Richard Linklater returns to cinemas tomorrow with Everybody Wants Some!!, the spiritual sequel to his seminal flick, Dazed and Confused. Starring Blake Jenner as lead protagonist Jake, this snapshot of youthful rebellion, confusion and impulses transports you to hedonistic high school life, jockstraps ‘n’ all. Here, we publish our HERO 15 interview with Jenner in which we talk marriage, baseball and Louis Theroux.

At the age of eighteen, Miami-born Blake Jenner packed his bags and moved to LA in search of the acting career he had always chased. Working part time in a parrot shop to pay his rent, Jenner seized his escape route, landing the plum role of jock-next-door Ryder Lynn in Glee and thus kickstarting his career – which may have simply been ‘pining for the fjords.’ Bearing down on meatier roles the 23-year-old actor is poised to go the distance as baseball mad Jake, the lead role in Richard Linklater’s latest film, Everybody Wants Some!!, a spiritual sequel to the director’s coming of age classic Dazed and Confused.

Alex James Taylor: Firstly, congratulations on getting married. We’re the exact same age, so you’re making me feel very young and immature right now.
Blake Jenner: [laughs] Nice, you’re 23?

AJT: Yeah, just turned.
BJ: Well thank you so much dude.

AJT: How’s married life treating you so far?
BJ: It’s cool man, we’re each others’ anchors and best friends, I couldn’t ask for a better situation.

AJT: You old romantic. So what’re you up to at the minute in terms of work, you recently wrapped your upcoming film Everybody Wants Some with Richard Linklater, right?
BJ: Yeah that was a while ago now, it was so much fun to film. And we’ve been on post-production for a film that I wrote called Billy Boy .

AJT: Yeah you wrote, produced and played the lead in Billy Boy, that’s quite the achievement. How long had you had the idea in your head for?
BJ: Between Glee season four and season five. I’ve always been a fan of those kinds of movies, ones with a message that show youth in revolt, the aches and pains of growing up. So I just started writing it one day and it slowly grew from there.

AJT: Can you relate to that youth in revolt situation then? I guess we all can in some way.
BJ: Sure, the feelings and emotions and everything behind it definitely rang true for me and what I’ve been through in the past. But in the movie they steal cars and stuff and I’ve never done that [laughs], but the tug of war with parental and social relationships, definitely.

AJT: Did you always have an ambition to write?
BJ: I’ve always written stories, from like fourth grade I’d write little stories and act them out in front of the class, that’s where the hook came from, for both acting and writing, I just continued from there. I moved out here [to LA] about two days after my eighteenth birthday and just started writing. The scripts were fucking terrible, bad sketches that when on way too long, but I loved it and progressed.

AJT: Billy Boy was funded by Kickstarter, do you feel an added pressure because the money has come from your fans and the public, rather than some professional backing or grant?
BJ: Yeah totally, there’s a bunch of pressure to make the people that support you proud. I think that was the most depressing month of my life, constantly checking Kickstarter, worrying about whether you’re going to make enough money or not. But it was an experience to say the least.

AJT: It must have taken up a lot of your time.
BJ: Oh yeah, we shot it for like eighteen days straight, three whole weeks. It took up a lot of time and was very physical too, I’d come home dead exhausted and bruised up, I actually got accidentally punched in the face by a co-star of mine a couple of times whilst filming one scene, so I had a scar on my left temple.

AJT: Doing all your own stunts.
BJ: [laughs] Yeah, for sure.

AJT: You mentioned earlier your upcoming film Everybody Wants Some, which is the spiritual sequel to Dazed and Confused, I’m a huge fan of that film.
BJ: Oh yeah, I saw it as a teenager and loved it immediately, I watched it again a few times as I was auditioning for Everybody Wants Some and it reminded me just how amazing it is. I’ve always been a big fan of Rick’s [Linklater], I auditioned around the same time Boyhood was in theatres, and so all the actors involved were super excited. To get the part was a dream come true for me, those were the best three months of my life, hands down.

AJT: It’s based on a baseball team, right?
BJ: Yeah, we’re all on the same baseball team.

AJT: Are you a baseball fan?
BJ: I’m a big basketball and football fan, not so much baseball. I’d play it as a kid with friends but I’ve never played a day in my life and we actually had to send in a baseball pitch for the audition, and mine were absolutely terrible. We went through like two weeks of baseball practice with dudes who knew their shit, it was cool, I know how to pitch now.

AJT: What’s the last film you saw at the cinema?
BJ: I recently saw Straight Outta Compton, I saw that about three times actually, it’s really good, I enjoyed it a lot.

AJT: Do you get much chance to go to the cinema when you’re not working?
BJ: I’ve always said that my favourite place to go is the back row of the movie theatre, but we’ve got a good movie system at home too.

AJT: Do you and your wife share the same film taste, or do you take it in turns picking films to watch?
BJ: Yeah we like the same films. We’re big documentary buffs too, so you’ll either catch us watching a film or a documentary at home. We’re always educating ourselves.

AJT: Yeah same, you can’t go wrong with a bit of Louis Theroux.
BJ: The most recent documentary I watched was the Steve Jobs one, that was really interesting.

AJT: I’m really into serial killer documentaries, not to sound like a nutter.
BJ: Same, same. We love that too, we definitely dabble in the dark stuff, like all the Charles Manson stuff, it’s really interesting.

AJT: Absolutely, it’s like a world within our own. So what’re your plans for this weekend?
BJ: Maybe go see a movie, and we’re going to spend some much needed time with our dogs, we’ve been busy and haven’t had a chance to see them much.

AJT: How many dogs have you got?
BJ: We have three dogs. So we’ll maybe treat them to the dog park and then at night we might go to this barcade that we love, it’s on Ventura Boulevard and have all 80s arcade games and drinks, it’s always a fun spot.

Everybody Wants Some is out May 13th.