Ryan Destiny, Drew Starkey and More Standout Actors of 2024 on Biopics, Breaking In and What’s Next

In the last few years, Barbaro has had to learn patience. “It’s funny, because it’s never been a strength of mine,” the actor admits with a laugh. After booking the role of Lt. Trace, the sole female pilot in “Top Gun: Maverick” in 2018, she watched the film go through several delays before its release in 2022. But Barbaro found a sil- ver lining in the wait. “We really became closer as a cast,” she says of the Tom Cruise blockbuster. “And we started the publicity process numerous times, so I learned to get better at interviews, which is some- thing I was awkward and terrible at.”

The wait also prepared her for her role as Joan Baez in “A Complete Unknown,” James Mangold’s biographical drama starring Timothée Chalamet as Bob Dylan. Barbaro first auditioned for the role of the legendary singer in 2020, shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic shut everything down. She fol- lowed up in 2022 with a self-tape when the project came back around, and it wasn’t until early 2023 that she met Mangold.

Because of the strikes that year, the film didn’t start shooting until early 2024, with a release date of December. The upside? “I got so much more time to learn her music and to really get to know the guitar,” Bar- baro reveals. “It changed everything.” The proficiency on the guitar also helped her pull off the most challenging scene, performing “Don’t Think Twice.”

Barbaro had a wealth of research to draw on, including Baez’s memoirs, and was even able to speak to the legend her- self, but not until shooting was already underway. Baez had no involvement with the film, and Barbaro hadn’t been told whether she should reach out or not. So she figured it was better to ask for forgive- ness than for permission. “I had started dreaming about Joan and I felt like if Joan were having dreams about someone, she would reach out to them,” she notes. “The conversation was amazing and mostly reassured me that I was on the right path.”

—Jenelle Riley

Agency UTA
Management Range
Legal Meyer & Downs
Influences Joachim Trier, Kogonada, Greta Gerwig, Alex Garland

Chao is excited that she was able to buy a house in Brooklyn with money that she earned pursuing her passion — acting and the arts.

Following the crippling SAG-AFTRA strike last year, she’s right to be excited about the big buy and the rising trajectory of her career. “The Afterparty” star plays a key role in Toronto Film Festival premiere “Nightbitch,” starring Amy Adams, and in 2025 has “The Roses,” from director Jay Roach, on deck.

But for the Rhode Island native, it all started in her living room, watching VHS tapes of old movies, mimicking her favor- ite stars. “My parents said that when I was young, they would hear me talking to some- body in another room, and then they’d peek

in and I’d have a yellow crayon in my hand, smoking and talking to the bookshelf, say- ing, like, ‘You gotta lay off the booze.’ And good for them that they knew not to be alarmed,” she says with a laugh.

It was during her senior year at Brown when she had to write and perform a one- woman show that she committed to act- ing. “It was during that process I realized that I was just dedicating all my life to mak- ing this thing happen, and that it felt really full and satisfying,” she says.

“I’ve always felt that I have a ton of tools in my toolbox, and if I respond to the mate- rial, and I have a gut instinct about some- thing that I’m gonna go for it, and that I can be a lot of different things,” she says.

—Carole Horst

Agency CAA
Management Entertainment 360
Legal Schreck Rose Dapello Adams Berlin & Dunham
Influences Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, Sandy Dennis

Destiny had never been in a fight before she booked the role of Olympic and world champion boxer Claressa “T-Rex” Shields in “The Fire Inside” in 2019. So she hired Michael B. Jordan’s boxing coach from “Creed” and got to the gym — training for several hours a day, seven days a week, to nail Shields’ style. “I was really ready for that challenge and excited to be able to push myself in a way that I never have before,” Destiny says. “Boxing is such a full-body experience.”

But learning to box was only half the battle, as a series of production-related woes kept the actor and singer/songwriter — best known for the Fox series “Star” and Freeform’s “Grown-ish” — on her toes. Oscar-nominated cinematographer Rachel Morrison’s directorial debut shot for two days before being suspended due to the COVID lockdown. Then the project was scrapped at Universal before MGM stepped in to resurrect it.

Production resumed in 2022 and, thank- fully, Destiny had stayed in fighting form, both mentally and physically. “I was very fortunate to have time to grow as a per- former in those years, to grow as a per- son, to grow as an artist, because I was just ready to go even harder,” Destiny says.

And it was worth waiting for — “The Fire Inside” was the type of big screen debut she’d prayed for.

Destiny and Shields share a lot in com- mon. Destiny grew up in Detroit; Shields is from nearby Flint. They are both 29, so it was easy to relate to one another’s experiences, especially navigating their respective career fields as young Black women. In 2012, while a 17-year-old Shields was fighting for her first Olympic gold medal, Destiny was booking her first TV role. “I feel like Clarissa did way more than me, but I definitely was in my own little world, in my own little space, trying to make it in my industry,” Destiny says of their parallel tracks. “It’s cool to look back on that time and see how far we’ve come.”

