Cries of anguish keep piercing the air of a Manhattan photo studio where Charles Melton has draped himself across a gray tufted couch. The très photogenic star of Nicolas Winding Refn’s new thriller Her Private Hell and Netflix’s Beef — who just earned his first Emmy nomination for the anthology series’ second season — isn’t in any physical pain, just extreme emotional distress. This Bustle cover shoot was inadvertently scheduled exactly during the World Cup semifinals, and he’s trying to look sultry for the cameras while also screaming at a laptop as his adopted home country of France loses to Spain 2-0.
Melton’s passionate sports fandom comes naturally. Before the 35-year-old got his big break playing complicated jock Reggie Mantle on Riverdale, he was an actual high school football star in Manhattan, Kansas, who earned the nickname “Kamikaze” for his injury-inducing determination to plow through anyone in his sight. (The injuries were usually his: broken hand, broken ribs, concussions.) In college, he got a taste of performing in front of 60,000-person crowds as a defensive back for Kansas State University. Now, though, he’s much more of a softie.
The second we meet, he asks if I’m half-Asian, like he is. (Yes! Chinese for me, Korean for him.) “It’s the eyes!” he says, knowing exactly how to win me over, and whips out his phone to show a picture of his 5-month-old daughter, an absolutely adorable, chubby-cheeked being whose name Melton and his partner, French-Australian director Camille Summers-Valli, are keeping private. “She’s a quarter [Korean],” he says, beaming. They live in Paris, and Melton can’t stop talking about being a new dad, how much he misses his family today, and how it’s going to be a whole agonizing seven days before he’ll get to see them when they join him in Los Angeles.
During one part of the shoot, he steps onto a fire escape, where he poses and waves to disaffected office workers in the next building, then comes in shaken. “I get so scared now,” he says, surprised and a bit flummoxed. “It’s crazy, after having a daughter, I’m kind of afraid of heights.”
The game, at least, is a distraction.
As he moves through the studio, ripping off his shirt to try new looks, getting his face blotted and his biceps rubbed with oil, the laptop comes with him. Melton is unfailingly kind and polite; he was a model in New York in his early 20s, and he knows all the hard-working people in this room are depending on him to get this shoot done in time. But goddamn it if this game isn’t coming down to the wire. His eyes keep drifting to the screen, so an assistant grabs the laptop and stands behind the photographer, sidestepping with the flow and turning the computer sideways and even upside down so Melton can at least appear like he’s looking into the lens. Any photos of him with his head in his hands, that’s not a pose.
Still, he’s an optimist to the end. “A lot can happen in 30 seconds!” he says, having paused the photo shoot to give the match his full attention as the clock runs out. France misses and then misses again. “OK,” he says, laughing, “nothing can happen in 20 seconds.”
Melton’s trajectory from teen drama star to Oscar-contending leading man has been an exceedingly charming one to follow. He’s never said a bad word about Riverdale, which he’s called “my Juilliard.” But even his ardent fans weren’t prepared to see him, just a few months after the long-running show had ended, 40 pounds heavier in Todd Haynes’s May December, as a childlike suburban dad opposite Julianne Moore, in a trippy psychological thriller loosely inspired by the Mary Kay Letourneau ‘90s tabloid scandal. He got a Golden Globe nomination (the Oscars have a long track record of not awarding young hunks) amid a press run in which he’d mail journalists jars of kimchi he’d made with his mom.
Maybe it’s the athlete in him, but Melton has a knack for physical transformation in his performances, and for playing sweet, non-intellectual types full of complex emotions they can’t quite handle. He’s the heart of Beef’s second season, a bold reboot of the Emmy-sweeping phenomenon about Asian American rage, with a whole new cast. Creator Lee Sung Jin had been writing with Melton in mind, then brought him in to help craft his indelibly funny part as Cailee Spaeny’s hot, dopey fiancé, a former college football star who’s languishing as a failed trainer. That is, until the chance to blackmail their bosses at an exclusive private club (Oscar Isaac and Carey Mulligan) opens up a whole new world of opportunity and vengeance, plus a latent awakening of his Korean identity.
