Photo by Tiziano
Moves publisher Moonah Ellison recently had the chance to speak with Love Hurts star Lio Tipton to discuss everything from their navigation through the entertainment industry as an actor to the liminal spaces that come with embracing all parts of oneself. This introspective conversation highlights the beautiful non-linear paths we take in life to arrive at the original destination via Tipton’s admission to originally coming to Hollywood to be behind the camera as a filmmaker. The conversation further touched on the L.A. wildfires, recent DEIA impacts on the LGBTQIA community, and more.
Love Hurts, starring Tipton alongside Academy Award winners Ke Huy Quan (Everything Everywhere All at Once) and Ariana DeBose (West Side Story), is in theaters now!
Moonah Ellison: So tell us a little bit about yourself. Where are you right now? I’ll call you Lio. Is that okay?
Lio Tipton: Please. That’s the preferred. Yeah. I am at home. Today’s been a little bit crazy. Ke Huy Quan, who is the star of Love Hurts, got his handprints on the Hollywood Walk of Fame this morning. I’ve never been to the ceremony. It’s a very intimate event. People from The Goonies were there… I know that we’re sitting right in back of The Goonies, and I’m like, losing my mind, watching my co-star get his handprints forever sealed on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Josh Brolin came up to speak. It was really special. So that was this morning. I’m back home and then I get into hair and makeup more formally, for the [Love Hurts] premiere tonight.
ME: I have to begin by first asking are you okay, families, okay? You guys got through the rough of it because I know everybody knows somebody who’s connected to L.A. with regards to the fires.
LT: It’s been devastating. And yes. Thank you for asking. My family, which is here with me for the premiere, are all from different areas in the country. So they’re safe. And we have been safe. A lot of people on production have lost their homes. And so, tonight is really, it is obviously a celebration; but you cannot escape the feeling of unique camaraderie. L.A. doesn’t have that often… As devastating and tragic as it has been, it’s been a really unique experience being in L.A. to see some of the camaraderie that I witnessed in other places.
ME: Tell us a little bit about your journey. Tell us a little bit about how you got here [to Love Hurts]? What drew you towards taking the part?
LT: I don’t always know why something makes me so excited. I think it’s because it goes against the norm. And yet there is an aspect of my wheelhouse that I haven’t been able to really, utilize or, express for a while. And comedy is something that is really what started me in this business and on this road. I haven’t had the opportunity to do as much physical humor as I would normally love to do. And when this script came up, I read it and I knew who was attached and I could visualize who was in it. Ke Huy Quan just made perfect sense.
My character was written very gothic and dark. I did some dark black makeup for the audition and I had my hair very straight, very sardonic and self-deprecating. But I got to just play with the character. And with humor, with comedy, there’s honesty. I’m very confident in my comedy.
(from left) Marvin Gable (Ke Huy Quan) and Ashley (Lio Tipton) in Love Hurts, directed by Jonathan Eusebio. (c) Universal Studios. All Rights Reserved.
ME: But you’re enjoying it. I’m sensing it was different. You’ve made so many of these movies that are kind of very scary. You’ve done some really deep dives into storylines that call for lots of blood and gory stuff from looking at your Rolodex of acting. The yin and yang must be really nice to kind of shift to something that’s not so dramatic.
LT: Yeah, there’s been a lot of drama. We kind of had this mentality like, there’s this thing in Hollywood where you have to play drama to be taken seriously, but there’s no joy like comedy. You get to try things out, you get to be ridiculous and silly and some of it fails. I feel like my comedy is like the rule of pasta where you take a noodle and you fling it on the ceiling and see if it sticks. If it sticks, it’s supposed to be done, right? I kind of feel like that’s how it [comedy] is. Comedy is like flinging pasta all the time. And often the director or the producers are the ones getting it flung in their faces.
ME: Who would you say you’ve had the most fun experience with, that you could kind of say, ‘Wow, I’d like to live that again.’?
LT: Crazy, Stupid Love was an incredible experience. There was a scene where I held a gun to John Malkovich’s head and he stopped the scene and he took the gun. He pulled it closer. He was like, ‘I need to feel it against my skull.’ And I remember telling this to my parents and they were like, you what? And I look back at that and honestly, I have memories with Jeremy Irons, with Scarlett [Johansson]. I have worked with really great, kind people. And I think each one presents something special and unique.
ME: You’ve also had a strong career in modeling. And at the time that you did, that was your moment. And then you move into acting. And you’ve been in front of the camera. Where do you see yourself going with the next layer? Writing? Producing?
