Have you ever wanted some perspective on life, Hollywood, and the cost of living in Shadyside from an occasional bird-watcher who happens to have 2.1 million Instagram followers and a hit television show? I can’t see you, but I can feel you shaking your head yes. In which case, I recommend giving Ian Harding a call.
To be perfectly frank, there’s no one else who could fit the bill—the bird kind or otherwise. (Editor’s Note: Could not resist poorly constructed bird pun—please forgive me.)
In addition to his many talents, this ivy-league educated 28-year-old also practices good hygiene. After exchanging hellos, he politely informed me that he was searching for his nail clippers, as he was going to the gym after our interview and thought that long nails would be unsightly. I assured him that Maniac applauds any man that takes appropriate nail-care seriously.
My conversation with Mr. Harding was very fun, engrossing, and somewhat unexpected. We all make rash judgments about the people we see on the screen. When that screen is inhabited by the guy who plays the impossibly handsome English teacher Ezra Fitz on Pretty Little Liars, who doles out lines like “I don’t ever want you to say you’re sorry again” before hoisting up his co-star Lucy Hale on the stove so they can begin their impassioned make-out session, you tend to feel wary.
Perhaps we worry that all hot guys have jedi-esque mind powers they use to trick the unsuspecting public into some nefarious act. But if our conversation can act as evidence to anything, it’s that whatever powers Ian Harding has, he certainly endeavors to use them for the forces of good.
Maniac Magazine: You were raised in a military family, was that an usual way to grow up?
Ian Harding: There’s an idea that a lot of military families move around a lot—but for us that wasn’t really the case. My dad moved to Heidelberg, Germany before I was born, after that he got stationed in Virginia consistently. I was able to get the best of both worlds, I was around the military, my dad and mom had that mentality of discipline…But at the same time, I never called my dad “sir,” or had to shave my head or anything. My dad grew up in Southern California, so he was pretty liberal and adventuresome.
MM: Did your parents encourage your love of performing, since it was a more liberal environment?
IH: They did. On my mom’s side, they had all been involved in music in some way shape or form. My grandfather was a conductor who was fairly well-known in Massachusetts. So they encouraged me in a very practical way, not so much in a hippie-dippie “Color on the walls! Be free!” way. They were very even-keeled in their support.
MM: You wrote a piece for The Huffington Post called “The Exact Moment I Decided To Become An Actor.” I thought it was interesting that the moment wasn’t born out of perfection, of everything going right in a performance. Rather, another actor had made a mistake, and you used improvisation to cover it up and were met with applause. Have you used that mentality in your life and your career?
IH: I was listening to Amy Poehler’s audiobook, and I think she sums it up really well—improv kind of prepares you for life, in that the main tenet is “Yes, and…” I think there is something to be said for really preparing for things, but at the end of the day you need to be really flexible. Most of the joy and happiness that comes from life is having an idea of what you want, but then going with what happens in the moment. I’d like to think that I’m good at accepting the present—but I don’t know, actually I might completely refute that—but I think the idea I keep coming back to for myself is that most of the pain and suffering you go through is because you have an idea of how your life is supposed to go. So in the end, I try to go with “Yes, and…”
MM: You went to Carnegie Mellon University for Drama, which is a phenomenal school, so you lived in Pittsburgh for a few years—what memories come to mind when you think back on that time?
IH: I liked this kind of “off” feeling Pittsburgh had, you know, Pittsburgh was odd… it had a lot of culture, there was a lot of really great food… that wasn’t the best for you, but still, great. I loved its blossoming beer culture. It was the ideal city to go to college. I loved it. I lived in Shadyside, right off of Walnut Street in a wonderful, incredibly overpriced apartment, next to a place called “Bites and Brews”… I went there a little too often.
MM: How soon after you graduated CMU did you go to Los Angeles?
IH: I went to LA almost immediately after I graduated, I graduated around May 14, 2009 and then was in LA by May 18, or something like that. And that proved to be beneficial.
MM: Did you get your role in Pretty Little Liars soon after?
IH: Yeah, about two months. I’m only realizing now just how astronomically lucky I was. I know that lucky is only preparation meets opportunity… but after I got the part, the show got picked up and shows never get picked up, and then the show got a second season and usually shows don’t make it to a second season. And here we are.
MM: You’ve got a lot of projects lined up for this coming year! Can you tell us a little about that?
IH: I find myself in an interesting situation which is, I’m on Pretty Little Liars for two more years, at least—supposedly. So it’s tricky trying to get other jobs that don’t overlap. I really love the independent film world, because there’s more leeway, not as many people you have to answer to. But I guess the other side to being in an indie film is that some of these films will never see the light of day. But I enjoy that because I got the show right out of the gate, I didn’t have time to do a bunch of different things. I say this not in a masochistic way—like, “Nah, I should have struggled more!” But it’s nice to do a film, and try out different stuff, and not have that pressure of a lot of people going to see it.
MM: There’s a lot of freedom in that, as well.
IH: There is! You get to work without consequences. I feel kind of bad for kids who get a huge movie out of the gate like Twilight or something of that nature, and they haven’t been able to grow into themselves. And people go to the movie and expect them to be a great actor, and if that’s not really the case…No wonder people go insane or completely alter their bodies. Because if you have enough people around you saying, “Listen, what really sells is how pretty you are…so you have to maintain that.” That seems logical, but after a while it kills any sort of spirit or personality you have.
MM: It’s unattainable to always be the same.
IH: We say these things to each other, like “beauty fades” that seem so obvious and cliché, but that’s a lesson some people never learn. I hope as I age I keep that in mind and don’t end up putting random crap in my face.
