03 August 2021

Matthew for Schön! Magazine

Hi Matthew fans! Matthew has done an interview and photoshoot for Schön! Magazine! He looks so handsome! Check out the photos in the gallery and read the great interview below!

Photoshoots & Portraits > 2021 > Session 03 | Schön! Magazine

SCHON MAGAZINE – “I’m going to run for mayor in New York,” Matthew Daddario jokes before pitching the three tenets of his hypothetical campaign — one of which involves ice cream. “Once a week,” he starts, “the city would buy ice cream for everyone who signs up for a program, and then we would eat ice cream while discussing the important topics or work from the past week as a community.” After all, as Daddario stresses, “Ice cream is one of the single greatest things in life. There’s nobody who doesn’t like ice cream.”

If that doesn’t secure your vote for Daddario, you are missing out on more than just free frozen desserts. Daddario is a versatile talent, serving up a delectable performance as the stubborn Alec on Freeform’s popular drama series, Shadowhunters. More recently, Daddario has been captivating viewers as the charming and fashionable Scooter on the Paramount+ dark comedy, Why Women Kill. Schön! caught up with Daddario about what he misses about his time as Alec, his different roles, his hypothetical mayoral campaign and what he is working on next.

So excited to talk to you – I actually interviewed your sister Alexandra a few weeks ago! Any funny stories you want to share from when you were growing up?

As kids, I think my parents told us that sometimes people thought we were twins. We kind of looked alike, and there are three of us who are close in age… It’s great to have a sibling who’s close to you in age, because it’s like you have a friend around all the time. I noticed it especially now that I have a child. You learn how to deal with all interpersonal relationships and people having different desires and interests, and you have to adjust yours to match theirs. You have to care, be empathetic to what they’re currently feeling, and you have to be able to read that in order for that relationship to prosper. And I guess if you have a young sibling or a sibling with you, it really provides that on a constant basis, if you don’t have access to friends, neighbors, community in general.

If you were not an actor right now, what would you be doing instead and why?

I think a lot of people noticed this over the course of the pandemic, which is really screwing up our system. The problem is, people have a misunderstanding right now that lack of work is somehow better than work, and that’s not true. The truth is that you want to do a job that you don’t hate doing. Now, that seems like a difficult concept, because generally what we do is we strive for a job that pays more or that has a certain level of cachet attached to it. What we don’t recognise is that what we should be doing are the things that we enjoy, even if we’re making less money.

But there are all kinds of jobs which I would enjoy doing, at least to some degree. I would love to be a doctor. That would be great. I’d love to be a writer. Great. I never mind sitting down and writing. I love gardening — I love going out and I love digging a ditch. I love building, I love putting stones down in a fashion that makes the area I live in or somebody else’s a little bit nicer. So, anything that fits one of those qualities, fits the need for enjoyment — anything that I enjoy doing, I would do if I wasn’t even paid for it.

Let’s throw it back to Shadowhunters. What is the thing you miss most about that show?

There were a huge number of people involved — hundreds of people who have a variety of skills — and to be part of that? There’s something really special about it. And when you’re at the core of it, in a certain way, which often the actors are, you are kind of the face of the final product, and you feel a great sense of accomplishment or achievement and responsibility. So, I liked having that responsibility to some degree, and luckily it was shared with several other great and really wonderful people on the show. It was a lovely experience working with those people and having responsibility for that, and also it was my first very big project, so it was a fascinating learning experience.

Tell us how you are similar or different to Alec in real life.

There were four books written based on the book series, so Alec is obviously already pre-written. There was a limitation of where I could go with the character. And at the time, when we first started, it was like I operated off the books. As the scripts came out, however, and as I saw how the other characters were acting, I started fitting into that world, and I started to adapt. And then, I noticed certain qualities from myself in Alec because it was like, how would I deal with this issue? Alec has certain similarities with me… one of which was his desire to lead. I have that quality. I don’t want to lead against other people’s liberty, but I like the idea that I can solve a problem with a group of people, and that’s something that Alec deals with. So, whenever there was a problem, and Alec had to deal with it, I tried to apply certain aspects of myself.