—Angelique Jackson

Agency UTA
Management 717 Management
Legal Hansen Jacobson
Influences Halle Berry, Brandy, Cher, Phylicia Rashad, Diana Ross, her coaches and teachers

Gascón went from appearing in Spanish telenovelas to sharing the best actress prize (with co-stars Zoe Saldaña and Selena Gomez) at this year’s Cannes Film Festival for playing the titular role in “Emilia Pérez.” Jacques Audiard’s audacious musical stars Gascón as Emilia, a drug lord who undergoes gender reassignment surgery to start a new life, then hopes to reconnect with her children years later. It’s a bold, star-making turn that is already earning Gascón best actress buzz.

Gascón knew she could handle the acting, but was concerned her singing and dancing skills wouldn’t be up to par. Audiard, meanwhile, had struggled to find his leading lady. Luckily, a meeting between the two put them both at ease. “We both breathed a sigh of relief at the same time, thinking, ‘I found you! You were my last hope!’”

In addition to the role of Pérez, Gascón fought to play the pre-transition Manitas — a performance so convincing many have questioned if it is indeed the same actor. “I wasn’t going to pass up the opportunity to be able to do something I knew I could do better than anyone else,” she notes. “Precisely [like] any self-respecting actress or actor, I don’t shy away from challenges, I embrace them.” Inspired by Marlon Brando in “Apocalypse Now” and Sylvester Stallone in “Rambo,” she worked at finding Manitas’ voice while also trying out various facial hair looks. She eventually convinced the production.

Gascón hopes to continue to make history and break barriers by playing characters in other genres and “to be an example for so many actors and actresses who love their profession, for so many people I rep- resent in one way or another.”

Sharing the best actress award is a good start, one she says she has yet to fully comprehend. “At the end of the day, I just put all my heart and soul into this film. It matters more to me to understand that I gave it my all, and I’m proud of it,” she says. “Emilia Pérez deserved my whole being. I thank her for compensating me with her spirit.”

—Jenelle Riley

Agency UTA, GET Agency
Management IMC Management
Influences Jacques Audiard, “Star Wars,” Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, “The Terminator”

Tell Hechinger that grandmas must love him after he charmed audiences as the grandson to June Squibb’s titular character in “Thelma” and he laughs. “Well, that river flows both ways, as I love grandmas,” Hechinger replies. “Thelma” kicked off a busy year for the actor that includes an epic sequel (“Gladiator II”), an acclaimed indie (“The Nickel Boys”), a superhero pic (“Kraven the Hunter”) and a musical biopic (“Pavements”). “It makes me seem like I have some clone running around, but some of these were shot years apart.”

Growing up in New York City, Hechinger attended St. Anne’s School, where he was inspired by his good friend Lucas Hedges, already taking acting seriously at a young age. “He really taught me about the impor- tance of storytelling but also the power of making something you really care about.”

Those who recognize Hechinger as the put-upon brother to Sydney Sweeney in Season 1 of “The White Lotus” or the laid-back teen from “Eighth Grade” might not be prepared for his wicked turn as one of sibling emperors (alongside Joseph Quinn) in “Gladiator II” later this year. While he can’t reveal much, he will say, “You don’t want to get coffee with that guy.”

Making the film was a dream come true for the cinephile, who has long admired director Ridley Scott. “I remember watching ‘Alien’ and ‘Thelma and Louise’ and ‘Blade Runner’ and then finding out that it was all the same person,” he recalls. “All these vastly different films that were so specific and unique. It really shaped my conception of cinema and what a director could be.”

Hechinger also has to be tightlipped about “Kraven,” in which he plays Dmitri Smerdyakov, a.k.a. the Chameleon. He was already a fan of the comics, but searched out every one. “It’s almost like studying Greek mythology, as every writer at dif- ferent times has a take on the character and what he represents.”

—Jenelle Riley

Agency WME
Management Brillstein
Legal Jackoway Austen Tyerman Wert- heimer Mandelbaum Morris Bernstein Trattner Auerbach Hynick Jaime LeVine Sample & Klein
Influences His family, Martin Scorsese, Turner Classic Movies

Hunt has spent her last two birthdays in the place she loves most: on a movie set. She turned 25 while filming on the dusty trails of Kevin Costner’s Western epic “Horizon: An American Saga,” then celebrated her 26th birthday while traveling back in time to 1975 for Jason Reitman’s “Saturday Night,” about the first broadcast of “Saturday Night Live.”

