Austin Abrams is about to spend an evening answering questions about the roles that have pushed his career into a very different gear. On October 9, the actor is scheduled for a live Q&A following a special screening of Whalefall, giving fans a rare chance to ask him directly about the movie and the rest of his recent run of projects.
The timing is almost suspiciously convenient.
Abrams has had a packed stretch lately. He appeared in Weapons, took a major role in Resident Evil, continues to be recognized for Euphoria, and now leads Whalefall as Jay Gardiner. There is also Wolfs and his earlier work in projects like Do Revenge and Dash & Lily.
So yes, there are plenty of questions.
The obvious one is Whalefall. Abrams spends much of the film playing Jay, a young man who is swallowed by a sperm whale while diving off California. He has about an hour of oxygen left and has to find a way out while dealing with the grief surrounding his father’s death.
That sounds like the sort of production where the first behind-the-scenes question should simply be: how did you film this without losing your mind?
The filmmakers built large whale interiors for the production, which gave Abrams and the rest of the cast physical environments to work with. That matters for an actor in a survival movie. Panic looks different when you are actually inside a giant set with walls closing around you compared with staring at a tennis ball taped to a stick.
Abrams also has the challenge of carrying a story that stays tightly focused on one character. Jay is not just trying to escape. He is forced to confront memories of his father and the reasons he went into the water in the first place.
That makes the Q&A especially interesting.
A generic movie interview usually gets you the familiar stuff. What was the audition like? What did you enjoy on set? How was working with the director? Nice questions. Safe questions.
An open Q&A can go somewhere else.
Abrams has worked across comedy, drama, horror and coming-of-age stories, so someone is bound to ask about the strange path from Euphoria and Dash & Lily to projects like Resident Evil and Whalefall.
And then there is the elephant in the room, or technically the whale.
How do you prepare to act inside a creature that does not exist on set?
Abrams may finally get the chance to explain how he approached those scenes, how much of the whale was practical, how much was effects work and what it actually felt like filming the movie.
The Q&A is scheduled for Friday, October 9, at 9 PM ET, after the special screening. Whalefall itself opens in theaters October 16.
That gives Abrams a busy week.
First, survive the whale.
Then, survive the questions.
Given how quickly Abrams has moved between very different kinds of roles, the session could also reveal what he wants to do next. Does he want more horror? More character dramas? Another project where someone spends ninety minutes trying not to die? The last one sounds like a terrible career plan, but Hollywood has done stranger things.
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