“I feel more sure in who I am today than, you know, five months ago before my daughter was born.”
Melton in person seems a lot like a smarter, more evolved version of his character Austin from Beef. He’s a film nerd who rattles off auteur directors he loves and brags about being an AMC A-List member but who also happens to have eight-pack abs and asks the photographer if it’s OK to sexily rip off the white tank top he’s wearing, you know, for the art of it all.
In an hour and a half he’ll be heading to a tastemaker screening of Her Private Hell, a blood-and-neon-soaked crime thriller co-starring Sophie Thatcher and Havana Rose Liu that’s also the first feature from Drive director Nicolas Winding Refn in 10 years.
The film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and garnered significant attention for the number of walkouts it had. Despite the mixed reactions, the cast and crew are unfazed, believing that any publicity is good publicity for a movie that is described as a “Shakespearean fairy tale” with a BDSM serial killer named The Leather Man.
In the film, Melton plays an American GI who transforms into a vigilante figure, navigating a dark cityscape reminiscent of “Blade Runner” or Hong Kong in search of his missing daughter. Refn, the director, praises Melton’s performance, noting his dedication to stunts and fight choreography.
Unlike traditional superhero movies, “Her Private Hell” is expected to have a niche audience and may not be a box office hit. However, its stylized visuals and unique approach to the genre are likely to attract a cult following.
Refn discovered Melton through his daughter, who introduced him to the actor’s work on “Riverdale.” Melton’s admiration for Refn’s films and his physical presence led to him being cast in the lead role.
The film’s themes of fatherly love resonated deeply with Melton, who had a personal experience with fatherhood while shooting a crucial scene. Refn praises Melton’s ability to balance kindness with intense emotional depth, essential qualities for an action hero.
Melton’s dedication to his craft is evident as he prepares for his next role in a top-secret project with acclaimed directors. His diverse range of upcoming projects showcases his passion for storytelling and collaboration with talented filmmakers. He’s also signed on to star in a new film directed by Lulu Wang, known for The Farewell, alongside Lucy Liu. The movie is about a K-pop band stuck in Waco, Texas, and he’s also set to appear in Bradley Cooper’s Oceans Eleven prequel.
“I remember driving to a football practice, and I heard on the radio, ‘Do you want to be a star? Do you want to be an actor, singer, songwriter?’ And I was like, ‘I want to be an actor!’”
As the photo shoot wraps up, Melton goes around hugging every person in the room. He changes into a breezy summer outfit, blending high-end designers with Korean streetwear: leather Adidas sneakers, sunglasses from Gentle Monster, an oversized dress shirt from Evan Kinori, cropped pants from Jiyong Kim, a Cartier watch, and a Louis Vuitton fanny pack with a can of tuna. Melton always carries tuna with him, a reminder of his mom and aunt packing 60 cans of tuna and instant ramen for him when he moved to LA with just “a hope and a dream.”
The only tattoos on his body are signatures on his hands: his aunt’s, his wife’s, and his own.
Walking through Chinatown, Melton is prepared to protect and joke around, showcasing his friendly and charismatic personality. People don’t seem to notice his recognizable face until they stop at a corner store.
The cashier notices the microphone for the interview and asks Melton about content creation, specifically TikTok. Melton jokes about seeking attention before discussing the show Beef with the cashier, who recognizes him.
In a boba shop, Melton displays his polite nature, even if he’s not a fan of carbs. He and the writer share a moment of politeness, both being people-pleasers. Melton mentions his character Austin in Beef, a role tailored for him.
Melton’s portrayal of Austin involves going along with various schemes, leading to comedic mishaps. He discusses the character’s evolution and the humor in playing a people-pleaser.
Reflecting on his acting style, Melton admires Ryan Gosling for playing naïveté as lived-in rather than just a joke. He relates this approach to why people find it funny.
The journey began when Melton met Beef creator Lee Sung Jin at a dinner for Gold House, an organization bringing together Asian Americans in the film and TV industry. Melton also encountered Wang, Chloe Zhao, and Wicked director Jon Chu through them.
