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All eyes are now on Griffin Gluck. The 22-year-old actor has previously shown his eternal talent in the Netflix show Locke & Key, in Big Time Adolescence and in Private Practice. Now he’s stealing hearts as Luke in the second season of the teen mystery Cruel Summer where he falls into the web of a love triangle that has unfortunate consequences. Cruel Summer follows three different timelines and three teens — Luke, Megan and Isabelle — during the summer of 1999 to the summer of 2000 and they quickly realise that being in love can end deadly.
Schön! speaks with Griffin to dive deeper into his role as Luke, his ambitions, the art of making mistakes and so much more.
Griffin, if you could describe how you are feeling today with a song, what would it be?
I prepped this and I don’t know how to pronounce the artist, but I found the song. It’s a Japanese jazz song which I know is pretentious as hell. But it’s really good.
Interesting! I mean, I don’t speak Japanese so I wouldn’t know.
I took Japanese classes. I’m so butchering this pronunciation, but it’s by Shigeo Sekito and it’s called Special Sound Series Vol. 2: The Word.
Interesting! I’m gonna listen to it. I love jazz, I have never listened to Japanese jazz.
Japanese jazz is awesome. I do rate it very highly.
I like the classics like Frank Sinatra. Japanese Jazz sounds interesting, I’m gonna give it a go. I’ll look it up after this interview.
Or a second choice would be a different Japanese rock song. I don’t know why but I like Japanese music for some reason. It’s called Baby Blue by the Fishmans.
Let’s talk about Cruel Summer. I watched the second season and I found it very intriguing! If you could describe the second season of Cruel Summer in three words, what would they be?
I would describe it as teen-angst. That’s one word. Hyphenated teenage angst. I would describe it as mysterious and I’d say another good one is nostalgic just because of the era that it takes place.
What did you think about playing between the past and the present? I liked the way it was portrayed. You know that the screen would change colour in different time zones. How did that feel for you?
It was pretty confusing, to be honest. Especially while we were shooting it was difficult to wrap my head around at first, but it became really fun. I’m a big fan of cinematography and stuff. So to see how they were doing that on set with the different lighting and the different colours that they would use that are so severe. From a technical standpoint, it was really interesting. From an actor’s standpoint, it was also very interesting, but it was a lot more challenging than anything else I’ve ever done because there’s so much information being passed around and you don’t know all of the information all the time. And things change from script to script, so it was really difficult to kind of wrap my head around but once we got into the groove of things we all sort of started to figure it out.
Yeah, it took some time to figure it out! Tell me about your character, Luke. Explain his character a little bit and his involvement in the story of the second season.
I think Luke’s an interesting character to talk about because he’s strangely complex. I’m still learning things about him, especially now that I see the show coming out, and I view him differently when I watch the episodes. I’ve always described him as a confused, young teenage boy going through just the trials and tribulations of being a teenager. He’s falling in love. He’s also kind of discovering, he’s a teenage boy that has just gone through puberty and he also just wants to kiss girls and have fun. He is trying to live up to his family’s expectations of who they want him to be, who his romantic partners want him to be, and who his friends want him to be.
I don’t think he knows exactly who he is even though he seems that way. He has a lot of insecurities and he’s trying to compensate with this severe false sense of bravado and confidence. That ties in really well to this story because he’s just someone for everyone else to project their, emotions and their feelings onto and he takes up those roles willingly because he thinks that’s what he should do. He’s trying to please everybody. And that gets difficult for him throughout the season and it leads to a lot of drama and chaos because he’s in love with his childhood best friend. There’s a new girl in town. She’s really into him. He’s into her, but he doesn’t know that he’s in love with his childhood best friend yet. Then he’s stuck in this weird love triangle.
And how did you prepare for your role?
I mean, the one thing that I tried to keep in mind with Luke, and especially with this show, is that although it takes place in the early 2000s, and that’s a completely different era, which is crazy because it was only like 20 years ago, it’s a different era. Technology’s changed everything. It’s changed the culture and all this stuff. But at the end of the day, this is not a new kind of story. It’s a teenage love triangle. He has difficulties with his family, that’s not era specific. That’s not specific to the 1990s, or early 2000s. A lot of the show’s subject matter isn’t specific to the era. So one thing that I wanted to keep in mind with prep was, don’t go too deep into the whole idea that this is set at that time and try to stay true to the situations whether it would have been in the 90s or would have been today. You would have felt the same things.
