NEW YORK — Chad Michael Murray is at present deep in thought. Together with his index finger firmly pressed towards his chiseled jawline, he’s making an attempt to find out precisely what number of instances he’s shirtless in “The Merry Gentlemen.” He can’t determine it out — it’s a minimum of 9 by my rely — however he’s positive it must be a recreation.
“Every time Chad loses his shirt, have a sip of wine, beer or eat a cookie,” he laughs over Zoom, as one hand brushes his golden strands behind his ear.
Lounging behind a desk on the Plaza Lodge right here, Murray — who now rocks a little bit of scruff with a touch of grey — remains to be almost an identical to his previous alter-egos, just like the charming protagonist Lucas Scott in “One Tree Hill” and Chilton bad-boy Tristan Dugray in “Gilmore Girls.” Now, 43, he has a little bit of a rugged edge — one thing that’s serving him properly in his newest function within the “Magic Mike”-meets-mistletoe flick “The Merry Gentlemen.”
Within the Netflix film, which premieres Wednesday, a dancer named Ashley (Britt Robertson) returns to her hometown and tries to save lots of her dad and mom’ nightclub by beginning a holiday-themed male revue. Murray performs Luke, a contractor-turned-entertainer who serves as Ashley’s romantic curiosity.
Netflix’s “The Merry Gentlemen” facilities on a dancer named Ashley who types a male revue to save lots of her mother or father’s nightclub. From left: Ricky (Hector David Jr.), Rodger (Marc Anthony Samuel), Luke (Chad Michael Murray) and Troy (Colt Prattes).
(Katrina Marcinowski / Netflix)
“When you say Christmas, the first thing that typically comes to your mind isn’t strippers,” he quips.
Murray wasn’t fearful about baring his abs for the movie — it was the dancing that terrified him. He admits he might have even “peeked” at “Magic Mike” to prep for it. “It’s not that I don’t dance,” he clarifies, “I do, but at home and at weddings.”
However for the function of Luke, he obtained an expedited training. For six hours a day, as much as 4 days every week, Murray labored his approach by means of nation western, hip-hop and jazz. Dancing 12 hours a day, half-naked in entrance of a crew was unexpectedly a “dopamine hit” for him. However nobody is extra shocked than Murray that he fell in love with dance.
When it got here to “The Merry Gentlemen,” it was no coincidence that Murray’s character was referred to as Luke, a reputation shared by a number of of his earlier characters, together with in “Mother of the Bride” earlier this yr. “When we got to the table on this one, I think his name was Bob or something, and he didn’t feel like a Bob,” he says. He supplied three names — one was Luke. Alongside the best way, Murray, who’s a training Christian, found the identify Luke means “light.”
“It just felt kismet,” he says with a gravelly lilt. “That’s one of my main goals as an actor, to bring light to people’s life, enjoyment and entertainment, a departure, an escape from the mundane realities of day-to-day life.”
“That’s one of my main goals as an actor, to bring light to people’s life, enjoyment and entertainment, a departure, an escape from the mundane realities of day-to-day life,” Murray says.
(Justin Jun Lee / For The Occasions)
That need for escapism has been Murray’s driving drive since childhood. The actor grew up in Buffalo, N.Y., with 5 siblings and was largely raised by his father. He says the household lived paycheck to paycheck or “sometimes worse.” For Murray and his siblings, TV grew to become an escape.
“When I was 6, 7, 8 years old, I used to dress up as Jim Kelly of the Buffalo Bills during the halftime shows,” he remembers. “I’d dress up in my old Buff helmet and my Jim Kelly jersey, and I’d do commentating like I was doing a mid-game interview.” That sparked his curiosity in tv and movie.
At age 15, Murray was hospitalized for greater than two months after his intestines twisted and he required an emergency resection that resulted in post-operative inner bleeding. Whereas recovering, he realized what he wished to do along with his life. His nurse, who was a mannequin, urged he get into modeling. Murray, nevertheless, wished to be an actor.
“She said, ‘Well, you can segue into acting [by starting out as] a model. You can do this. You’re getting out of this bed. I’m going to set you up as soon as you get out of here,’” he says, pausing for a second. “And she kept her word.”
Murray says that second modified the whole lot. When he was 18, he attended a modeling conference, met an agent who inspired him to relocate to Los Angeles and started modeling for manufacturers like Skechers, Tommy Hilfiger and Gucci.
By 2000, he had nabbed a recurring function on “Gilmore Girls” as Tristan — till his character was shipped off to navy faculty in North Carolina throughout Season 2. “They had asked me to stay and to become a regular at the end of Season 1, and I was young and I wanted the opportunity to kind of have my own thing,” Murray says. Shortly after, he landed a recurring half on “Dawson’s Creek” as womanizer Charlie Todd, who dates Jen Lindley (Michelle Williams).
