T
here’s a lot Logan Lerman doesn’t want to talk about.
Sure, the Percy Jackson and Bullet Train actor says there’s a ton of directors he’d kill to work for — he just doesn’t want to name them. He’s never spoken about how he and his fiancé, ceramics artist Analuisa Corrigan, first met, and he’d love to keep it that way. Most recently, he starred opposite Molly Gordon in Oh, Hi!, a dating-snafu comedy about a situationship turned crashout at an upstate Airbnb. Lerman tells Rolling Stone he was captivated by the realness of the script and was reminded of several of his own dating experiences that went awry — but none that he wants to share publicly. And he’s an avid reader and says that he’s constantly on the hunt for the next script, project, or book that calls to him, but doesn’t want to mention any of them by name, either.
Lerman blames this reticence on a deeply ingrained anxiety about jinxing things. “I don’t like talking about things until they’re real,” he tells Rolling Stone on a zoom call from his home in California. “Even my friends and family, nobody knows anything until it’s 100 percent happening. Because I’m superstitious about things falling apart.” But tightly held tradition aside, Lerman’s desire to keep things close to the chest feels like the natural result of an actor whose earliest career moments were defined by very public roles that opened his life to intense scrutiny.
Lerman, 33, began his professional acting career in the 2000s, becoming an immediately recognizable kid actor with spots in The Patriot and Hoot. But it was his memorable roles in The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012) and Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief (2010) that earned him the status of the internet’s boyfriend. The films couldn’t have been more distinct, one a family friendly superhero-esque tentpole meant to appeal to fans of the best-selling YA series, and the other a gritty coming-of-age film about PTSD and childhood sexual abuse. But both — and Lerman’s performances as two unique but adorable main characters — made Lerman a star on Tumblr, where fans would post candid photos or film screenshots captioned with lines from Stephen Chbosky’s book. Lerman — or rather his face — became synonymous with a type of teenage melodrama. And as those same teens grew up, Lerman’s star morphed as well, eventually turning into a popular internet sex symbol. (In 2021, a tweet calling him the “white boy of the century” became such a staple on the app that friends got the post printed onto his birthday cake.) Lerman calls the attention “flattering,” but it’s clear that the consistent focus feels less like a compliment and more a stunning realization at just how much the movie-making business has changed since he started acting, all thanks to social media.
“It is such a strange concept!” Lerman says. “The world of movie making, Hollywood, celebrity culture has changed so much. It used to be you get a part, hopefully do a good job, you get in a magazine, and then someone sees you there and that becomes something. Now the internet has all these monikers for people and they just catch on. It’s flattering, I guess. I just hope it means I can get some movies made.”
Oh, Hi!! is one such movie Lerman is grateful for. He stars as Isaac, one half of a brand-new couple on their first weekend trip upstate. Isaac and Iris (Molly Gordon) are practically dripping with the glow of new love, stopping at peach stands, having long makeout sessions on their Airbnb couch, and feeding each other scallops under the stars. But there’s one problem: Iris thinks this is their first trip away as a couple. Isaac thinks they’re just friends who sometimes kiss — and he’s not remotely interested in a relationship. Cue the crashout, which starts as a fight and quickly devolves into kidnapping, spell work, and the dilemma of figuring out which friend to call to hide a body.
Logan Lerman and Molly Gordon in Oh, Hi!
Sony Picture Classics
“The quality of the writing is what caught my attention,” Lerman says, describing his first time ever reading the script. “I couldn’t stop thinking about it afterwards. I love the left turn it takes. I thought it really added to the genre as a whole, so it checked all the boxes for me.”
Lerman was excited to work with Gordon (Theater Camp, The Bear, Booksmart). But one thing he was worried about was acting while being actively handcuffed to a bed. “I wouldn’t say I’m a [handcuff] expert, but I’m definitely more familiar with them than I was before we started filming,” he says. “I didn’t even know they could be so comfortable. I was thinking the whole time during pre production that they were going to be metal cuffs. I’m like, ‘How do we do this all day long?’ But they were comfortable leather straps. It was actually a really great experience being tied to a bed for most of the movie.”
Isaac is undeniably an asshole in the film, which is a stark departure from the loveable, kind-hearted characters Lerman is known for. But even though he continues to branch out from those teen roles, audiences are still desperate to see him in more romances. Ever since author Emily Henry became a fixture on BookTok, Lerman has been one of the most popular fancasting choices for Henry film and television adaptations. Lerman hears these comparisons often, and says it’s something that he and friend (and fellow white-boy-of-the-month actor) Dylan O’Brien get a lot. “We should start a book club to try to get just to read these books, just him and I discussing the romance adaptations,” Lerman says. “It’s funny to even be thought about for someone’s book character. That’s a flattering thought.”
One of the biggest strengths of Oh, Hi! Comes from building a romantic comedy around a situationship. The genre is known for its happily ever afters — or at least something close — but the movie’s heart comes from how serious this relationship is to Iris, even though she can’t even call it one. And the romance aspect? Well, the love story isn’t between Isaac and Iris. It’s between Iris and the friends she calls to help her sort out her mess. This is the learning experience that Lerman loves the most about Oh, Hi!. “The situationship, or the short lived thing that doesn’t really get the chance to be, you learn a lot from that. I think we’ve all been through that, but I think more people go through this period of time where they’re figuring out who they are, and trying to make sense of what they want,” he says. “It’s an interesting time in your life, in your 20s, where you’re really trying to find your footing.”
Lerman won’t give an example of the craziest thing he’s done for love, but he notes it’s a universal experience to end up doing something foolish for a relationship. “I found myself being more of an Iris than an Isaac, personality wise, so it was kind of fun to play the Isaac type in the movie, because it’s truly not who I am at all,” he says. “It’s the willingness to jump in. Being the person who’s not too hesitant to go deeper with someone. But I think everybody has that little bit of crazy in them.”
