‚Three Months‘ director/writer breaks down the movie’s ending, casting Troye Sivan, and more.
Troye Sivan commands the screen in the new Paramount+ movie Three Months, which is available now. The singer stars as Caleb, a South Florida teen who discovers he’s been exposed to HIV on the eve of his high school graduation. He has to wait three months for his results and learns more about himself during that time than ever before. HollywoodLife spoke EXCLUSIVELY with the writer and director Jared Frieder about bringing this deeply personal story to life. For Jared, it was “always” Troye to play Caleb, who is the person Jared “wished” he could have been in high school. He also opened up about the decision to not show Caleb getting his final results. Read our Q&A below: I know it’s been a long time coming with this film and this particular story. What inspired you to write this story? Jared Frieder: For me, it was important to tell the kind of queer story and write a queer movie that I wished I could have had growing up, that would have made me feel more understood and less alone. So that’s what I set out to do. It’s a story that’s based on events in my own life. I first wrote it like 9 years ago, and since then tried to make it as a movie, tried to make it as a TV show, had my own writers room and a major streamer, then tried to make it as a movie again, [and then] finally got the chance to direct it with my dream cast. We went into production on March 3, 2020, and two weeks in the world shut down and there was a global pandemic. After like 8 or 9 years, I was like, I don’t know if we’ll ever get to finish. It was 6 or 7 months of waiting to find out if a virus would change my life, which is ironically, exactly what this movie is about. And spoiler alert, we got to finish, and it comes out on February 23 on Paramount+. I am so excited for the world to see it. I know that you wrote it almost a decade ago. The thing I noticed when watching the film is that it seemed timeless. It could have been done in the ’80s in the ’90s, but it’s nearly modern-day. It just felt so timeless, so relevant to today still. Jared Frieder: Thank you. That means the world. I mean, I really tried to create something that would resonate with all audiences, especially queer kids, of course, but every age, every time, people who’ve experienced every era. For me, it’s these themes of feeling different but learning that things that make you different also make you special, learning that in our modern world with access to health care HIV is no longer a death sentence, and what we really have to focus on is helping fight the shame and stigma around the disease and what it’s like to wait, which is something we’re all experiencing now with the COVID-19 pandemic. Even though we’re waiting, we still have to fight for joy and go after the things we want. These are things that have never been more important than they are now, even though this was a movie set in 2011. It’s so great to hear you say that it resonated and felt timeless because that was exactly what I wanted it to do. This cast is stacked. Troye is obviously an incredibly talented musician and acted when he was much younger. What was the process of getting Troye? Was he someone that you had in mind? Tell me a little about that process. Jared Frieder: It was always Troye. It was always Troye for me, even years ago when I first wrote the script. It’s been a dream come true to work with him. I am his biggest fan. He is so talented in every way an artist can be… I think people are going to freak out when they see his performance in this film because he carries this movie on his back and has to access every element of the emotional spectrum to bring Caleb to life.
