Chad Michael Murray has revealed he loves being called a teenage heartthrob and thinks of it as a blessing.
Speaking to the PA News Agency at the premiere of his latest movie Freakier Friday, Murray said he feels privileged to have had such an impact on a generation.
“I’m very, very blessed, very fortunate and lucky to be a part of a lot of really great movies and great stories that have affected a generation. That’s really the only reason to be an actor for me. I just wanted to make people happy.”
Best known for his lead role in teenage drama series One Tree Hill in the early 2000s, the actor also made appearances in Dawson’s Creek and Gilmore Girls as well as several movies.
He also starred in the 2003 comedy film Freaky Friday alongside Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis, and is now reprising his role as Lohan’s character Anna’s former love interest Jake in the sequel.
22 years after the first film was released, Freakier Friday sees Lohan and Curtis return to their roles as mother and daughter.
In the 2003 film Tess Coleman (Curtis) and musician Anna (Lohan) traded places after reading fortune cookies at a Chinese restaurant.
The story picks up with Lohan’s character, Anna, now a mother to a teenage daughter of her own and a soon-to-be stepmother.
In the sequel, Anna’s daughter Harper, played by Julia Butters and her soon-to-be stepdaughter Lily Davies, portrayed by Sophia Hammons, join Anna and her mother Tess in a wild, quadruple body swap.
Speaking about returning for the sequel, Murray said they had to work out how his character would realistically fit into the updated story.
“It’s a house of cards, you move one piece and the whole thing kind of crashes down with four people switching bodies. So we had to be really careful and deliberate with the choices we made,” he said.
“I went straight into analytics mode. We had to flesh out who Jake has been over the last 22 years. What’s he been up to? Where’s he gone? What’s the funniest choice here? And that’s where we went. Then it just became exciting from there.”
Murray added: “My joking sales pitch for this film has been, this movie will make you live longer as it reduces cortisol levels.
“If this is the type of content I do for the rest of my life as an actor I’m done, I’m happy, I’m in.”
The 2003 film was based on the 1972 novel by Mary Rodgers, which was previously turned into a 1976 movie starring Jodie Foster and Barbara Harris.
