OnlyOnAOL: Meet Derek Zoolander's blue steel baby boy
BY DONNA FREYDKIN
Celebrities love to complain about the hardships of gaining weight for a role. Not so Cyrus Arnold, who was cast as Derek Zoolander's less-than really, really, ridiculously good looking son in "Zoolander 2," the sequel to the 2001 male supermodel saga opening Friday. Originally Cyrus was deemed too thin for the part, so he gained 15 pounds in what he called the Zoolander diet. He has no regrets.
Guess what folks? Eating for fun is, well, fun. Plus, playing Stiller's offspring isn't a bad gig, either.
"It's been pretty amazing because I grew up watching Ben Stiller. On the first audition, he wasn't there. The callback, he wasn't there. I flew out to New York to meet him. It was a 45-minute thing. We discussed the character," says Arnold.
Once he got the role, Arnold met Stiller's two kids, Ella and Quinlin. "After I booked it, he invited me to his daughter's birthday party. It was just a birthday party thing," says Arnold. "His son's amazing. He's so funny. He talks all the time. He says the best stuff ever."
Of the many new talents that Arnold now has, one is the ability to rock a runway. We challenged him to demonstrate his skills. Arnold was game. Very game.
"I did it in the movie. You want me to do it? OK! We actually practiced. Don't swing your arms, like you're trying to drown," says Arnold, gamely strutting up and down the green room.
He didn't get official training per se. "It was just Ben. He did walk-offs all the time."
A post shared by Cyrus Arnold (@cyrusarnold) on Feb 1, 2016 at 6:13pm PST
But Arnold wants to make one thing very clear: the movie isn't about the glorification of modeling, or an in-depth exploration of the beauty biz. "The movie is satirizing walk-offs," he says, adding that it heavily focuses on Zoolander's newfound "responsibilities for having a kid."
Speaking of, does he feel that he resembles a young Stiller? Um, yes, says Arnold. "There was this photo -- this was weird. We found this photo online of him when he was eight and he was a doppelganger for me," he says.
See more from "Zoolander" below.
