Justice Smith Unpacks the Mysteries of I Saw the TV Glow —Including That Ending

Spencer Pazer

This interview contains spoilers for I Saw the TV Glow, including discussion of the ending.

Nostalgia. Memory. Identity. These concepts are never in a fixed state, always in flux, always open to relitigation. That tension inherent to that theme is an often explored idea in film, but you’ve never seen it unpacked quite the way Jane Schoenbrun does in their arresting second feature, I Saw the TV Glow.

The film, which opens in theaters nationwide on Friday, also features Justice Smith as you’ve never seen him before. He plays Owen, who bonds with fellow high-school student Maddy (Brigette Lundy-Paine) over their mutual fascination with The Pink Opaque, a Buffy the Vampire Slayer-esque ‘90s teen drama. Through horror and fantasy flourishes, unreliable narration, and some clever jumps back and forth from the ‘90s to the present, Schoenburn smuggles in an at times unsettlingly visceral story about authenticity, trans acceptance and self-awareness.

But in playing Owen, who wrestles with all of these ideas—often self-defeatingly—the usually bubbly Smith, typically deployed across some of your favorite franchises as a source of levity and warmth, gets to show off a new gear. His haunting performance is what powers the film, even when the story asks him to be more emotionally vacant than seems humanly possible. It might be the 28-year-old actor’s best work yet; his increasingly lifeless eyes, hollow line deliveries, and flickers of true emotion will stay with you long after the credits roll.

GQ spoke to the actor about his own relationship to nostalgia and identity, sharing scenes with Limp Bizkit’s own Fred Durst, and rewatching old episodes of Goosebumps.

GQ: The movie confronts and complicates our relationship with nostalgia, especially in a period where IP rules. I’m curious what your own relationship to nostalgia is, and how it’s informed your approach to being an artist.

JUSTICE SMITH: I love the moment in the film where he rewatches [The Pink Opaque] and it's not as good as he remembered. That's such a real thing that happens. I remember 12 months ago, I watched the Haunted Mask episode of Goosebumps, which really shook me as a kid. It scared the shit out of me.

Did you rewatch it for Halloween?

I don't remember why I rewatched it, but I just was like, this is bad. And a part of that is because I work in the industry now, so whenever I watch anything, I see the script and I see the camera angle and all that. So the magic is dead in that sense. But also, I think as a kid, your ability to suspend disbelief is higher and you're not as jaded. You're able to be immersed in the magic of storytelling a lot easier.

You can't discuss this film without talking about pop culture influences. What were some of the touch points in your youth that put you here today?

There's a lot. I liked a lot of those children's horror movies, which were the vibe of TV Glow, like Are you Afraid of the Dark? Or even The Simpsons, like Treehouse of Horror episodes. Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy. I loved anything that had a darker tone.

Jane’s big reference point here is Buffy—did you ever tap in with that?

No. I'd never seen it. And I still haven't seen it. Brigette hadn't seen it, and then watched all of the episodes in preparation for the part. And then I was like, I'm not going to do that.

What made you want to take this role on?

I read it and I was like, I don't know what the fuck I just read. It was intense. Jane’s films get under your skin, even if you understand them logically or not. The script was the same way. And I just felt it, even though I didn't really understand a lot of what was going on. I also was just drawn to the character. [Especially] because we track him over 20, 30 years, and I loved that as he gets older, he becomes less of himself.

There's this one line delivery you have that was so haunting, when adult Owen is buying the new flat screen: “I have a family now. I love them.”

That line is crazy, especially because I'm a shell of myself walking in and then I'm smiling at the camera and then I'm actively being a shell of myself. It was interesting how much we played a lot with who narrator Owen was, versus real Owen.

So in these moments where Owen is experiencing something in the scene, and then he turns to camera—who is that person? Because that person exists in this weird liminal space of reality. The whole movie exists in a liminal space of reality.

It’s definitely a film that promotes different interpretations, and different audiences are going to project different things onto it. I’m curious about what your overall interpretation of Owen's arc is.

He's running away from himself, the whole movie. The younger he is, the closer he is to who he is, the closer he is to his authenticity. And then as he gets older, even though he's involuntarily drawn to this representation of himself in The Pink Opaque, and he can't deny this fucking burning connection with this show, with his true reality—he is afraid of what that means, [and] of accepting that his whole life has been a lie.

It's scary, I think, to make an identity change. And his entire environment has, since he was a kid, conditioned him into feeling unsafe. So there's no world in which he wants to put himself in the crosshairs. And Maddie, who is more willing to do what it takes to be true to themselves, is obviously pushing Owen to do the same.

But I think it's a narrative that a lot of us struggle with. Who am I deep down? And even if I were to figure that out, does that mean I want to embrace it or should I just keep moving the way I've always been moving?

Speaking of Owen’s uncomfortable environment: His intolerant father is played by Fred Durst. What was it like working with him?

Fred Durst is sick. He's just so down. I remember when we did that scene where I shove my head in the TV and he pulls me out of it. We were working with the stunt coordinator, and I was like, "We can just fucking... I'm good. Let's fucking do it. Just yank me out of there. Yeah, let's just fucking wrestle.” And he was like, "I don't want to hurt you." I'm like, "It's okay. Honestly, it's okay if you hurt me. It's fine." He's dope.

