way to not piss a girl off is to not wear deodorant.

Well, some yeah. Well some you know, Some girls that's Shaylene in a nutshell. She's a different She's a different girl. You know, that's That's why people love her. Yeah. Because it's not like the same, you know, she's not predictable. So original. Yeah. And then also as an actress, too. She's so unpredictable. That's what's great about her. When you're unpredictable as a person, I think it it translates to screen.

And to take us out, not to put you on the spot, but can we get a seated breakdance?

Yes. Oh my God. This has become my thing now.

We're going to quit our jobs.

Yeah.