“Sonny showed me a picture of myself and said that this was in the Beef [Season 2] writing room,” says Melton, “and I was like, ‘Oh, does the character look like me or something like that? Have my hairstyle?’ He goes, ‘No, we’re writing it for you.'”
“I don’t know the statistics,” Melton continues, “but I can’t tell you the last time I saw someone specifically write for someone’s half-Korean, half-American-white experience.”
Soon, he and Melton were talking every week, with Lee pulling stories from those chats and throwing them into the script, like the line in episode three when Austin says his family used to go to Korean church, but everyone thought he was Mexican — which happens to Melton all the time.
“Funny story,” says Melton. “Sonny, when he first met me, was like, ‘Wow, Charles, you speak Korean really well.’ And then as he got to know me over time he realized that I can just say a few things very well that [make people believe] I’m completely fluent.”
He rattles off his favorite phrase, which sounds amazing. “I always say, ‘Oh, my Korean is so bad. I only speak Korean a little bit,'” Melton translates back to me in English. “And the reaction in Korea is, ‘Oh my gosh, no! Your Korean is so good!’ And then I’m like, ‘Don’t say anything else!’”
We’ve left the boba shop and have settled, at Melton’s request, on some concrete steps on a quiet Tribeca side street. It’s not till later that I notice he’s had his sneakers off this whole time, dangling his be-socked feet in the air.
He didn’t notice it, either. “My feet were too hot!” he says, laughing. “I did that unconsciously or subconsciously.”
Growing up, Melton’s family wasn’t even remotely involved in the arts. His father, Phil, fell in love with his mother, Sukyong, in the late ‘80s, when he was stationed in Korea with the U.S. Army. Charles was born after Phil brought Sukyong to his hometown of Juneau, Alaska, and has two younger sisters. But they never stayed in one place, heading wherever Phil was stationed, which included Germany and, after the Gulf War, five years in on a base in South Korea. (Melton has said he took the role of an Iraq War soldier in Alex Garland’s Warfare to better understand his dad.)
“Living overseas on a military base, there’s no such thing as social awkwardness. Or you’re desensitized to it because you know you won’t be in this place for too long. So why worry about what someone may think of you?”
When he was younger, Melton remembers being fluent in Korean; after all, he was there from preschool to the middle of fourth grade. Back in the States, his mother spoke Korean at home and kept the culture alive with four fridges, three for fermenting her spring, summer, and winter kimchi. (Ask any Korean kid and they’ll tell you it’s a very, very smelly process that needs to be separated from all other foods.)
Every Sunday after church, his dad would take him to the movies. He also went alone a lot because it’s not easy to make friends as a military kid. The rare times he saw Asian faces onscreen were of course indelible — Harold and Kumar, Fast & Furious, anything with Jackie Chan and Jet Li. But he also still cites A Knight’s Tale with Heath Ledger as one of his favorite movies. He remembers first telling his dad he wanted to be an actor in third grade after watching The Matrix. (Starring Keanu Reeves, secret Asian!)
Still, he does have a special place in his heart for his Korean and Korean American acting heroes, like Steven Yeun, who starred in Beef Season 1, after making a huge splash as a zombie-fighting heartthrob on The Walking Dead. What most impresses Melton, though, are the choices Yeun made after that giant hit show. “He was doing things that I hadn’t seen done by somebody [like him] in our industry,” he says. “And I feel like there’s so much room and so much space being created now for people from all walks of the community. You know, like, for me.”
And then there was getting to say lines opposite Song Kang-ho, who’s starred in two of Melton’s favorite movies, Parasite and Memories of Murder. In Beef, Song’s character, a disgraced plastic surgeon, gives an incredible speech in Korean about their life-threatening predicament as Melton’s Austin nods, and then reveals he only understood three words. (This was inspired directly by Melton’s language skills.) “Working with Song Kang-ho is one of my greatest experiences,” he says. “He has the same thing that Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore have for me, which is like, ‘Is this God-given or is this experience? What is this?’ You can’t express it. You can’t articulate. It’s just magic. They’re the kindest people. It was surreal.”