There’s so many moments where the narrative goes into the surreal to express what's really going on with Owen and Maddie. So when we see the TV scene and then the shower scene, what is going on there on a metatextual level?

That scene comes right after the final episode of The Pink Opaque. He's just watched the season finale and it ends bleakly. And again, it's that push and pull of, if this is over, that means I have no more connection to myself, and this is my last chance to really jump into the deep end of my truth. And so I think that's why he shows us that he's trying to get as close to that reality as possible—it's a moment where he wakes up and he realizes that the reality he's living in, it was one fabricated for him.

And Fred Durst, who represents this oppressive, patriarchal figure in the world, is trying to keep him away from himself, trying to keep him away from his truth, from knowing that there's more to life than this. So that's why he's pulling him out. That's why he's trying to calm him down with the steam and stuff like that. Even though Owen is shouting things like, "This isn't my life. You're not my dad. This is all fake."

I'm sure it was a challenging character to play. What was the scene or the sequence that you really had to lock in for and dig somewhere deep and put you to the test?

It's funny because—this film was challenging because there was so much to track, with the different ages and how intense his asthma is, and how Narrator Owen feels about the different situations. And also, when we would shoot certain days, we would shoot different ages. And I found that the more I let go and I just trusted my presence, the more I was effective in telling the story beat that I needed to tell.

This film was a really powerful lesson for me as an actor, because usually, when it comes to heavy material like this, I like to put my music on and get into my space or whatever. And specifically for that [ending] scene, I remember being like, I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know where this is going to come from, but I'm just going to fucking throw a paint at the wall and see what sticks. And it surprisingly works, it's a really fucked up intense story beat of Owen's final cry for help.

And it was just trusting Jane. I left it all in the take, because I was really on a journey of trusting my authentic self, my authentic creative expression, which is, ironically, exactly what the movie's about.

It’s interesting to see you take this on, because I think most audiences used to seeing you in different types of roles as, if not outright comedic relief, then just an overall source of levity.

Yeah. It's funny because even in all the comedies I do or the lighter characters I do, I approach them the same way. I'm always just like, what's the truth of the scenario? And even in comedy, it's just about truth. It's like if the situation is funny, it's funny. So yeah, for me, it's not necessarily like I'm doing something... I understand how people are like, whoa, this is a completely different tone for him. But yeah, for me, I'm like, I'm just doing what I've always been doing.

But did you take it to present a different tone because sometimes audiences just need to be...

I took it because I was drawn to it. I don't know if it was actively to be like, "Hey, see what I can do." I've always been a fan of horror, so I've wanted to do a horror project for a long time—and I'm circling some other ones right now. I really thought my career was going to be that I would live in some indie apartment in LA and wait tables while I was doing one-liners in indie films. And I was really excited and happy for that.

And then my career took this unexpected turn down this blockbuster lane, doing all these popcorn movies, which presented its own challenges and its own benefits. But I come from a theater background. I've always been drawn to drama. I always approach everything through a drama lens. Even the Pokemon movie, I'm like, Oh, gosh— it's a father-son story. So it's finding the balance of the light and dark. But I'm happy that I get to do darker fare because it speaks to my inner self.

I know you're just pursuing the projects that excite you, but do you feel like this is a trend that you want to continue down a little bit more?

We'll see. I'm drawn to what I'm drawn to. I think it really depends, honestly. Part of me is trying to just let go and trust, and feel it out. But I know that there's a project right now that I'm circling that I'm like, I think I'm just going to do this for money. I’m not really crazy about this project or story or character, but I have a mortgage to pay. And then there's other projects where I'm like, ‘Oh, this is creatively fulfilling.’ I think it's a balance of the practical and the art.

Your relationship with Brigette’s character is really interesting to me because it's almost like an anti-chemistry in a way that you had to develop.

That's a very cool way to put it.

Like the basic version of this movie has you guys being a lot chummier. So it was really interesting that Jane presents it in a way where you guys are still on opposite ends, but the movie has to thrive on the connection that you build. It struck me as a unique dynamic to have to build with a scene partner.

They're two sides of the same coin, yin and yang. Similar to the show that they're obsessed with the character that they're [respectively] drawn to obviously is a representation of them. But Brigette is a trip. And it's this meta commentary on the movie because my character is like this scaredy-cat and Maddy is way cooler, and more self-assured and rebellious.

There is another version of this movie that follows her when she leaves town and doesn't stick with the guy who's still stuck.

But I think that it's more interesting to follow a character who is their own villain, their own antagonist. Because I'm really interested in characters who are presented with a decision and decide wrong. I think that's so much more narratively interesting.

Thinking about the movie and its commentary on authenticity, how did you relate to that in your own journey? It's a cautionary tale of not being your authentic self. Did any reflections on your own life come up as you got into Owen’s skin? Like even if we don't have something as literal as the egg-crack moment or don't specifically relate to that, we all have our own versions of it.