Speaking of technology, I did do some prep in that sense. Another thing I recognised is that these teens could not contact each other instantly with text messages and emails and FaceTime and things like that. So,when I got to Vancouver, I would leave my phone in my apartment and then I would go on a walk for the day or I would leave my apartment and just try and figure out my plans. It sounds so scary to most kids and teenagers, and maybe even adults now, but that’s how most people have lived for the entire history of our species on this planet until just about like 15 years ago. That was fun to try and get in touch with although I don’t know how much that preparation helped me for this. It was more of just a fun taste of what the late 90s might have been like.
What initially drew you to Lukes’s character? Would you say that there are similarities between you and him?
Own up to your mistakes. Note that you make mistakes but your mistakes don’t make you. Just try and do better and be better. And if his life didn’t get cut short, I’d be like learn from your mistakes, move forward, and try to be better.
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necklace. Personal Fears
You mentioned that Cruel Summer was a bit different and more difficult for you to play compared to lighthearted dramas. How would you say it was different from all the other projects that you did so far?
I’d say the level of drama, it’s very very elevated, and the stakes are very high. The tone of the show is very much a lot more intense than I would say even Locke & Key was very fantasy based, so it was, I think it was fun. Locke & Key was different because there was a lot more free room to play. I’m playing a demon, I’m playing a ghost, I’m playing somebody that doesn’t exist, who has magical powers. Cruel Summer is a different kind of drama where it’s about love, relationships, and heartbreak. It’s all this stuff. It’s so much more real and so much more intense. Then I would say Locke & Key or most of the dramas I have done are, maybe aside from Private Practice, but that was when I was way younger. So I’d say that’s the main difference, I’d say the level of intensity.
Do you have any anecdotes that you can tell me about working with Lexi and Sadie? Any fun stories from the set that you’ll always remember?
I think one of the things that bonded Lexi, Sadie and I were the nights that we would spend just hanging out and talking off of the set. When we would watch TV and we would discuss how a certain thing that we watched made us feel, like Lexie and I bonded over Bojack Horseman which is a show about the industry. It’s a fantasy cartoon, but it also tackles some really heavy real-life subjects. We all got into some really deep late-night conversations, which are always really fun.
How did it feel for you to act the love triangle? Was it easy for you because maybe you’ve gone through it in your personal life or was it difficult?
I think it was difficult for me because of the mistakes that Luke makes in the show. It was weirdly cathartic and in a way I had been in that situation before and so I know how I would operate afterwards but to visit those feelings was slightly uncomfortable. I had to face stuff that maybe I was trying to avoid for a while.
And then what’s something that you want the audience to take away from the second season of Cruel Summer?
I hope people are just entertained. I think a lot of people try and draw messages from things and people try and learn lessons and there’s a lot of lessons to be learned from this show. You know how not to act, don’t do what Luke did. Maybe don’t follow the same path that a lot of these characters did. This show is full of mistakes that these kids make and how it affects their lives, so hopefully some life lessons on how you should treat other people and how other people should be treated and the double standard is a big thing that we talk a lot about on the show, like girls versus guys and how society views the same actions.
At the end of the day, what I just hope is that people are entertained. I’ve always found TV to be a form of escapism. In the darkest times of my life, TV has been there for me to distract me and take me out of whatever funk I’m in and I get to exist in that world for a little bit. And I hope that people feel the same way about this show. I hope people can watch our show and maybe just escape their reality for 30 to 45 minutes every Tuesday night. I hope people just get to be entertained and enjoy the ride of the show.
Yeah, I definitely did! Is there anyone that you are dreaming of working with?
Yeah, I think so. It’s funny, my list changes all the time. But I would say right now, I’m a big fan of Riz Ahmed. He’s a great actor. He was in Nightcrawler and Sound of Metal. I think he’s a phenomenal actor and I like his comedic style. The way he can blend comedy and drama. I admire that so I would say him. I just watched a movie that was called On The Count Of Three by Jerrod Carmichael that came out about two years ago or last year at Sundance. It’s the perfect blend of dark comedy and drama. So he’s on my list. Who else? Will Ferrell. I’ve always wanted to work with Will Ferrell or Steve Carell. Like those. Or Jim Carrey. Those are my comedy icons. Those are the people I look up to.
