FROM THE FAULT IN OUR STARS TO WEST SIDE STORY: WHY WE LOVE ANSEL ELGORT

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Ansel Elgort was born March 14, 1994 in New York City. He has Russian, Jewish, English, German and Norwegian ancestry.

At the age of nine, his mother took him to try out for the School of American Ballet. Elgort attended Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School (a performing arts school whose alumni include Timothée Chalamet and Adrien Brody) and Stagedoor Manor summer camp. He starred in his high school’s production of Guys and Dolls. He appeared in the Off-Broadway play, Regrets, by Matt Charman. Elgort started taking acting classes at the age of twelve, and is very excited about all of his given roles. Also, for the previous six years, Elgort has been taking piano lessons. He has also learned tap dancing.

“I was at the School of American Ballet, and they put me in The Nutcracker at Lincoln Center,” Ansel said. “That was my first time performing, and it was in front of 3,000 people. I loved it.”

The first movie Ansel Elgort was cast in was the horror film Carrie in 2013, in which he played Tommy Ross, as the smooth jock who also happens to be sensitive enough to woo the school wallflower out of her shell. Being on a film set for the first time seems not to have fazed him one bit.

Then Ansel co-starred as Caleb Prior in the 2014 dystopian book adaptation, Divergent, another Young Adult smash, in which he played Shailene Woodley’s brother. „Shailene,“ he says, „is a very different person to most people. She’s very unique. Shailene and I share a certain love,“ he says, „but it’s a friendship love.“

In the same year he was cast in the role of Augustus Waters in John Green’s young adult novel and cultish bestseller The Fault in Our Stars, about two teen cancer patients who meet at a support group and fall in love.

Ansel Elgort‘s role had a type of bone cancer called osteosarcoma, but is in remission after having part of his leg amputated — a demanding special effect. “We used Ansel’s performance on set as the basis for how his prosthetic leg should be moving, and we used a young man who actually lost his leg as a double and for lighting reference,” said visual effects supervisor Jake Braver. “Ansel really sold those shots with his performance.”

So did he cry when he watched it? „Yeah, of course,“ he shoots. „Well, I cry whenever I watch an emotional scene that I did, just because it brings me back to that moment. It’s like I remember being there, I remember feeling what I felt. It’s really weird, right?“

When the trailer was first released on YouTube, it clocked up a record-breaking three million views in 24 hours; when the movie was released in the US, it sped past Tom Cruise to the top of the box office.

Fame at this pitch holds no fears for a man apparently allergic to anxious introspection. Or, perhaps, just a 20-year-old self-aware enough to know he’s on top of the world. And making the movie did change his perspective, he says. Sometimes, luck runs out. „I think one of the biggest things is that … it just happens.“

„It“, of course, being cancer. He quotes the film – „The world is not a wish-granting factory“ – then sits back. That’s how it is. It could happen to anyone, y’know? As young people, we think we’re invincible.“

Edgar Wright’s Baby Driver was one of the few movies in 2017 that isn’t part of an existing franchise, based on a book or TV show, or inspired by true events. And, thankfully for creative risk-taking, it’s already paid for itself. Ansel stars alongside Oscar winners Kevin Spacey and Jamie Foxx in this heist pic.

„This cast is insane,“ Elgort told in an interview. „But here’s the thing about these guys: I show up to rehearsal the first day, I mean my heart’s pounding out of my chest, I’m so excited to work with Jamie Foxx, Kevin Spacey … and I’m not expecting them to be the nicest guys ever, because they’re big, big stars. … But they were immediately the warmest, most generous guys I’ve ever worked with.“

Elgort described what it’s like working with them: „You do scenes with them, it’s like, ‚Holy crap: I don’t even have to act!'“ he laughed. „All I have to do is be there, open my eyes and breathe.“

Despite big box-office success and unexpected summer magic, no one thought Edgar Wright’s heist film had the gas to make it to awards season, but Baby Driver received 9 major nominations in 2018 incl. 3 Academy Award® nominations for Film Editing, Sound Mixing and Sound Editing.

