It isn’t an exaggeration to say Nicholas Alexander Chavez had an excellent 12 months.
Now a member of Ryan Murphy’s unofficial appearing troupe, he starred in two of the creator’s new collection. First got here the Golden Globe-nominated “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story,” for Netflix. Chavez performed Lyle, the elder of two brothers serving a lifetime jail sentence for killing their dad and mom, Jose and Kitty, in 1989.
Chavez acknowledges some components of the collection are “really, really difficult to digest” however factors out that “Monsters” reveals a number of sides to the story. The brothers have stated they killed their dad and mom out of self-defense, following sexual abuse by their father.
“To my knowledge, it’s the first TV show about the Menendez brothers that’s told in that format,” stated Chavez, who ready by watching outdated court docket footage. (The drama — and a brand new documentary — reignited public curiosity within the case, and a choose is weighing Los Angeles County prosecutors’ request to resentence the brothers.)
It was towards the top of filming “Monsters” that Murphy invited Chavez to affix Niecy Nash in “Grotesquerie,” a double act that earned him a spot as one among The Related Press’ Breakthrough Entertainers of 2024.
“I was just so excited that he thought of me,” stated Chavez of the chance. “I had studied Season 1 of ‘Monsters.’” The chance to behave with Nash, says Chavez, “was really kind of a wonderful way for me to close the loop.” To get into character as Father Charlie, Chavez would take heed to music: “Don’t Do Anything Illegal” by Charles Manson — sure, that one — was on his playlist.
Even earlier than the Murphyverse, the 25-year-old had a loyal following from his work on ABC’s “General Hospital,” TV’s longest-running cleaning soap. Chavez was promoting vehicles through the pandemic when he auditioned for and acquired a component on the daytime present. He performed Spencer Cassadine, a grandson of legacy character Laura of the Luke and Laura days. A 12 months later, he gained the 2022 Daytime Emmy Award for excellent youthful performer in a drama collection.
Of the coaching that actors get from cleaning soap operas, Chavez stated the collection helped him: “It’s no joke when they talk about the memorization. I think that my heaviest day on set was something like 85 pages.”
A profession in appearing wasn’t on Chavez’s radar till he performed Atticus Finch in his highschool manufacturing of “To Kill a Mockingbird.”
“I just really, really enjoyed myself,” recalled Chavez. “I felt really free and present and immersed in the moment. It felt like I was doing the thing that I was put on earth to do.”
He remembers being instructed afterward by academics that he ought to pursue appearing as a profession. Their encouragement caught with him: “Not many kids in Denver got told this. It’s not really a part of the infrastructure the way that it is in LA or maybe in New York.”
Cooper Koch, who performed Erik Menendez in “Monsters,” credit Chavez’s layered efficiency within the collection. He recollects a scene when his character confesses to the crimes in a remedy session. Lyle bursts via the door to cease him.
“He’s sort of pleading with the doctor like, ‘We’re going to be OK, right? You can’t tell anyone,’” Koch stated. “After we cut, me and Nick and our director of photography, Jason McCormick, sort of huddled up outside and we just started crying. It was so beautiful. And I really, really saw his (Lyle’s) humanity and the lion mask kind of come off and he became this wounded child. It was so, so beautiful to witness.”
Subsequent, Chavez has a task within the “I Know What You Did Last Summer” reboot. He additionally says he want to get solid in a comedy. Greater than something, he simply needs to be on set working.
“My life feels whole and complete between the words ‘action’ and ‘cut.’ I live for those moments,” he stated. “I think that is the purpose of my entire existence. I can’t wait to see what the future holds.”
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For extra on AP’s 2024 class of Breakthrough Entertainers, go to https://apnews.com/hub/ap-breakthrough-entertainers
