Austin Butler Should Smoke Cigarettes

     The clear top pick to be the next great American movie star is Austin Butler, but will he be cool enough to be a movie star off the screen. We've been struggling to find one since Leo and Brad Pitt have naturally aged out of it and Denzel did earlier than them. The people are starving for a cultural movie star.

    In the simplest terms a true movie start needs to be a great actor plus being intimidatingly cooler than anyone you've met while also seeming approachable and a good hang. The gold standard for this is Paul Newman who off screen raced cars and gave tons to charity through his food products. This would make him seem like he was some untouchable god, however you'd be just as likely to see him drinking a Coors and smoking a cigarette. Now the image of him changes from some superhuman philanthropist to this cool guy you could know who also happens to be an Oscar winning actor that uses his platform to do cool things regular people can't. 

    This is an important time for Austin Butler to fully ascend into this role because who knows how the window will stay open. Later this year he will be in Dune where he is going to have a dual scene against Timothee Chalamet, assuming they don't change the story, and this should be his anointing moment. The two biggest young actors head to head. Chalamet has established himself as the coolest New York actor, but that doesn't always work for middle America. He probably is the next Willem Dafoe right now which is great. Butler though has the looks to go along with a simple anywhere in America name and he is going to win the Oscar this year for playing an American icon in Elvis. On the screen it's clear he will be the man in the biggest cool movies for the next two decades, hoping he doesn't get stuck in the Marvel universe. 

    Now, the case for Butler off screen is growing after his speech at the Golden Globes where he decided to use the Elvis voice. People are talking about this online: about his commitment to the role, becoming Elvis, and just a general what is this guy? If you watch his earlier work and interviews it's clear that is not his voice, even at the actors round table from the Hollywood Reporter he doesn't use the voice. So, he chose to accept his Golden Globe in that voice just because he wanted to which is hilarious. We don't know a ton about him though yet besides him being a child actor and that he's a good talk show guest which is important. Meaning this decision to talk like Elvis at an awards show is the best indicator to us that he has a laid back perspective on the whole industry.

    Cigarettes are the next step for him as he moves into this phase of being the biggest star on the screen. Smoking is having a coolness resurgence especially as vaping has taken over high schools and colleges plus weed is at its least cool right now. It's the cool option right now because it's openly bad for you so when you see someone doing it you're like yeah I get it. This understanding makes it both deviant and traditional. Austin Butler needs to be seen outside an Oscars party smoking a cigarette to instantly be put on the level of yeah I can hang out with that guy.