Actor Nicholas Galitzine says he feels like a ‘cut of beef at a meat market’

By Lianne Kolirin, CNN

(CNN) — British actor Nicholas Galitzine has said that the focus on his appearance has left him feeling like a “cut of beef at a meat market,” adding that he wants to be “taken seriously as a performer.”

The 29-year-old actor, who appears opposite Anne Hathaway in the new romantic comedy “The Idea of You,” admitted that comments about his looks have made him feel uncomfortable.

In an interview with GQ magazine published Wednesday, Galitzine responded to a question about how playing a character who is considered good-looking made him feel.

He replied: “I think the most important thing to me is that I’m taken seriously as a performer. I’m not gonna ask you to cry me a river here, but it’s been difficult being part of a conversation that feels very much like I am a cut of beef at a meat market.”

He said he got this sense not only during the casting process but in other people’s reactions to his work.

“I think that being my defining feature is something I’m constantly terrified of,” he said.

In the new movie, Galitzine, who also stars in “Mary & George” with Julianne Moore and in last year’s “Red, White and Royal Blue,” plays the lead singer of a popular boy band who embarks on an unexpected romance with a single mother, played by Hathaway, after meeting her at Coachella.

There has been much speculation as to whether his role as Hayes Campbell, the singer in fictional boy band “August Moon,” is based on Harry Styles.

He admitted that Styles is “an obvious comparison,” but added: “I think it’s very important that we don’t draw too much of a comparison to him because [Styles] is a real person, within both the music industry and the film industry.

“I think we need to normalize [keeping them separate] as opposed to drawing a direct parallel to someone who already exists.”

In a recent interview with V Magazine to promote the movie, Hathaway described how Galitzine was cast for the role.

She said the auditions saw actors choose a song they would play to get Hathaway’s character to dance.

She said of his choice: “I heard [the lead singer of Alabama Shakes] Brittany’s voice and I just started smiling. And he [Galitzine] saw me smile, so he relaxed, and we just started dancing.”

Galitzine said of the same audition that their connection was “unlike anything [he] had ever experienced.”

“We were flying. We were tearing up with each other,” he told GQ.

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