Most of us know Penn Badgley as non-Upper East Sider, nice-guy Dan Humphrey on the hit television show Gossip Girl, but audiences will see the 22-year-old in his first lead film role in The Stepfather, opening Oct. 16.
The Stepfather, a 2009 remake of the 1987 thriller under the same moniker, finds troubled teen Michael Harding (Badgley), returning home from military school to meet a new man of the house. Yet something is off about his future stepfather, David Harris (Dylan Walsh).
“You know who the killer is from the first frame of the movie,” Badgley said in a college conference call, which included North by Northwestern. “It’s not straight-up horror, it isn’t full of twists and turns. It’s really like a really tense dread, where you’re waiting for the other shoe to drop.”
Throughout the film, Badgley and girlfriend Kelly (Amber Heard) desperately try to convince mom, Susan (Sela Ward) that Daddy-to-be is not who he claims he is. The film’s trailer, possessing a similar tone to 2007’s Disturbia, starring Shia LaBeouf, previews everything from chainsaws to identity switching to intense stunts.
“I was doing push-ups, pull-ups, screaming and letting the blood rush to my head, and drooling a little bit even,” said Badgley, who has been dating Gossip Girl co-star Blake Lively for almost two years.
The Baltimore native even laughed off the brutality of intensely heavy “movie rain,” which he endured in a thin t-shirt and jeans for three nights in sub-50-degree weather.
“It came to this point where I couldn’t get dry in between takes because for 12 hours at a time I would just be wet and either cold or hot because I’d be standing in between these body heaters,” he said. “It was just miserable.”
Although Badgley has a long list of television and small movie appearances (he also did voice-overs in Mario Golf 64 and Mario Tennis 64), breaking into movies has always been his ultimate goal.
“Right from the start, the thing that attracted me to [the movie] was just the fact that it was a new area, just something different,” Badgley said. “Film is where I’ve wanted to be for years and film is where the people working for me, behind me, have always imagined I would end up, so it was a very natural progression.”
With 2009 already being a tough year for horror movies such as Sorority Row and Jennifer’s Body, Badgley knows teens and adults alike can relate to Michael and even draw some comparisons to Dan Humphrey.
“For me, I’m a very relaxed person, a very casual person,” Badgley said. “I actually have a very strong relationship with my parents, but that doesn’t mean there hasn’t been strife in the past. I think the universal nature of Michael Harding, I would relate to more.”
“Dan Humphrey doesn’t really have problems,” he said. “The most abnormal thing he has is this strong relationship with his parents. If there’s anything anybody can relate to, it’s any issues that you can relate back to family. That’s what everybody has.”