At the same time, Alec had more demons in his closet, and he was definitely struggling with those. And those were affecting his ability to make urgent decisions because he was constantly trying to hide from himself. And I’m less like that, luckily. Maybe it’s because I’m older in age, I think? Regardless, Alec was always very principled. If you’re principled, one of the principles you must have is that you’re willing to adapt. You shouldn’t give up on key principles that are important for your identity, but you have to be ready to adapt the principle slightly to the needs of others.
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17 July 2021

Matthew Daddario on ‘Why Women Kill’, Loving ‘Lord of the Rings’, and Motorcycles

Photoshoots & Portraits > 2021 > Session 02 | Flaunt Magazine

FLAUNT – Matthew Daddario has had nothing short of an adventurous year, becoming a dad, premiering the movie Trust and now starring in the second season of Marc Cherry’s glamorous Paramount+ Series, Why Women Kill.

Premiered on June 3rd, the second season of Why Women Kill features Daddario as Scooter, in the darkly comedic drama as an adulterous young man focused on making it big in Hollywood no matter what means it takes. Set in 1949, this season peels back the mask people wear to uncover the hidden truth as well as the estrangement women feel within society.

So you’re from New York originally? What was it like growing up in the city?

Here’s the deal. I think that people don’t really know what New York is unless you live there. I think a lot of people want New York to be a certain way, and they want New York to to be a way that fulfills whatever the image is in their head, and they get that image, probably from TV, from film, and from whatever else, or other sorts of media where they see the city. I think for me, it was just a place that I was growing up. Obviously, the thing that drives New York really is this kind of energy, I think that everyone always talks about, right. But that is kind of hard to understand, and I’m sure many people have written many essays on the topic.

But really, what it felt like for me was a sense of freedom. I think that New York provides young people with an enormous amount of responsibility and enormous amount of freedom, in comparison to growing up elsewhere. You’re not limited to access to things by vehicles, or by getting moved around by your parents, if you’re in the suburbs, hypothetically. There is full access to everything, really, that you could fill your every day with something new at that age. So I think that that’s really what New York was, was this large amount of freedom and a large amount of responsibility. And I think that it’s very hard for some people, and I think that it’s um, I don’t think it’s the greatest place to grow up, but I do think it’s the greatest place to grow up. You know what I mean? Those two things at once.

So what did you do with your freedom?

What did I do with my freedom? So many good things, I was very well behaved. Let me tell you, my mom will read these things. Now if my mom reads this, she’ll say, “Now, Matthew, why are you telling people that?” I walked around, I skateboarded, I went and met my friends and we would wander around the city. I had some good friends that would just wander when we were younger, then go meet people. Meet other people from other schools and see what they’re doing and what they’re up to. You don’t get in trouble. Because you know, that’s not what people in New York do. That’s not what teenagers do. They don’t get in trouble.

So how did you get into acting?

So actually my older sister, she is an actress. She was in it for a bit and obviously, I didn’t get into it and I went to college for different reasons. I majored in something else and then when I graduated, I kind of went to it as I exposed to it. So I knew what it was. I understood the elements and I understood what the process was. I understood that it’s a bad decision to try and become an actor. If you want it as your livelihood, it needs to be something that you’re doing, because you actually love it, because really, your chances of succeeding are near zero, and they’re not necessarily based off your skill level. So you are kind of in a weird business, and a lot of a lot of chance plays into it.

Like I say, luck, but chance and circumstance. So I knew what I was getting into, and I said, “I’m going to try this.” It was at a time when the economy was not doing so well. I wanted to experiment in this area, because I felt that it would provide me with a better sense of self. When I started taking classes, it really gave me this realization that this is really what I want to do. Eventually realizing that made me kind of question my other choices, and then it kind of went from there. I continued to go to classes and got an agent and went through the whole process of managers, agent auditions, failure, a lot of constant question of “is this really the right choice?” Eventually, it worked to a degree, and I’m so happy that I did it.

Tell me about your sisters and growing up with them.

I think that because my sister and I were very close in age, we played a lot together, and grew up with each other. I have a kid now, so I kind of realized the benefit of having that it must be. I think it was kind of hard for me to contextualize how important that could be. Hypothetically, if my kid doesn’t have exposure to other kids, you have this permanent playmate, and the two of you can compete. And the two of you can play games and things, it gives you a lot of time with another young child, which is enormously beneficial.

