Cosmopolitan's cover says it all: "Hollywood just got hotter," referencing Yara Shahidi and Charles Melton, the costars of The Sun Is Also A Star. It would be hard to find a more attractive couple.
Are you hooked on rom-coms and can't wait for Henry Golding as the leading man in Last Christmas or the sequel of the ground-breaking Crazy Rich Asians? Perhaps The Sun is Also A Star, which hits theaters May 17, will satisfy that void in your life.
“What if I told you I could get you to fall in love with me…?” asks the The Sun's character Daniel Bae, played by Melton. College-bound romantic Daniel Bae and Jamaica-born pragmatist Natasha Kingsley meet—and fall for each other—over one magical day amidst the fervor and flurry of New York City. Sparks immediately fly between these two strangers, who might never have met had fate not given them a little push. But will fate be enough to take these teens from star-crossed to lucky in love?
With just hours left on the clock in what looks to be her last day in the U.S., Natasha is fighting against her family’s deportation as fiercely as she’s fighting her budding feelings for Daniel, who is working just as hard to convince her they are destined to be together. A modern-day story about finding love against all odds, The Sun Is Also a Star explores whether our lives are determined by fate or the random events of the universe. The film stars Yara Shahidi (Grown-ish) as Natasha and Charles Melton (Riverdale) as Daniel.
“Being an Asian-American lead for a studio film — it almost seems like it’s not real for me, you know?” Melton says in Cosmopolitan‘s May cover story. The Korean American actor says it’s been “very emotional” to be cast as the leading man in the movie, especially opposite Shahidi, who is also bringing diversity and representation to the screen. “Yara is Iranian and black. It’s very surreal,”
Melton adds, “Growing up, I never saw anybody who looked like me, really,” he says of the groundbreaking Crazy Rich Asians, which featured an all-Asian cast. “I cried seven times. It was just so emotional. Everyone was of Asian descent, and I was like, Wow.”
Like Golding, Melton is another strong argument against the old Hollywood belief that says audiences don't like Asian men in romantic situations.
Directed by Ry Russo-Young (“Before I Fall”), the The Sun is Also A Star is based on the acclaimed bestseller by author Nicola Yoon. The book was No. 1 on the New York Times bestseller list and has received multiple accolades, including: 2016 National Book Award Finalist; Amazon’s Best Book of 2016 in YA; Amazon’s Top 20 Children’s Books of 2016 in YA; the New York Times Notable Children’s Books of 2016; and Entertainment Weekly’s 10 Best Books of 2016.
_______________________________________________________________