I’ve been fortunate enough to work with a lot of my heroes. I mean, I love Bryan Cranston and Malcolm in the Middle and Breaking Bad and so many other things. I was a big fan of Pete Davidson’s before I got to work with him and now I get to consider him a friend, which is great. In terms of big names, we’ve got Jim Carrey, we’ve got Will Ferrell. We’ve got Steve Carell, Michael from The Office. I would love to work with Jason Orley again, who directed Big Time Adolescence. I can’t think of anyone else. I know that there’s a million more but I’m blanking on that right now.
That’s okay. I mean, you can add more to your list and dream bigger and then it will become true!
Yeah, I’ll put it on my mood board.
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What do you do when you’re not on set?
I don’t know. I’m in kind of an interesting point in my life right now where I’ve been fortunate enough to be so busy for the last decade almost, having worked all the time. I love working — I don’t want to do anything but work. I could work for the rest of my life, every single day, I’d be so happy. When I’m off set, I kind of go through these interesting phases. If I’m being completely honest, it’s almost like an identity crisis whenever I have too much time to myself. I’m taking time off right now a little bit to try and resettle and centre myself and figure out who I am when I’m not on set. I have a lot of hobbies that I would love to explore more. I’ve always been into photography. I’ve grown up skateboarding and I love skating and I want to get back into that.
I watch a lot of TV. I love to hang out with my friends. I was just talking to my friend the other day, the last time I had a break from work, we would hop in my car. I’d pick a couple of friends up and we would drive around all day and go get food and throw a football around in a parking lot. Spend a day at a park reading or writing a book or writing in a journal, going to an art museum or just travelling, things like that. It was so simple to do those things, but it felt like it was feeding our souls just to kind of spend time together and get to know each other again and explore life in such a simple way. I’m looking forward to getting back to that but exploring my hobbies is just what I want to do. I pick up hobbies and I drop them like the weather changes and I’m really glad that now I have the time to explore them a little bit further in depth.
Yeah, that’s a good thing. I mean, keep trying. I’m very similar as well, but I’m very perfectionistic. I start something and then I want to be good at it already. Instead of…
Instead of having to try. Trying is less fun than accomplishing!
Exactly! But you need to go through it to be good at it. How would you say you grew as an actor between when you started and where you are now?
Wow, I would hope a lot. It’s tough to put my finger exactly in one way. I started when I was nine professionally with Adam Sandler just doing comedies as a kid. My whole career, especially since I started so young, it’s been fun and games. I just like acting; I like being on set. I like being with like-minded individuals. I like talking about the art and the craft and things like that. And I think my taste has developed a lot since I was a kid. I know what I like now, I know what I like working on. I’ve done enough different things that I can pinpoint exactly which projects made me the happiest and the most creatively fulfilled. So I’ve changed a lot in that sense.
Although it is still fun and games at this point, it’s a little less just fun and games and now it’s a little bit more serious and I’m a little bit more detail-oriented and goal focused than I was when I was nine or when I was younger. When I was younger, it’d be like any job you throw my way I’m more than happy to take just because I want to be there. I want to be working. I want to be on set, I want to be in that community. I want to learn, I want to grow as an actor. Luckily I’ve done that and I’m at a point where I want to keep growing. But I think I want to do exactly what we said before about hobbies. It’s fun to pick something up, but if you’re not good at it, then it becomes a lot more challenging. The goal and the idea is to stick to it and get better and better at it. Now I want to find my niche, my favourite things to do, my favourite roles, my favourite jobs, my favourite scripts and just get better and better at them. I want to get into writing I want to get into directing and producing. I think every project I’ve worked on for the last 10 years plus have helped me form this. It can be fun and games and it can still be something that I’m very passionate about.
If you wouldn’t be an actor, what would you do? Did you have any childhood dreams or did you always want to be an actor?
When I was a kid, I think it was interesting. I talked about this a decent amount, but I was kind of a loner as a kid. I don’t feel like I had all too many friends. I didn’t have much direction. I had no clue what I wanted to do when I was older. I didn’t know who I was as a person. And I don’t know if I do yet still. But I think acting was the very first thing that gave me a sense of purpose and a sense of pride and confidence in who I was as a person. That’s why I got into acting, it was just a sense of community, to begin with. To make friends and to be amongst people who I felt were the same, who were also kind of loners.