And then we have the younger sister, Catherine. And that was also very good, because it also gave me a sense of what it was to have a younger person who you were sort of responsible for. So I actually think that there’s something really nice about having three kids that are close in age, and I also recognize the incredible difficulty of having three children, which is like madness nowadays, especially in New York. Oh my God, we were crazy. It’s nuts. But you know what, I encourage everyone to have tons of children, it’s a lot of fun.

So you recently became a dad this last year, in the middle of the pandemic, how has that been like for you?

There’s nothing really great about the pandemic, not a fun time to discuss the pandemic. But one big advantage was that we had time at home and time with family. People weren’t busy doing other things, because we were at home. And so that gave time with the baby and that otherwise I might not have had and that other people might not have had. So it was really, it was really great for the family in general. And I mean, I wouldn’t suddenly say I would recommend having your baby during a pandemic. But now we can find that it was actually quite alright. It was quite alright from that perspective.

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28 June 2021

The Philosophy of Acting with Matthew Daddario

We must be in a dream because Matthew has a new photoshoot!? Matthew talked with VMAN about acting and his current series Why Women Kill. You can read the interview below and check out the photos in the gallery. I hope we get some more from this photoshoot!

Photoshoots & Portraits > 2021 > Session 01 | VMAN

VMAN – There are actors. Then there are ACTORS, who’re greater than the usual crop. Then, of course, we have actor’s actors, the class that supersedes even the capitalization to denote top-notch ability. Matthew Daddario is kind of like a combination of all three.

Daddario is an actor because the craft inspires him, and he’s just as passionate about everything that gets put out there as much as he is about everything that goes on behind it. That passion goes beyond being a shared family hobby, considering his sisters Alexandra and Catharine are also actors.

When I ask him why he decided to become an actor, he explains, “The film business, acting in general, is an art that is also a productive business. People consume it as part of the culture as part of society. I think there’s something about it that satisfies several needs that I have from a career perspective.”

When I ask him to talk about how he’d describe “Why Women Kill,” his newest role, to someone who hadn’t heard of it, he says, “I just tell people, listen, you’re going to like it. Because I honestly believe that. So I’ve been telling people that it’s in 1949, it’s about a bunch of people, a little bit heightened. And in the end, some people are dead.” The conviction is in the fact that just watching the show is enough for you to understand why you’d want to keep watching.

Set in 1949, Daddario stars as one of the leads in the Paramount + show’s second season, alongside Allison Tolman, Lana Parrilla, and Nick Frost, among others. He plays the character of Scooter, an actor (re: “aspiring”) who’s looking for his big break in Hollywood, his shot at stardom. And he finds it through more unconventional means, that being the financial backing of one Rita Castillo (Parrilla), a woman married to a man with a fortune, and nothing more.

Scooter is the kind of handsome, suave, charming gentleman of the ‘40s and ‘50s that you’d swoon for then and look right past now. He says “bay-bee” and “dawll” with the most affected accent this side of the Hollywood lot. In his very introduction to the audience, he passes by a couple of women on the street who can’t help but blush right at the sight of him, as they were wont to do at the time. Scooter simply shoots them a look and a smirk, walking backwards as I wonder whether he’ll hit the newspaper stand right behind him. But he’s the effortlessly cool old Hollywood hero, he swivels and smoothly glides past it, allaying my fears and setting the character’s tone.

“I figured that Scooter would be this guy from the Midwest who came out to LA,” Daddario says, “And he’d watch a lot of films. So I watched a lot of the films he watched, from the ‘40s and ‘50s, the Arsenic and Old Lace types. I tried to copy Cary Grant’s character a little bit with the voice. He talks in this way that isn’t a real way of speaking, and I figured Scooter would have that otherwise he’d sound like he was from the Midwest.”

He continues, “And I have him behaving like a 13 year old, someone who’s constantly encountering somebody that asks him to do something and he just doesn’t understand what the heck they’re asking. It’s 13 going on 30.”

In many ways, Daddario is the embodiment of Scooter. Well, the embodiment of what Scooter aims for, to be precise. Daddario has the unassuming charm you’d expect of a Cary Grant-type without the air of pretense and glamor that would imply. His New York accent and tonal shifts in his speech make you listen close, anxious that you’ll miss a word he’s saying. But that just means you’re that much more interested in hearing what he has to say.