To actually be a movie star now, given the way he got into acting, though, feels like a one-in-infinity chance. “I remember driving to a football practice, and I heard on the radio, ‘Do you want to be a star? Do you want to be an actor, singer, songwriter?’” he says, telling me a story he’s told countless times before, always to dropped jaws. “And I was like, ‘I want to be an actor!’”
It was one of those Midwest talent showcases you had to pay to enter. He begged his parents to loan him the $3,000 fee, then drove to a Marriott in Salina, Kansas, read some lines for a Twizzler commercial, somehow won, and dropped out of college to move to LA, convinced he’d made it.
Pretty soon after getting there, though, he got scouted to be a model, which turned out to be a way better way of paying rent than auditioning and not getting parts. He relocated to New York and resided in a model apartment, attending fashion weeks and castings without ever getting a chance to walk in a show. After 18 months, he came to the realization that he couldn’t pursue modeling at night if he truly wanted to become an actor. Therefore, he transitioned to doing odd jobs such as dog walking and delivering Chinese takeout, living off a mere $20 a week. He spent his money renting movies from Redbox until he scored his first acting opportunity with a guest spot on Season 5 of “Glee,” where he appeared on screen for only 43 seconds.
At the age of 26, he landed a role on “Riverdale” for its second season, taking over the part of Reggie after Ross Butler left due to commitments to Netflix’s “13 Reasons Why.” This opportunity allowed him to play a high school jock and explore different aspects of his character over six seasons of the show. His background in sports instilled discipline in his life, alongside guidance from his father, which he believes contributed to his success as an actor. Despite not receiving formal training, he attributes his preparation and dedication to his athletic background.
Throughout his journey, he faced challenges such as being advised to change his name by a casting director and being typecast based on his ethnicity. However, he persevered by presenting himself as an all-American in auditions to avoid being limited by stereotypes. He emphasizes the importance of representation in media and acknowledges the impact of seeing oneself reflected on screen.
He reflects on his identity as a half-Korean individual and embraces both sides of his heritage, inspired by a conversation with rapper Dumbfoundead. This realization allows him to accept and celebrate his Korean-American identity. His journey of self-discovery and acceptance resonates with others who may have struggled with their cultural identity.
Melton’s relationship with Summers-Valli is kept private, but he mentions that they met through work, likely during a commercial shoot for Coach. He praises her talent and expresses deep admiration for her. While he doesn’t delve into details about their relationship, he openly discusses his joy in becoming a father. The Daniels’ latest film project marks a significant moment in his life, as it is the first he is working on since becoming a father. This new chapter has brought a sense of clarity and purpose to his life, transforming his perspective on both personal and professional levels. He reflects on how fatherhood has made him more self-assured and focused, stating, “I feel more sure in who I am today than, you know, five months ago before my daughter was born.”
One particular incident during a photo shoot highlighted the newfound fears that come with parenthood. The realization that he is now afraid of heights struck a chord with him, as he expressed, “My stomach was tossing and turning because you’re not just living for yourself anymore. I want to be here for my daughter and not miss anything.”
Despite these new fears, he remains optimistic about his upcoming projects, even if they involve risky stunts like wirework. The unnecessary risks that once seemed appealing now feel unwise, as he contemplates the impact of his actions on his daughter. He explains, “Just things have become clearer. I don’t know how to explain it.”
The Daniels’ outlook on life has shifted dramatically since becoming a parent, as he now finds fulfillment in the simple moments and everyday routines. He emphasizes the importance of leading a grounded and mundane life off set, believing that it enriches his performances by bringing authenticity to his characters.
In his view, every action, no matter how small, contributes to his growth as an actor. From drinking coffee to putting his daughter to bed, he finds beauty in the simplicity of these moments. He strives to authentically portray the nuances of everyday life on screen, a goal that he believes sets great actors apart.
Ultimately, The Daniels’ journey as a new father has brought a sense of completeness and contentment to his life. He finds inspiration in the ordinary moments and experiences, viewing them as essential to his creative process. As he navigates this new chapter, he remains committed to staying true to himself and bringing a sense of realism to his work. Transform the following sentence into the active voice:
“The decision was made by the committee to postpone the project.”
The committee decided to postpone the project.