MM: How do you keep away from that mindset? What keeps you grounded?
IH: Raging nihilism!
MM: That helps!
IH: I do get wrapped up in it sometimes. I have a wonderful girlfriend, who also went to Carnegie Mellon, who I’ll say things to like, “I can’t believe I didn’t get an audition for Fifty Shades of Grey!” These are the things I freak out about and she’s just say, “What is wrong with you?!” That stuff seeps in you know, and I think the best way to think about it is that at the end of the day, you’re playing make believe.
MM: It’s important to not believe your own hype.
IH: That’s it, believing your own hype…That moment when you’re like, “I got two million Instagram followers dad!” And nobody cares.
MM: You do a lot of work with the Lupus Foundation of America. Does this ground you? How did you get involved with that?
IH: I’m involved in that because my mother was diagnosed with Lupus when I was seven. She’s had it for about twenty years, she’s doing well. It’s a very odd and tricky disease in that it takes many shapes and affects different parts of your body. My mother’s strain of Lupus affects her differently in that it is a daily irritation. But then she’ll have occasional flare ups, like last Christmas morning, it appeared like she was having a heart attack. We rushed to the hospital, and lo and behold nothing was wrong with her. I think it’s important, for when you’re doing well in life, to keep perspective. The way you can give legitimacy to all of these Instagram and Twitter followers you have is, instead of tweeting out pictures of your cereal with “hashtag still healthy” or “hashtag fiber,” is to let your fans know what is important to you.
I’m also involved in the Children’s National Medical Center in Washington D.C., as well as the Humane Society. Those are the things I work for, try to raise money for, because I have family and friends who work in the “saving the world” industries. They go to Africa and help refugees, and then my mother helps disabled GI’s…And I make out with someone for a living, and I make a lot of money. So think the best thing to do is to better the world in whatever ways that you can. The microphone I have is great, because I can’t do some of the things the people around me do—they have degrees, and are more culturally in tuned with the places they work in. So my piece of this machine is to make as much money as humanly possible, to give money to the rights places. That’s what I can do as an actor.
MM: Since this is our men’s issue, when do you really think you really grew up? When did you stop feeling like a boy as opposed to a man?
IH: I think when I feel the most like a man is when I’m able to see the boyish qualities in things. You will always have that child in you, and I don’t think becoming a man means exterminating that other person inside of you. It’s just knowing when it’s acceptable. Truly, what being a man is, is being able to yo-yo between responsible and steadfast adult, and wonder-filled giddy child.
MM: Speaking of giddy—to prepare for this issue I started watching Pretty Little Liars, and I realized I had made a terrible mistake because I could not stop and I had a magazine to edit. What aspect of the show has made it such a huge phenomenon?
IH: First of all, thank you for watching. Most of my friends haven’t even seen it! Which is fine, if it’s not your cup of tea I get it. Its success is due to a combination of things…It started to take off as Twitter and Instagram became a force to be reckoned with. All of the cast members, writers, directors can directly communicate with fans. We were one of the first shows that got fans involved using the hashtag. When I first saw it I thought, “What is this? It’s so distracting!” But then you look on your twitter feed and you taking your shirt off is trending world-wide—which is weird.
MM: That sounds like my worst nightmare!
IH: It’s my worst nightmare too! I can’t drink beer anymore! So I think it’s that, and—listen, I understand the show isn’t Chekhov or anything, but it’s entertaining, and one of the things I’m really proud of is that it’s about four young women. They’re the four leads, and there’s peripheral male characters, and on top of that we have a lesbian character that’s a lead and it’s not just for titillation. There’s something awesome about when she goes to prom with her date and it’s not a big deal. So its combination of that, the constant “who-dun-it”, social media, and the girls dialogue being very clever.
MM: Are you working on the show now?
IH: We actually just finished the fifth season. So we’re off for two months, and then we’ll go on to the sixth, ideally.
MM: I don’t know how much you can reveal, but should fans of the show hunker down and emotionally prepare themselves for the next season?
IH: I should be back one way or another—we only get a contract that says that you’re employed for this amount of time. So I should be back, but I don’t know in what capacity yet.
MM: Maybe at some point you’ll be a ghost!
IH: If it was revealed that I was a ghost the entire time…That would be really phenomenal.
MM: For the sixth season, I think you should just wear a sheet with holes cut for your eyes and make spooky noises.
IH: I prefer if I was just super pasty.
MM: I’m not suggesting that we should write the show for the sixth season…but we’ve got some good ideas.
IH: Some real gold nuggets for the writers!
MM: Before I let you go, since this is our Love issue as well, what would you say is the most romantic gesture one person can do for their significant other?
IH: Just consistently being there. A romantic gesture is taking an interest in what the other person does. Sure, surprising them with a trip to Fiji is pretty awesome! The biggest romantic gestures, the ones that always stuck with me, involved something I was passionate about… oh, this is going to sound weird… I feel like I’m coming out of the closet or something… but I’ve always bird watched. The reaction to that is either “awwwww” or you just hear the sound of someone collapsing on the ground in laughter. In college I had a girlfriend who took me to the National Aviary in Pittsburgh, and I loved it. And the fact that she was like, I’m going to go here and watch a grown man hang out with a bunch of kids who are feeding penguins, and am still going to want to sleep with him afterwards…That’s pretty good.
You can keep up with all of Ian’s upcoming projects by becoming one of his millions of twitter followers by using the twitter handle @IanMHarding. To learn more about the causes Ian is involved with, please visit Lupus.org, HumaneSociety.org, and ChildrensNational.org.
Photography by Ross Ferguson
Styled by Karen Raphael
Groomer: Daniele Piersons