He’s not going to Clark Gable you and sweep you off your feet, but that’s probably because he doesn’t want to. He speaks with the quiet confidence of a man who knows it all, even if he outright says he doesn’t.

But unlike Scooter, Daddario clearly understands what he’s doing and he has an acute awareness of the industry he’s in. “As an actor, you’re always worried about the next part, the next thing, no matter how hirable you are,” he says.

Plus, apart from his career in movies, this is just his second lead role in a TV show in five years, following his turn as Alec Lightwood on the Freeform classic “Shadowhunters,” so clearly he has the acting career Scooter’s been scoping auditions for.

The glint of the business does entice Daddario, though, just like it does with Scooter. But it’s less about wanting to be part of the legacy of excess that suggests, and is more attuned to the artistic aspect of being in the movie business. I ask him about what’s next on the (cue) cards, he says, “I want to do some things that are a little bit more independent, I want to do some things that are big budget, I want to see all of it, I want to do all of it because it is a fascinating business, and you have the ability to act in all these different roles and capacities.”

Being an actor, an ACTOR, or an actor’s actor, none of it is really about your particular level of skill as a performer. It’d be easier to tell people you’re a good actor rather than have them see it, the “fake-it-till-you-make-it” school of acting that Lee Strasberg probably didn’t endorse.

It’s all about the ability to convince people you’re worth paying attention to, commanding respect with your aura alone. And enough charm to actually downplay the authoritarianism that aura could become.

Daddario has that. He makes you firmly believe that he’s an actor worth his salt, through the utmost conviction with which he sells himself and his passion for the field, whether it’s with big fan draws like “Shadowhunters,” or under the radar flicks like 2021’s Trust. He doesn’t even have to do it earnestly, it just naturally emanates from that personable drawl of his.

Maybe that’s what Scooter needs, a drawl…

10 October 2017

2017 New York Comic Con

On Saturday (October 7), Matt attended the 2017 New York Comic Con to promote Shadowhunters with some of his cast members including Katherine McNamara, Isaiah Mustafa, and Alisha Wainwright. I have updated the gallery with HQ photos from the press line and panel. Also, I’ve added some gorgeous portraits taken for HollywoodLife at the con to the gallery.

Public Appearances > 2017 > Oct 07 | 2017 New York Comic Con – ‘Shadowhunters’ Press Line
Public Appearances > 2017 > Oct 07 | 2017 New York Comic Con – ‘Shadowhunters’ Panel
Photoshoots & Portraits > 2017 > Session 09 | NYCC – HollywoodLife

22 August 2017

Matthew Daddario for RAW

Photoshoots & Portraits > 2017 > Session 08 | RAW

RAW PAGES – RAW: What was it like growing up in New York’s Upper East Side?
MATTHEW: I loved it but I did miss out on a bunch of stuff to be honest. You don’t get the full experience. I didn’t know cheerleaders were real, you know what I mean? In movies, there’s these cheerleaders. There’s a whole bunch of them doing all their cheerleading stuff. I didn’t know that actually existed, I thought that it was just movies.

RAW: How did New York City shape you as a person?
MATTHEW: A sense of autonomy at a young age, which sort of I’ve never wanted to have taken away from me. Does that make sense?

RAW: Your parents were lawyers and you studied business. Then you and your sister Alex got into the arts. Were your parents apprehensive about this?
MATTHEW: No, Alex got into acting at a young age– she’s always wanted to do it. She’s been good at a young age, so she got in. Our parents just told us, “Don’t be lawyers,” so I did something that I was supposed to enjoy…

RAW: Was there a first movie or TV show that made you think, “Oh, I want to be an actor,”?
MATTHEW: Yeah there is. I don’t want to say what it is because I don’t want to give him a big head. (laughs)

RAW: How proud are you of your sister Alex and her success?
MATTHEW: Incredibly. She succeeded in a business that’s more prone of failure than any other we can really think of. She’s done a tremendous job. It’s been a constant upward trend for her and it’s just incredible.

RAW: How do you define success?
MATTHEW: (laughs) Success is… you could look at it in a variety of ways. Some people look at it as how much praise they’re gonna get from an outside source or maybe if they achieve a certain goal. That’s nice if you can get that sense of success from that goal and then just set yourself a new one. It’s whatever keeps you happiest the longest because the end goal should always be happiness. So if success leads to happiness, then you’re successful. And if your success doesn’t make you happy then you’re not really succeeding.

