Christopher Mintz-Plasse is getting candid about the effects of fame following his role as McLovin in “Superbad”.
The then-17-year-old shot to fame overnight after becoming instantly recognizable as the hilarious vest-wearing one-named Hawaiian organ donor opposite Michael Cera and Jonah Hill in the 2007 comedy co-written by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg.
“It was very tough to be a nobody one minute and then, literally, two days after the movie came out, it was me getting recognized everywhere,” he tells Page Six.
Now 31 years old, the actor says his sudden fame was “very alarming, it was very intense.”
“There was a lot of anxiety, a lot of breakdowns, but I had a great support system of friends and family, a great agent and manager to help me guide a career that I wanted, “but it was intense.”
“It was very alarming for a 17-year-old person,” Mintz-Plasse explains. “I was trying to figure out who I was as a human being at the time and then to have millions of people knowing you as McLovin was very intense.”
The role was Mintz-Plasse’s first acting gig and the actor explains he was unprepared for the attention, unlike co-stars Hill and Cera who already had a number of roles under their belts.
“It was zero to 100 very fast and I was barely out of high school,” Mintz-Plasse says. “When it was happening, I think I was young and dumb enough to go along with the ride, but looking back at it now it was very intense.”
Despite the pressures and toll on his mental health, Mintz-Plasse stressed he “loved” the movie and is grateful his experience led him to roles in “Kick Ass”, “How To Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World”, and “Neighbors”, and his most recent cameo in the Oscar-winning “Promising Young Woman”.
“It was only five minutes,” he says. “I had zero to do with its greatness but I recommend people go watch it if they haven’t seen it yet. I just think it’s one of the most challenging movies this year.”