LT: I moved to Los Angeles to be a filmmaker. I had no intention to be in front of the camera whatsoever. Not in modeling. Not in acting. In fact, I did not like actors. I thought I genuinely didn’t understand them. I thought, why are you doing what you do? Does it really make the world a better place? Are you expressing any art? Because I was wanting to be a director and writer, I’m from the place of creating and I never saw actors as artists. At 19, I was on America’s Next Top Model. And of course, my parents were like, what are you doing? And I was like, I have no idea. I’m 19.
I was down in LA and I didn’t know what to do, and that’s how I got into acting, kind of through that. And I didn’t say I was an actor for a good four years.
ME: You just weren’t feeling right. But you say that you started off in film. That was the ultimate objective of going to L.A. Did you pursue that? Did you pursue behind the camera?
LT: I am. I still am.
Photo by Tiziano
ME: I always think that some actors can fit into unique roles or roles that would be outside of their regular kind of day-to-day. They just fit in…
LT: I played pretend [when I was young]. My pretend world I think and my reality as a child have blended together so much because I had such a vivid imagination. And I think that was a coping mechanism because I was overwhelmed with the world. I had something, and I feel like I’m sure that that’s not uncommon with artists. But yeah, going into different roles honestly feels almost more natural than having to be myself.
When I’m out [in public], I think there’s a lot of social masking that takes place when I’m presenting myself. And I think in acting, I’m playing adult pretend. And I’m sure if we Google that, that’s probably not going to come out correctly.
ME: The good thing is that you knew when you were in the role and when you were out, right? I mean, you knew how to separate it.
LT: You know what? Actually, that did take me some time, especially with gender. As non-binary, I feel like I went through a period of time where I really felt like I had to always be this person that I never felt connected to. It wasn’t until I came out as non-binary that I could honestly separate myself from the rules that I did because when I was being cast as certain things, I would feel like, well, I’m cast as this because they saw this role in me, even though I’m playing pretend. So I felt like I had that expectation to kind of live up to. Now, I get to put on whatever dress or glam makeup and things like that.
ME: And not give a fuck at that. Which is brilliant, right? It’s a great place to be. It’s liberating.
LT: Exactly. But if it’s like a female-presenting role, like the role in Love Hurts, Ashley, is female. Or identifies as female. And I would go and I would be able to put on that hair and makeup and get into this character. Just because people might think of me as one gender, not know who I am. And now that can’t influence my work.
Photo by Tiziano
ME: You are a big advocate for the LGBTQIA [community]. How do you feel about what’s happening right now with the whole diversity boundaries that have been thrown at us?
LT: I am devastated for the youth. I think more than anything, and I feel like anyone that has entered the LGBTQIA community, the youth is what matters in so many moments of what’s going on. They are the ones that are impacted. And that very frail timeline, the evolution of self and acceptance that is now becoming something that the youth is going to have to fight for once again. I do feel like everyone wants to double down on making sure people know that they are loved, that they are accepted, that there’s no right or wrong thing.
I’m really hoping that it comes in a wave of love, and the best thing to do right now is to really step up. And if you know anyone going through something or questioning or [afraid about] being open, it’s terrifying. That’s how I feel.
ME: If you had the chance to take only one more role, what and who would it be?
LT: I want to play Sally Ride, the first female in space. I went to space camp and aviation camp. I’m obsessed with space and mathematics and physics, and it’s a big part of my upbringing. She also had a really fascinating life where, as the woman at the face of American space travel, she was gay. She was also married and had children and lived this initial life of like, see, I can go to space and also have a family and be a wife.
But I’m very, very excited for the next movie I do, which is this incredible indie film.* It’s just going back to kind of a character development route. I feel like with the confidence that I have coming from doing comedy, I hope to kind of carry that.
*At the time of this interview, the working title of the indie film was The Slow Machines. The title might be subject to change.
Photo by Tiziano
Lio made their Cannes Film Festival debut last year starring in and producing Weston Razooli’s feature film Riddle of Fires; starred in the independent feature Broken Star for director Dave Schwep opposite Tyler Labine; and was seen in All Nighter opposite J.K. Simmons and Emile Hirsch for director Gavin Wiesen.
They can also be seen in a leading role opposite Jake Lacy and Colin Hanks in the Peacock limited series, A Friend of the Family; the New Regency series The Edge of Sleep based on the podcast; and recurring on Marc Cherry’s CBS All-Access series Why Women Kill opposite Lucy Liu and Ginnifer Goodwin.