04 January 2017

BuzzFeed: 27 Things We Learned On Set With Matthew Daddario

Photoshoots & Portraits > 2017 > Session 01 | BuzzFeed

BUZZFEED – 1. If anyone could play you in a movie, who would you pick?
Cate Blanchett would kill it. Can you see if she’s available?

2. What’s the first album you ever bought?
Hahaha, no.

3. Describe your style in three words.
Things that fit.

4. Craziest fan story?
One time I walked in to a store and a guy came over to help. He’s talking to me for a minute and I’m being semi socially-capable. He takes a step back, looks me up and down and says, “Hey, wait a minute…you look like that boy from that show.” I go, “Yeah?” And he says, “Yeah, that kid from (show name redacted) show. Damn. You look just like him.” It was a different show with a guy who shoots arrows. I was like, “Oh, yeah I hear that sometimes.”

5. Last book you read?
[I’ve] been reading Dune. It’s nice when you haven’t read a book in ten years so you forget most of it and it’s like reading it anew. So great.

6. What’s your biggest pet peeve?
When that dweeb stops at the top of the escalator realizing he’s not sure if he’s going in the right direction and it causes a five-person pileup behind him.

7. What’s the most memorable concert you’ve been to?
With things like this the memorable ones seem to be the ones people can’t remember.

8. Last person who texted you?
My manager, Donnalyn. Making sure I answered the BuzzFeed questions. I told her I did.

9. Which emoji do you use the most?
The one with the eyes where it looks like he’s caught but tries to poker face and fails. Also sometimes I write out the description of the face.

10. Who’s your doppelgänger?
Some dude who lives around Union Square keeps getting me in trouble with friends. About 10 different people: “I saw you at Union square and called out but you didn’t answer!” Me: “I’m in Toronto.”

11. Favorite reality show?
That one where they cook a meal under pressure and if they don’t do it in time or it isn’t good enough they have to enter a gladiatorial pit vs some unspeakable ancient horror. Love that show. Also, I like Planet Earth.

14. Guilty pleasure?
Frying cheddar cheese and parmesan in a cast iron skillet and then eating it until I’m gross.

15. Go-to comfort food?
I put that cheese from above in my belly until I am comfortable.

16. Dream vacation spot?
Big city/warm beach.

17. Hidden talent?
Really, really good at eating sticky oily things out of a smoking hot iron pan.

18. What’s one word you say too often?
I probably curse too often. It’s fun to do with friends, enemies, when you fall down, when you watch sports…all the time really. It’s just kinda great. But if anyone reads this…don’t curse. It’s bad, and if you all start doing it all the time it won’t be as fun when I do it.

19. Favorite place to visit?
The Natural History Museum in New York. They have a gem I want to steal. But I won’t. Winky face.

20. Name something on your bucket list.
This feels like a very personal question, BuzzFeed. I am tempted to make something up. I want to be the president for two years and am impeached successfully after a fake scandal. Then, the following year I’m vindicated, and everyone wants me to be president again but I’m busy with other stuff.

21. If you could invite five people—living or dead—to a dinner party, who would they be?
I was just in Rome. Give me an emperor, a gladiator, a cynic, an actor and some tough Roman lady. Then we drink wine.

22. Biggest fear?
Food poisoning. I hate it. I hate it so much. And you know what’s weird? High end restaurants are most often the guilty ones.

23. Best piece of advice you’ve ever been given?
“The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry” seems to always prove itself accurate.

24. Background wallpaper on your phone?
A dog eating flowers.

25. Favorite song of 2016?
I like the song from Narcos.

26. What’s the last thing you searched for on Google?
“What is a dry riser.” I could pretend that it was something funny or deep but that would be lying, and everyone knows people don’t lie in interviews to make themselves more appealing or interesting.

27. What do you hope for in 2017?
I wrote out a sincere and sappy answer about society as a whole but realized I just really want them to find Genghis Khan’s tomb this year.