It’s difficult because I felt comfortable with acting. The second I started doing it, I was like, oh, I want to keep doing this for the rest of my life. But if I wasn’t acting, I wonder if I would still be in this industry. I think I would hopefully be some part of it, whether it be a producer or a writer or a director, or a cinematographer or something, just something to do with movie making. I think it would bring me a lot of joy. I would hope to be somewhere in this industry if I wasn’t an actor.
And there are still so many things you can try out as you said before, so I’m sure you won’t only do acting. What’s the best advice you have ever been given and that you live by?
Let’s see. Octavia Spencer gave me some great advice when I was a teenager. I was lucky enough to work with her. It’s very simple advice that I think many actors have heard 1000 times. But the advice is just fake it till you make it. If you don’t feel comfortable, if you don’t feel confident in yourself, pretend that you are. It will not only make you seem confident, but you’ll start to believe it. The other piece of advice I live by a lot is a Mac Miller lyric. Where he goes: “You make your mistakes, your mistakes never make you.” And that’s important for me to remember because I’m a stupid teenage boy, or I was for a while and I made a lot of mistakes. And I always thought that those were the end of my life. That each mistake was final and that there was no coming back from it. But it’s really important to remember that you’re allowed to make mistakes. You’re expected to make mistakes. They should be expected of you. You don’t have to know what you’re doing all the time. And the only downside to making mistakes if you don’t learn from them.
Yeah, that’s really good advice. Because you can’t learn if you don’t make mistakes. Tell me more about what’s next for you. Any exciting upcoming projects?
I mean, yeah, I’ve got a few things in the works that should be coming out. Some stuff that I am not quite sure I can talk about. But I might be revisiting some older projects from the past and coming back to make little returns, which is exciting. And I wish I could say more, but I don’t want to say anything before it’s concrete. But I’m excited to go back into some older roles. Hopefully. It’s exciting. But other than that, in my career, things to look forward to, projects I’m working on like I said, I’m taking some time off right now. It’s kind of an interesting transition phase between being a young adult actor to being more of an actual adult actor. And it’s a strange transition to make. Now that’s one of the reasons I have to start thinking about what I want to do more seriously, what projects I’ve found joy in that I want to continue doing and honing my craft and get better at.
But in that time off, I hope to, like I said, explore those hobbies, explore those things that I want to do. I hope to get more serious about my writing and hopefully develop some projects of my own in the future. If I get the chance to direct something, I’m working towards that right now. So things like that. Hopefully, there will be some acting roles. But the next thing I think, hopefully, people can look forward to in my career is a project that I can call my own. But that’s on the distant horizon. That’s not anytime soon.
But it will, I’m sure it will become true.
Hopefully, fingers crossed.
What is something that you want to be remembered for? So what is something that you want people to think of when they hear your name?
I’m going to take my time with his last question. I want to make sure I answer it well because that’s a really good question. There are works of mine that I hope people remember, like Big Time Adolescence, like American Vandal. Those are the projects that I feel most proud of, in a way not that I’m not proud of the other ones. It’s like choosing a favourite kid. It’s impossible to do. But those are the ones in my career that I feel most genuinely like myself and proud of. But what do I hope I am remembered for? I mean, I think one of my biggest idols in this world is Mac Miller. I just was such a fan of his music and of his artistry and his craft and how he developed as a person. And I think what made him so special to me was how truthful he was, how honest he was about his mistakes, about how he had to grow, about how he wasn’t perfect. And I don’t want to be remembered as some perfect, fantastic actor.
I would love to be remembered for my mistakes. And hopefully how I overcame them. Just being truthful and honest about who I am as a person. And in that sense, when Mac Miller did that, I saw that he was human, this person that I idolised was human and he made mistakes. It made me appreciate him so much more and it made me feel a lot less alone. So I hope I’m remembered for the same thing. I hope, if you call acting an art, which some people do, but not all people. But if you consider this an art then I hope that my art makes people feel less alone and it helps them escape, and I hope they remember me for why I do it instead of what I’ve done.
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Cruel Summer season 2 is airing now.
photography. Ivan Bideac
fashion. Nicolas Eftaxias
talent. Griffin Gluck
grooming. Monica Alvarez at See Management Using Dior Beauty and UNITE Hair
video directors. Znere Grace + Calle Hans
interview. Maja Bebber
