Former Disney Channel star Dylan Sprouse dons a bright pink dress for a gender fluid performance as an escort in short film, Daddy.
Created by filmmaker Christian Coppola (not an immediate family member of Francis and Sofia), the film follows Sprouse as he comforts an older gentleman who has lost his female partner.
On why he chose the role, Sprouse told Interview Magazine, "It’s almost cliché, but when you’re an actor, sometimes the dialogue jumps off the page at you. It just makes the performances all the easier. It certainly made my choice to become this character easier. I feel like for me coming out of college, after a very long break away from acting, this was certainly a character that I had not seen recently in any projects or scripts that I had been sent."
Sprouse and Coppola, who went to college together, both loved the film for subverting the audience's expectations. It's not about sex per se, but about grief and acceptance and intimacy. Even the title is uttered from an unexpected source.
"I didn’t want people to feel it was just one thing," Sprouse continued. "I wanted it to feel complex, because that’s how people are. There’s something really beautiful that lies in the ambiguity of how a human being operates and moves in the world. The wide spectrum that exists of what people’s needs are, and what constitutes a romantic connection. I think it’s a very complex dynamic that you and Ron are exploring in this story."
Watch Daddy below.