20 May 2016

Matthew Daddario for The Luxer

Standing at 6’3’’ with raven black hair, and piercing hazel eyes, Matthew Daddario definitely has a seraphic presence about him. It should come as no surprise, then, that he is one of the stars of Shadowhunters, a new show on the Freeform network based on The Mortal Instruments book series, about a centuries-old war between angels and demons. Playing Alec Lightwood, the stoic, selfless warrior on the side of good, Daddario was aware of how this character has been beloved by fans of the books. Luckily, this role suits him to a T—not only in appearance, but also because he can relate to Alec’s humanity. He tries to find the qualities that make Alec vulnerable, and translates that to the screen.

Originally from the Upper East Side of New York City, Daddario went on auditions for commercials as a child. “My mother wanted me to learn how to speak publicly, and she figured this would be a way to get me comfortable with speaking to other people,” he said. He would later attend Indiana University Bloomington, where he majored in business, seemingly abandoning acting entirely. But after seeing his sister, Alexandra Daddario, going after her dream of becoming an actress, he did an about-face.

“I wouldn’t say it was a mistake to study business in college, but it wasn’t my passion,” he said. “I was doing something that I thought would be best for my future. I then realized that business is not the thing I wanted to be doing, but thought I should be doing.”

Daddario already looks the part of a star, and has amassed a hefty social-media following, but he knows that this isn’t enough to secure lasting success in his industry. For him, great actors become iconic based on their performances. Harrison Ford, for instance, is someone he admires. “He became part of our culture because of great roles like Indiana Jones and Han Solo,” he said. “Getting great roles like that is something every guy wants.”

And though Alec in Shadowhunters may not be as renowned as Ford’s career-making personas, it is an important launch pad to rocket to greater things. Indeed, this up-and-comer has his sights set on the stars. As he said, “If I didn’t go into acting, I would have tried to be an astronaut.”

Rising to stardom with “Shadowhunters”

You auditioned for the original film, The Mortal Instruments, and didn’t get the gig. Did you feel vindicated in any way after getting cast in the television series?
When I got cast in the show, I wasn’t thinking about the movie. Also, I don’t believe that feeling vindicated requires feeling animosity or bitterness. And I wasn’t bitter about not being cast. So, I didn’t feel vindicated, but, in this instance, they made the right choice.
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20 April 2016

Matthew Daddario for 1883 Magazine

Matthew has done a new photoshoot and interview with 1883 Magazine. You can check out some amazing outtakes in our gallery and read the interview below.

Photoshoots & Portraits > 2016 > Session 04 | 1883 Magazine

Taking a break from slaying demonic entities, co-star of the Freeform fantasy series ‘Shadowhunters’, New Yorker Matthew Daddario (aka. Alec Lightwood) discussed with us his role, tastes and thoughts on possessing an army of fan-girls.

Based on the fantasy novels ‘The Mortal Instruments’, ‘Shadowhunters’ brings the vision of author Cassandra Clare to the small screen. With one season of brilliant, outlandish events already under their belt, a second round of demi-angel on demon action can be expected, as Freeform announced a sequel series earlier this year.

Growing up, was acting the only thing you could see yourself doing or was there anything you could have been doing now in place of acting?
Acting was more my sister’s thing, I only came to it through her. For a little while, my mum would have me do auditioning as a way of building public speaking skills and to give me confidence speaking in front of other people. I didn’t enjoy it much as I was scared of it and found it kind of terrifying. I had other things going on and it wasn’t until I was a bit older at 18 or 19 that I started picking it back up again.

If you could go back and tell your younger self some words of advice, what would they be?
It’s easy to say in retrospect, “I should have done this or that” but given the information that was available to me at the time I think I made pretty good decisions. So I would say, maybe I should have focused a little more on doing what makes you happy and less on what you think will lead to a more classical and successful career.

What your favourite artists or influences from any genre?
I think the people who like art and that kind of space are not people who are in any way similar to me. So for example, I really enjoy Jimi Hendrix, and he is the coolest singer ever. I don’t like guitar and I am not particularly musical but I think Jimi Hendrix is just the coolest. In another space I think that Picasso is super cool as he represents a person who was absolutely astonishing as an artist and then he moved away from the classical art and created something completely new which is astonishing.
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16 April 2016

New Promotionals of Matt, Harry, and Isaiah

The Shadowhunters’ facebook page has released a few new promotionals of Matt with co-stars Harry Shum Jr. and Isiah Mustafa! You can check out the promotionals in our gallery!