The young actor discusses being part of the Night Swim family and what it’s like working on spooky sets as a young man.
Young Gavin Warren quickly made a name for himself in Hollywood at the age of 10, playing young Rick Armstrong in Damien Chazelle’s epic film First Man, about America’s mission to the moon in the late 1960s with Ryan Gosling as Neil Armstrong. From there, Warren has starred in Mack, 12 Mighty Orphans, and A Hard Problem, and he’s set to star in some major projects soon — the Western thriller Long Shadows, with Dermot Mulroney, Jacqueline Bisset, and Dominic Monaghan; the intense abduction thriller Mister Whisper, the inspiring drama The Unbreakable Boy with Zachary Levi and Patricia Heaton, and the horror film The Man in the White Van.
In fact, it’s horror cinema where Warren is making big waves. He starred as Finch in Fear the Walking Dead, and just appeared as Wyatt Russell and Kerry Condon’s son, Elliot, in the Blumhouse and Atomic Monster horror film, Night Swim. As we wrote in our review, “It’s here that young actor Gavin Warren really shines. A boy who’s wise beyond his years, his character Elliot is equally skeptical about his dad’s strange attraction to their backyard source of entertainment.”
Warren answered some of our email questions about his performance and his experiences as a young actor starring in such intense horror projects. Check it out below.
MovieWeb: Did any real-life experience in either swimming or baseball help you while preparing to play your role?
Gavin Warren: I love swimming. I had to go through a very thorough swim test during the audition process to earn the role. Growing up, I had a swimming pool at his house with a lazy river. I lived in the pool in the Texas summers and loved to swim against the river current, which helped my swimming skills.
MW: Did you become afraid of pools in real life, maybe even just a little, after starring in this movie?
Gavin Warren: Being in the movie probably made the effect of the movie less scary than watching it! Making the movie is fun and exciting, even the underwater stunts. I love to see how everything works behind the scenes of scary movies. Watching the movie and seeing how it all comes together is the best!
MW: Since Night Swim and Fear the Walking Dead are both scary projects, did your experience with one project help with the other?
Gavin Warren: I was a lead in an unreleased indie horror film called Mister Whisper, which had a lot of stunts and scary scenes that prepared me more for Night Swim than Fear the Walking Dead. FTWD was an awesome experience but very different than making a horror film.
MW: Wyatt and Kerry joked in our interview that they “fought like a married couple” during the movie. Do you agree or do you have any fun memories of what they were like on set?
Gavin Warren: I guess they kept the arguments away from me. They are both strong actors with great opinions and ideas to add to the movie. Amélie [Hoeferle] and I had an instant connection, like brother and sister also. It was very easy to feel like a family with all.
