'Percy Jackson' actor Logan Lerman

Logan Lerman has the honor of being the first individual on whom Good Prattle has ever had two articles: he was first featured on this website when I participated in his roundtable interview for retro road trip flick My One And Only; now he's here being interviewed one-on-one for Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, in which he plays the title character. He and I talk about The Lightning Thief, which is a modern-day fantasy adventure that follows Percy—who just so happens to be Poseidon's son—as he strives to prove to the gods that he did not steal Zeus' thunderbolt; we talk about travel; and we breach the subject that inevitably seems to come up in every conversation between two second-semester high school seniors: college. Enjoy!

You know, when they told me you’ve been up since 4:30am today, I was like, “…”
Yeah. I’m… out of it. Not to mention this is just one of many cities we’ve gone to—I can go through the list: San Francisco, Dallas, London, Greece… and there’s more to do, too: Atalanta, Los Angeles, and Tokyo.

I was in one of the roundtables you did over the summer for My One and Only—
Oh, really! Okay.

I was in the same room as the lady who asked you if Renee Zellweger brought cookies to the set.
That’s fantastic! I remember that. That’s funny.

Well, I just picked up on how rapturously you talked about movies.
Yeah. I’m just a huge fan, you know? It’s the reason why I’m here, more than anything. I just love moviemaking. I could just talk for thirty minutes right now about pretty much every film that I loved and why.

Growing up in LA must be perfect if you’re into movies.
I love it. I love it. I mean, how can you hate a town—how can you not like a town that’s all about film, especially if you’re a movie geek? I mean, I love that stuff.

I might be moving there next year for college.
Oh, very nice! It’s great there. I love it.

What’s it like?
It’s an amazing city. You’ve just gotta steer away from the B.S. Don’t get caught up in the L.A. lifestyle of consuming. You know, make sure you’ve got your head on your shoulders.

Sounds kind of like New York!
Yeah—I mean, I guess it’s like that in all cities, really.

When you got involved with Percy Jackson you hadn’t read the books or anything, had you?
No, I knew nothing about them, actually. I discovered the screenplay—I got the script like any other film, and I saw Chris Columbus’ name and I was like, “I gotta do this.” He’s a director I love, and his movies have really shaped my childhood. And then I read the script and fell in love with it, and I read the book and fell in love with that too.

Right. I asked the mythology question at the conference because I’m kind of a Roman mythology nerd, and all the names are different so during the film I was like “Oh, you mean Diana! You mean Venus!” But it must have been great that you got an entire world to play around with instead of something set in a world you’re already familiar with.
Yeah. Yeah, I mean, to touch on that, the thing about this movie that’s so unique—and I’ve never seen it before—is that we’re taking Greek mythology and we’re putting it in the modern day. And it’s basically retelling these classic myths and showing it to a modern-day audience. And how do we do that? We change the shield when Perseus battles Medusa from being a reflective device to an iPhone. And you’re kind of tricking the audience into learning Greek mythology without knowing that they actually are.

There are a lot of references to—for example, Brandon has a line that references the recession.
Oh, yeah, that was funny. Yeah, there are some things that might go over kids’ heads, for parents, too, so Chris is great at making a film for everyone.

That definitely came across. How do you like being in New York, by the way?
Oh, I love it. I love it. Y’know, it’s a little overwhelming for me because I’m just not used to being so enclosed in a city—it’s a little bit more spread-out in L.A. But I love it here. It’s fantastic.

Do you get to visit a lot?
Yeah—only for a couple of days, though. I haven’t had any substantial period of time that I’ve gotten to hang out here and get to know the city yet.

Well, if you’re ever here and have any extra time, I’d be happy to show you around!
[laughs] Oh, really—thank you very much! Yeah, I don’t know my way around at all, but I’ve got friends who go to NYU, so.

Are you going to college next year, or…?
Yeah, no, I might end up going to NYU, possibly.

Great school. I’ve got friends who go to school there.
Oh, really! Yeah, it’s very nice. I hope I end up there.

Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief is in theatres now.