“I feel so grateful to be a person who gets to be in movies, and having on-set birthdays is the epitome of that,” Hunt says, giddily. “It was such a treat — and to be on such vastly different sets too. Part of the dream has been to play roles that feel diverse and strange. Juliette and Gilda really tick that box.”

In “Horizon,” Hunt plays Juliette Chesney, a prissy and a bit prickly British settler making her way out West. “Juliette is a character, on the face of it, who is a little bit of a challenge to love,” Hunt says. But Costner was confident she could handle the character’s dramatic survival arc, and his belief rubbed off on her. “It made me feel like I can try things that scare me.”

Hunt was itching to stretch her range and surprise herself, but never imagined she’d be considered to portray a comedy icon like Gilda Radner. “Gilda was such a surprise for me. Honestly, I thought my agent was joking,” she laughs. “I was like, ‘There’s just no world where this goes my way.’”

t he British rising star has been acting since she was 11 — scouted by an agent at a school play — but built her career on more serious material like the Apple TV+ period drama “Dickinson” and the ITV dramedy “Cold Feet.” The zany zombie Christmas musical “Anna and the Apoc- alypse” marked Hunt’s first opportunity to get goofy, and then came “Saturday Night.” Much to Hunt’s delight, the role didn’t require an impression of Radner performing her famous characters, like Roseanne Roseannadanna, but allowed her to imagine what the funny woman was like “off-duty.”

“We’re meeting these people before any- one else knew them,” Hunt says, explaining that the movie captures Radner while she’s still forming. “Sowing these little seeds of her thinking about these characters was so fun for me and felt really creative.”

Hunt, who is also a singer-songwriter, says her dream role would be a musical biopic. “Working on Gilda’s voice was such a joy and central in the prep for this movie, so working not only on someone’s speak- ing voice, but someone’s singing voice would be fucking delicious.” She’s got a few big names in mind: “Sinead O’Connor would be amazing. Kate Bush would be incredible. I love Joni Mitchell — I don’t think that we have much of a physical like- ness but falls under the banner of ‘surpris- ing.’”

—Angelique Jackson

Agency UTA, United Agents
Legal Schreck Rose Dapello Adams Berlin & Dunham
Influences Jane Campion, Nina Simone, Will Sharpe, Vivienne Westwood

“I’m definitely an indie boy,” says Jonsson, the breakout star of “Alien: Romulus.” “This is really weird.” Not just the ninth “Alien” installment but one of the series’ most commercially successful, the film cat- apults the British actor to a new level of visibility. Playing malfunctioning android Andy, he turns a familiar corner of fran- chise lore into an actor’s showcase.

“With Andy, who’s a synthetic creature by nature, you almost feel like you need to do a bit,” Jonsson explains. “I found out quite quickly that if I did that, I’ll be deny- ing the impulses that I always play with, which is what the other actor gives me.”

Informed by his father’s eclectic tastes (from “Lady Sings the Blues” to “Coming

to America”), Jonsson started his career in youth theater before transitioning into roles on television (“Industry”) and in film (“Rye Lane”). “What I learned in theater is there’s a certain sacrifice that you make in taking on any role,” he says. “The more you do, the more you learn … You’re going to look like an idiot for a bit, and you’re going to get back up and go again.”

Though Jonsson insists he’s far too intro- verted for “the celebrity thing,” upcoming roles in Calum Macdiarmid’s “Wasteman” and Francis Lawrence’s adaptation of Ste- phen King’s “The Long Walk” promise to keep the spotlight trained on him for the foreseeable future. “Part of the actor’s job is trying to get people to notice you. And hopefully that then turns into more jobs,” he says. “But the acting and the art comes first to me, and then everything else is secondary.”

—Todd Gilchrist

Agency CAA (U.S.), United Agents (U.K.)
Influences Chadwick Boseman, Tom Hardy, Gil Scott Heron

When producer Nina Jacobson began thinking about who should portray sports star Aaron Hernandez in “American Sports Story,” she couldn’t help but think of Rivera, the man she met as Sejanus Plinth in “The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes.”

“I wouldn’t be here without her,” says Rivera, who got his start in the U.S. tour of “Hamilton,” and made his film debut as Chino in Steven Spielberg’s 2021 remake of “West Side Story.” “She pulled me into this project really early on, which I’m very, very thankful for.”

Ryan Murphy saw the drive and determination that Jacobson saw when cast- ing the football player turned convicted murderer, a man who struggled with his sexuality, endured a childhood of abuse and had brain trauma. Although it is a true story, Rivera approaches the layered char- acter as a “perception of the person rather than a copy.” To accomplish that, the actor worked on the way he carried himself and his dialect.