Three years after his first stint on the WB, he landed the lead function of Lucas Scott within the soapy teen drama “One Tree Hill.” Throughout his time on the present, he married co-star Sophia Bush, however the couple divorced after simply 5 months in 2006. Whereas starring in “One Tree Hill,” he landed two different pivotal roles — as Jake, the motorcycle-riding, Britney Spears-singing crush of Lindsay Lohan’s Anna on “Freaky Friday,” and as star quarterback Austin Ames in “A Cinderella Story,” reverse Hilary Duff.
Murray landed his first lead TV function on the WB’s “One Tree Hill,” taking part in Lucas Scott within the teen drama.
(Fred Norris / The CW)
As Murray remembers, he was answerable for a pivotal plot change in “A Cinderella Story” involving Austin’s soccer staff, the North Valley Frogs. “They were going to lose, and I wouldn’t have it, so I said, ‘Guys, look, he’s a stand-up human being. And I understand that he’s in love, [but] he’d give the ball to his best friend, Jake,’” he says.
With these roles, Murray catapulted into stardom, a heartthrob with a capital H. He grew to become a fixture of the tabloids and each teen woman’s crush, along with his profitable smile, bad-boy appeal and tattoos. However Murray admits he didn’t deal with the highlight properly.
“There’s no playbook,” he says, “or at least there wasn’t then.” Murray provides that he didn’t know methods to say “no” in a wholesome approach and that he was burning the candle at each ends. The largest lesson he discovered: “What does Chad want to do?” he dryly cackles, earlier than interrupting himself. “Yes, I just spoke in the third person about my past self.”
Immediately, he doesn’t essentially need the highlight. Murray, who shares three children — a son and two daughters — along with his spouse, actor Sarah Roemer, has completely different priorities now. “I want to be a dad but still work and service everybody else and help people make a great show so that everybody else can be happy,” he says.
That’s partly what drew him to vacation motion pictures like “The Merry Gentlemen” and Hallmark’s “Write Before Christmas,” “Love in Winterland” and “Road to Christmas.” Murray is hyper-aware of the roles he chooses and the way they could have an effect on his household.
“You kind of have to think about what’ll happen if you do Movie A versus Movie B and what your kids will have to go through,” he says, including that it’s one thing that he and his spouse all the time focus on intimately. Wherever he or his spouse is filming, they journey in a pack. (“They’re here in New York with me right now,” he says.)
His present function within the TV drama “Sullivan’s Crossing,” was, fairly actually, the reply to 2 years of prayers. “I wanted a show where I was not No. 1 on the call sheet,” he says of the Canadian present, which airs on the CW within the U.S. Now, he can coach his son’s soccer staff, take his daughter to bounce and his children to highschool. And for 5 months out of the yr, his household is fortunately settled in Halifax, Canada, the place the sequence movies.
Murray isn’t craving the highlight as he juggles fatherhood with work, which is why he took a job on the CW’s “Sullivan’s Crossing.” “I wanted a show where I was not No. 1 on the call sheet,” he says.
(Justin Jun Lee / For The Occasions)
Subsequent yr, Murray might be seen reprising his character from “Freaky Friday” within the film’s sequel, “Freakier Friday.” In returning to the function, Murray requested himself, “Where the heck would Jake be?” Regardless of some prying, he’s coy about his character’s place within the narrative and as a substitute stresses how a lot time has handed between the movies. “We’ve had whole lives in between,” he says. “We got kids and grandkids. Jamie [Lee Curtis] got an Academy Award.”
However will he be dusting off his vocal chops for an additional pop cowl like within the first movie? He’s not ruling it out. “We will see,” he says. That second when Jake sings an off-key model of “…Baby One More Time” is “burned into my frontal cortex,” he says. The scene was an concept from director Mark Waters, who wished Murray to create his personal model of John Cusack’s boombox scene in “Say Anything.”
However he says they each agreed that bringing “One Tree Hill” again was good. “I want it for the fans,” he says. As if on cue, Lafferty texts Murray whereas we’re discussing the subject. “Speak of the devil,” he laughs, flashing his iPhone display on the laptop digicam for me to see.
However Murray isn’t too involved about what tasks he might or might not do subsequent. He considers himself a laissez-faire man who believes within the butterfly impact, and with the profession path he’s helmed, he’s been capable of star in his most fulfilling function — dad. And as soon as his children are older, he might begin taking completely different components — perhaps a psychological thriller or an indie movie. But when somebody approached him to star reverse Meryl Streep proper now, he’d soar on the alternative. “I would potentially pee down my leg,” he laughs.
For now, his future is a blur — and that’s OK with him.
“I truly feel like I’m just getting started,” Murray says.