I think I was blessed with an intuitive sense of authenticity. There's this one philosopher that always talks about the problem of other people—I forget how the quote goes, but it's like, we as individuals have so much depth and eccentricity and magic, and when you put that in a relationship with other people, that's when repression happens. That's when it's like, Oh, well, my need for connection is trumping my need to be true to myself. So that's a very difficult thing to balance for any human being.

But I still feel like I had an intuitive sense of being myself, and also, I wasn't really good at holding secrets. I've always been very upfront about the things that I'm thinking, but I've also played a lot of characters who are socially ill-equipped. Anxious characters or archetypically dorky characters or whatever.

So I understood how to draw upon moments in my life where I felt lost or felt uncomfortable or insecure, and just concentrated them in Owen. Specifically with his voice—because he's so detached from his body, because his body is not real. I wanted to make it feel like everything he said was getting stuck in his throat. Everything he said, he was trying to push it back down. So it created this almost congested vocal thing that me and Jane talked about before shooting.

Were there other performances that you looked to as you created Owen?

Yeah, I stole that directly from Julianne Moore. Have you seen Safe, that movie where she's allergic to everything? Anyways, I worked with her and I loved her process and the way she shaped character. But even before I met her—Boogie Nights is one of my favorite movies of all time. And I remember watching the EPK of Boogie Nights and hearing her talk about how she wanted her vocal quality to be. She wanted her head and her body to be separate. So she made her vocal quality higher. And so that would present an ungrounding of the character.

And I said to her, “Julie, I stole this idea from you." And she was like, "Actually, that's from this other movie."

Everyone always wants to use movies to put the larger context of where the industry is right now. And I think you're at an interesting nexus, because like you said, you've done a lot of blockbuster fare and you come from this dramatic world, and you do these indies that really push the envelope. How are you feeling as a creative person right now overall?

It’s something that I've been thinking about a lot, and I continue to think about, because I got into acting as a means to escape, but also a means to be messy. I could put all of my messy big feelings into these characters that I played in acting class or whatever. And that's why it meant so much to me because it was a source of healing. And then I knew it was a job, but I didn't understand it was a job, not in my soul. It was always just what I was drawn to.

And as I started to build a profile and make money, the business started to infect my relationship to it, and I started hating it. I was like, This sucks, I'm not having fun. I don't remember why I liked this. As a kid, I would do monologues in my bedroom by myself. That's how much I loved this thing. And then now I'm on set like, Oh, gosh, can I go home? And I realized it was because I had forgotten my inner child's reason for doing this.

And in the last couple of years, I've been trying to relight that fire and find the ways in which each character, each project I do is a source of healing for me. And at the same time, like I said before, it's a balance of like, Okay, well maybe I'll just do this because I can make some money. And then I'll find a project where I'm like, this is all for little Justice.

It's interesting too, because it feels like subconsciously, at least, a movie like this is in conversation with that feeling, right?

Yeah, exactly that, yeah. It's that relationship of truth, of what you're drawn to versus what society says, It's like the practical shame. Do you want to be true or do you want to be safe? That's a constant choice that I think every human being has to make, but specifically, is highlighted by these characters. And it’s also something I'm navigating in the industry.

There are a lot of people who are going to walk away from this movie with questions and debating the ending. What’s your interpretation of it?

It's a spoiler, but I'll tell you. It's validation that Maddie was right, that Owen is not himself. He is this other character. He is her. And when he rips his chest open and he sees all of the TV light, he realizes that Mr. Melancholy has created this fake reality where he's slowly dying because he's really underground without a heart. And it's so funny because we shot a different ending, and the way Jane edited it is actually beautiful, where he finally has tangible validation of his truth, of the thing that he's been running away from for so long, and it feels so good. And then he immediately returns to apologizing for his existence.

There's an extended ending where he comes out of the bathroom, he's apologizing to everyone for his panic attack, and as he slowly picks up speed, he runs through the arcade and the [light], and essentially, gets out. And Jane decided to cut that and just end it on him apologizing for his existence. And so it creates this dynamic of, Will he ever get out?

What do you make of that decision? It's a darker ending to show him staying there, right?

Well Jane and I think it's actually hopeful. Because it's more vague, because you see his expression in the mirror, he's very happy and he's moved by the light that he sees, and there's no denying it. And so, obviously, he's apologetic to everybody, but at least he's closer to who he truly is. At least he's accepted now who he truly is because he's seen it. [But it] is bleak. It's something that a lot of people experience. There are people who are lying in the graveyard right now, who never, ever lived their truth. There's a lot of people like that who will never accept who they are out of fear.

As more people see it and more people come up to you, has it set in that this is going to be a touchstone for a lot of people who are going through similar things?

I hope so. I've had a lot of trans people come up to me—at Sundance, and even internally, within A24—and talk to me about how much the film meant to them. And I know that Jane did a screening for a bunch of trans folk and there wasn't a dry eye in the house. So that's really powerful. There's a lot of really visceral reactions to this film that are... even if they don't understand it, logically they feel it. And that's, I think, the beauty of Jane's artistry.

Originally Appeared on GQ