Hear Me Out: Glen Powell’s ascension to the A-list feels like a Hollywood psyop
Can movie stars be manufactured? It’s a loaded question, one that’s left executives and agents scratching their heads for decades. Some actors are simply so talented they can’t be denied, while others overcome their dramatic limitations with abundant charisma. Glen Powell has been anointed as the next big thing, and for whatever reason, Hollywood will not be taking any questions on the matter.
He’s not an overnight sensation, though, far from it. Powell made his screen debut more than two decades ago in Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over, so he didn’t come out of nowhere. However, it’s only in the last couple of years that he’s come out of nowhere and become virtually ubiquitous, enjoying a rise up the ranks quick enough to make anyone’s head spin.
Fans of Ryan Murphy’s Scream Queens might be adamant that they knew Powell was destined for the very top, but let’s not forget the first episode of the darkly comedic episodic slasher premiered in 2015, so it’s not as if he used it as a springboard to his current status as one of the most visible leading men the industry has to offer.
Top Gun: Maverick got the ball rolling when he played a pearly white supporting part before rom-com Anyone But You teamed him up with Sydney Sweeney for a sleeper hit that ended its theatrical run as the highest-grossing live-action William Shakespeare adaptation ever. Co-writing and headlining Richard Linklater’s Hit Man gave him some indie cred in a well-received comic thriller before Twisters cemented his status as the current ‘it guy’ when he was placed front and centre in an effects-heavy blockbuster.
The route from jobbing actor to scene-stealing supporting player to romantic lead before detouring into acclaimed smaller-scale fare and top billing in an expensive adventure is about as well-worn as it gets, but something about it doesn’t quite feel organic. Everyone has been told that Powell is an A-lister waiting to happen, and everyone is expected to just go along with it.
However, this kind of thing has happened before, and it doesn’t always work out. Sam Worthington was unknown outside of his native Australia before he found his name as just one of two on the posters of Terminator Salvation alongside Christian Bale, played the lead in the top-earning film ever made in James Cameron’s Avatar, and led the line when the Clash of the Titans remake came within a whisker of half a billion dollars at the box office.
Those three films arrived within less than a year of each other, but would anyone call Worthington a star in 2024? Several years later, Taylor Kitsch was hand-picked as the next face of mindless escapism, only for Battleship and John Carter to lose an estimated $350 million combined in the summer of 2012. Armie Hammer? Best not to mention it. Josh Hartnett? He wasn’t interested. Alex Pettyfer? He gained the dreaded ‘difficult’ tag. Liam Hemsworth? He’s no Chris. Dane DeHaan? Nope. Hayden Christensen? Definitely not.
The common denominator is that all of those names were telegenic sorts who’d cut their teeth in smaller projects and the odd popular TV show, only to be thrust into leading man status without having proven themselves. The other common denominator, of course, is that the casual cinemagoer didn’t take to any of them.
That being said, Powell is admittedly more charismatic than all of them, and he has two major things working in his favour that the rest of Hollywood’s golden children haven’t had: Tom Cruise and self-awareness. An odd combination, without a doubt, but they’re going to be integral as Powell tries to convince the sceptics that he deserves his status as the latest ‘chosen one’.
He was welcomed into Cruise’s inner circle by being added to the legendary cake list; he was schooled for hours by the handmade filmmaking course the megastar only shows to his closest friends, and the Mission: Impossible figurehead even turned up at the premiere of Twisters in support. Cruise has never had a protege before, but Powell is as close as it’s gotten, which helps explain why Hollywood has no intention of doing anything other than telling the world he’s the new superstar in town.
At the red carpet premiere of Hit Man, Powell brought his parents along, where his mother stood behind him brandishing a sign that read, ‘Stop Trying to Make Glen Powell Happen’. Where was his father? Standing right next to her with another sign, which read, ‘It’s Not Gonna Happen’. When a producer claimed he was a bigger star and better draw than Ryan Gosling, he took to social media to deny the comparisons, celebrate his peer, and even drop a Barbie reference by saying, “I’m just Glen.”
The definition of psychological warfare is to influence minds without force. Hollywood has told everyone Powell is a star, he’s been compared to other stars while being placed on a level above them, Cruise is treating him as almost the second coming of himself, and he’s even acknowledged that he’s everywhere by poking fun at it while furthering his aw-shucks everyman credentials. With that in mind, his unstoppable rise is almost the textbook pysop.