If Ryan Gosling danced his way into moviegoers’ hearts in 2016 with La La Land, in 2017 it was Ansel Elgort who did the same, in Baby Driver. And, like Gosling before him, Elgort now finds himself nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actor in Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy.

A red Subaru WRX pulls up in front of a bank and then the car’s young driver presses play on his iPod. But while his three companions exit the vehicle to rob the bank wearing masks, Baby remains seated to party away to the song „Bellbottoms“ by the rock band „The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.“

And even when his team returns in „Baby Driver“ and they have to flee from the police in the Subaru in a high-speed car chase, he doesn’t stop listening to his music.

“I met with Edgar first, before I had even read the script,” recalls Elgort. “I didn’t know what I was meeting about, I just knew it was a movie. And we ended up talking about music the whole time, because I love music and I am making music. We talked and talked and talked, and finally he said, ‘Read the script.’ And when I read it, I realized why we talked about music the whole time.”

Baby shares this great enthusiasm for music with the actor who plays him. From the beginning, the then 23-year-old Ansel Elgort also built a successful career as a musician alongside his acting career. He sings, produces, is signed to the well-known label Island Records and works as a DJ and an EDM producer with the alter ego Ansolo. His first single, „Home Alone,“ released in 2016, directly reached #2 on the Spotify Viral Charts.

Back when Ansel appeared in Baby Driver, critics called it his career breakthrough. Elgort has been busy in the years since Baby Driver, and not all of his projects were creative directions his fans would have expected.

In fact, his follow-up project was November Criminals alongside Chloë Grace Moretz. Then there was Jonathan, a science fiction drama. After that came Billionaire Boys Club, which also cast Emma Roberts, Kevin Spacey, Taron Egerton, and plenty of other recognizable faces. That’s not all Ansel’s been up to, though. He also acted in the film The Goldfinch, which was a resounding box office bomb. The thing was, Ansel starred in the movie along with actors like Luke Wilson, Nicole Kidman, and Finn Wolfhard. So while the movie wasn’t critically acclaimed, it was another boost on Elgort’s resume.

Not that he needs it, of course. Not only does Elgort’s family already have ties in the industry (his dad Arthur Elgort is a long-time Vogue photographer and his siblings are photographers and cinematographers, plus his mom Grethe Barrett Holby is an opera director. So it’s not that surprising that Ansel’s next project puts him in a producing role.

As IMDb notes, Ansel’s next gig was on Tokyo Vice, which the actor produced ten episodes of. Besides that, Ansel’s upcoming film West Side Story directed by Steven Spielberg is now in post-production, and he has yet another project upcoming for 2021; Finest Kind with Jake Gyllenhaal.

The musical West Side Story is a real classic and so is the 1961 film version. Now Steven Spielberg is taking on the material and a first image of his adaptation has now been published.

It’s time again to warm up the muscles for some dancing and oil the vocal cords, because the Jets and Sharks meet again after almost 60 years. The rival gangs are at the center of the musical West Side Story, which premiered in 1957 and was first filmed in 1961. The work by Jerome Robbins and Robert Wise won ten Oscars® at the time and is now considered an absolute film classic, and now master director Steven Spielberg is shooting his very own version of the story.

Ansel Elgort and Rachel Zegler, who makes her big screen debut with the production. In the first image, the two can be seen holding hands, surrounded by the gangs.

The rest of the cast also includes Corey Stoll (House of Cards) and Rita Moreno, who already starred in the 1961 film. The German theatrical release is currently scheduled for December 9, 2021. Below you can watch the trailer for the old classic.

Ansel is similarly out of the spotlight, unless it serves him of course, as was the case with his „nude“ photo for charity. This might be a smart move, given past allegations against him that happened to arise via social media.

„I’m happy to be a role model because I think I can do it over other people. I think my parents raised me well. And I’m pretty straight edge. All my friends make fun of me for being straight edge. Like we go out and I’m not really drinking. But they understand why – I’m doing really well, I’m really focused always on the prize. I want to keep creating and making important things and that’s what I want Ansel Elgort to be about.“

Regardless, it’s clear that Ansel’s future is bright, and he’s kept plenty busy since the movie that earned him his place among Hollywood royalty. And that‘s why we love Ansel Elgort.