“I think that capturing that core foun- dation was important, and it helped me to maintain versatility during the actual show, with different circumstances,” he says. “A lot of this — the in-between moments that the public doesn’t know about — is largely speculatory. So, it’s dif- ficult to copy what a person would do in something that you have no idea how they would handle a situation.”

In addition to his research, Rivera had to physically transform to resemble the title character. He ended up gain- ing 30 pounds to build his body more like Hernandez. Additionally, he had to spend more than three hours a day in the makeup chair as he wore face prosthetics and was, at one point, covered in tattoos. While in the chair, he experienced empa- thy for other actors. “I kept thinking about Jim Carrey’s makeup in ‘The Grinch.’ That must have been absolutely nuts!”

—Emily Longeretta

Agency Paradigm
Legal Jackoway Austen Tyerman Wert- heimer Mandelbaum Morris Bernstein Trattner Auerbach Hynick Jaime LeVine Sample & Klein
Influences Tony Kushner, Nina Jacobson, Irene Cabrera

A starring role in Luca Guadagnino’s trippy romance “Queer,” in which he plays the mysterious love interest of Daniel Craig, has propelled Starkey to new heights in his career. After the movie’s premiere at Ven- ice Film Festival in August, the actor has earned critical praise — and even Oscar buzz for best supporting actor — that’s sure to put him at the top of many directors’ wish lists.

Before joining the ranks of Guadagni- no’s muses — a starry crew that includes Timothée Chalamet and Josh O’Connor — Starkey had appeared in such films as the 2022 reboot of “Hellraiser.” But he was best known for playing bad guy Rafe Cam- eron on Netflix’s popular teen adventure series “Outer Banks,” which just launched the first part of its fourth season on the streamer (the rest drops Nov. 7.)

Starkey felt right at home on the North Carolina-set show, having grown up in the state’s mountain town of Hickory. It was there that he first developed a passion for acting, participating in his school’s produc- tions and eventually studying the craft at Western Carolina University. “I was a pretty shy kid growing up, and for whatever rea- son getting up in front of people and performing was a way of expressing myself that I didn’t have in my real life,” Starkey says.

He also fell in love with movies at a young age, citing “Cool Hand Luke” and “Forrest Gump” as early favorites. But Starkey reached an inflection point when he watched Paul Thomas Anderson’s 2007 epic “There Will Be Blood” as a young teen. “That just broke the levee,” he says. “I was like, ‘This is what film can be.’”

Starkey hopes “Queer” will have a similar effect on those who discover it. “This film is incredibly unique and singular and its own thing, but I hope it kind of shines a light on a whole new side of cinema for people.”

As for what’s next, Starkey is keeping his options open. “I want variety, I don’t want to sit in one thing for too long,” he says. “Also, I’ll work with Luca until I’m dead, so.”

—Ellise Shaffer

Agency Gersh
Legal Goodman, Genow, Schenkman, Smelkinson & Christopher
Influences Immediate family, Paul Thomas Anderson, Cate Blanchett, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Sam Shepard

Wallace has a confession to make. He didn’t know how to ride a motorbike when he signed on to “The Bikeriders” to play the Kid. A small snag, as the the film is about a Midwestern motorcycle club. “I’m not sure that’s what I told production,” he chuckles. “But I got around to it.” Wallace adds that he took a two-day course, followed by the production’s bike “boot camp” for another month and a half. “We got together as a group and got all these old Harleys and just started riding all over Cincinnati,” he says.

As a young boy, Wallace had a video cam- era and made war films, zombie movies and “Jackass” type shorts. He also took an acting class where an executive from a management company spotted him and put him forward for auditions.

His first feature, “Lucky Country,” landed him an Australian Film Institute Award for best young actor nomination. Roles in “Underbelly Files: The Man Who Got Away” and the long-running Australian soap opera “Neighbours” followed.

Up next, he’ll be seen in Ron Howard’s survival thriller “Eden,” set over 100 years ago on the Galápagos Islands. “It’s abso- lutely insane that it’s true. Even when we were making it, I couldn’t really believe that all of this had happened and that these people were really like this,” Wallace says.

As for what item he’d have with him to survive: a flint, a sleeping bag “and a bottle of Cholula because I absolutely love hot sauce. I put it on everything,” Wallace jokes. Or maybe he’s serious?

As for dream collaborators, he’d love to work again with Danny Boyle, who cast him as Sex Pistols guitarist Steve Jones in the miniseries “Pistol.” He has another partnership goal in mind. “I’d want to act in a Wes Anderson film across from Adrien Brody. That would be heaven,” Wallace says.

—Jazz Tangcay

Agency CAA
Management 3 Arts, CP Artist Management Legal Sloane, Offer, Weber, & Dern Inspirations Danny Boyle, Steven Speilberg, “The Mighty Boosh”