Penn Badgley finds fame 'extremely unnatural'

Penn Badgley finds fame "extremely unnatural".

The 'You' actor became a household name when he played Dan Humphrey in 'Gossip Girl' at the age of 20 and he has had to "really grapple" with accepting the downsides of life in the public eye in order to also enjoy the "extreme privileges".

Stressing he doesn't want people to feel sorry for him, he told The Guardian newspaper: "[Fame is] extremely unnatural, just the way that people want to relate to you. It’s not a new idea that fame has all these nefarious dimensions to it.

"And in order to even appreciate or utilise the privileges that come with it, one has to really grapple with the ways in which it’s completely disabled parts of you or your life, or your relationship to others and society.

"The privileges and the sacrifices are both extreme and obscene, and so you have to take them both. In order to be a decent person, a good father and a husband, a good friend, a responsible colleague, I’ve been grappling with all the ways in which this stuff is just not a good way for somebody to live.”

The 39-year-old star - who is expecting twins with wife Domino Kirke and is already dad to four-year-old James and stepdad to his spouse's 15-year-old son Cassius - "hated" his body and "wanted a different one" when he was growing up, and he admitted becoming an actor brought further pressure.

He said: “There was just a period where, coming out of depression and isolation, I was jumping wilfully into, but also being thrust into, this world where the more conventionally beautiful I seemed, the more successful I might be, the more value I might have.

"There’s no way to get past the superficiality of this work, and if you recognise that, you can’t help but recognise the superficiality of our culture, because of the way it rewards this work.”

Of 'Gossip Girl' he added: “What was that show other than aesthetic? That was its thing, the way we all looked.

“I didn’t particularly love the superficial celebrity aspect of the way I was perceived.”

For some time, Penn considered quitting acting as a result but ultimately found an "inner transformation" through the Baha'i faith, and he now prays and meditates every day.

He said: "That is what allowed me to persevere through the disillusionment, all the things I’d been grappling with, and then come back to it all, but with hopefully some kind of inner transformation.”