“It was definitely a disappointing experience, and difficult, and it definitely opened my eyes to the internet and how horrific it can be.
You’d think, after doing ‘Dear Evan Hansen’ onstage for four years, I would have already known that. I try my best to focus on people who tell me it was moving to them and they really felt seen by it. It is very easy for the good to get drowned out by the bad.
…I find that Twitter is almost exclusively for tearing people down. I wasn’t getting anything positive, and it’s been really nice to be away.”Ben Platt speaking to The New York Times about the critically-panned 2021 film version of Dear Evan Hansen.
Related: Ben Platt talks new tour, the need for queer artists, plus an update on “The Politician” season 3
tmball13
This is what happens when you write checks your talent can’t cash. He was too old to do it when he did it on Broadway, and certainly too old to do it in the movie. His boyfriend, Noah Galvin, is imminently more talented and doesn’t come off like a self-aggrandizing douche. Not to mention that Noah can play much younger than he is.
ldweisberg
Oh, Boo-hoo-hoo… if you could have parked your ego, YOU would have seen that you were now too old to effectively pull off that role. YOU should have helped handpick someone to star in the film adaptation. Perhaps someone who recently played the stage role who was more age appropriate. But no, you let your ego drive and since Daddy made the film, it was just nepotism all around. You looked downright creepy in the role against the other younger actors. So the criticism was well-deserved and earned. Suck it up, buttercup.
Stan H
James Dean was around his age when he did “Rebel without a cause”. The cast of Glee were 10 years too old to play their parts. Now I did not like “Dear Evan Hansen”. It wasn’t because he was too old it was because it was not a good film. Now I did not see the play and after this film I never want too. What I do agree with is that his dad is a producer and that is how he got the part.
nm4047
It’s the internet, that’s what keyboard warriors do with anonymity.
Joshooeerr
Besides Platt being too old, it’s a musical that culminates in a song about “you will be seen” after a plot about a character who commits suicide because he was not seen. The big number is directly contradicted by everything else about the story. And we’re supposed to be uplifted?
Doug
I agree with his comments re: Twitter, but I couldn’t make it past twenty minutes of the Evan Hansen film because he just wasn’t believable (or that interesting, I’m sorry) in the part. I guess I’m also just not a big musical fan.
inbama
Between him and Beanie, so much for that film version of “Merrily We Roll Along.”
Kangol2
To be filmed over 20 years, no less. And Linklater’s already started. Sounds like a disaster in the making but hey, why not?
whammykiss
He “finally” speaks, as if this were some celestial prophecy that God himself–finally–whispered into his ear. Nobody was waiting for his opinions, as the film was such a catastrophic mess that it made Cats seem like art house cinema.