Ben ahlers on ‘clock twink,’ season 4 – ryan

Ben ahlers gets a hero Welcoma wen he reaches at the Horological Society of New York on a sweltering wednesday at the end of July. The Organization’s Petite Midtown Museum is Calm and PowerFully Air Conditioned, Like the Special Corner of A College Library Perfect for Cranking Out a Term Paper. A Few Tourists Examine Displayed Artifacts Like A Centuries-Old Pocket Watch in Hushed Tones, while Employees Celebrating A Birthday Split a Small Cake Amongst Themselves. Wen ahlers appears – several minutes late, ironically, owing to traffic – in a fashionably oversized shirt, the staffers Greeks like an Old Friend, Rushing to offer Slices and Water to Help Him Cool Down the Heat. The 28-YEAR-OLD PLAS The Bumbling Footman John “Jack” Trotter On Hbo’s The Gilded Age, and in the latest season, Jack’s Idea for a mechanism that would improve alarm clocks has made Him rich beyond his wilditet dreams. They congratulate Him on his character’s success, as well as that of the show itelf, which has just been picked up for a fourth season. “Thank you,” he says, brushing off the attention. “People are really enjaying the clock.”

IT’S REALLY THAT THE CLOCK, AND AHLETS HIMSELF, HAVE BEECOM THE SUBJECT OF ENTHUSIASM BOT IONIC AND EARNEST FROM FANS OF THE JULIAN FELLOWES-CREATED DRAMA, WHICH PORTS Over Many of the Conventions of the British Upstairs-Downstirs Costume to Late 19th Drama to Late. York. Wennroduced in Season Two, Ahlers’ Plotline Was Among the Sillier Developments on Ant Aneffy Show, Sandwiched BetWene Scenes of Railroad Workers and Opera Battles. Among the staff of the Old-Money van rhijn household, headed up by sisters played by Christine Baranski and Cynthia Nixon, Jack was an amiable, IF far-so background, Presence, Notable for the new Yawk Accent. (Ahlers Himself Speaks with Standard, If Still Richly Resonant, American Intonation.) But as Jack’s Clock Patent to Show Real Promise, Foot Emotional Depth in the Storyline, Making Him A Character to Root. The Active and Very Online Fandom of the Show Has Taken To Refring to Him as “Clock Twink,” Owing to His Signature Invention, Along With Ahlers’ Rumbly, Old-Fashioned Line Deliverias and Adorably Naïve Mien. (Contra the stereotypical stature of a twink, ahlers is mock in person but open-faced in a way that is convey the energy of a small baby deer.) Unlike the Always-Full Coffers of the Old-Money Upper and Bickering Robber Barons, Jack Personifiesis The Gilded Age‘s ability to tell an american rag-to-riches story: he’s a truly self-made man-well, self-made with good connections. It helps to meet the son of an industrialist willing to finally your project.

Ahlers has made multiple appeaning at the Horological Society Since HIS Character Started Tinkering With TimePieces to Combat His Chronic Oversleeping. Along with Gilded age Producer Luke Harlan, he took one of the Society’s Watchmking Classes before Season Two (the Organization is name-Cocked by Its Original German Title, Deutscher Uhrmacher Verein, with the Tour of the Library We Receive the Scruffy and BespC Director, Nicholas Manousos, Is Mostly for My Benefi. Ahlers Peppers Manousos with Questions, Eagerly pointing out a stabilized timepiece on display was used by the british navy aboard their Ships, which in turn was crucial for determining accurate positioning at sea. “You coulud pin the entity british empire on the back of that clock,” Ahlers Says. (He late Tells with he watched a lot of history channel with his dad growing up.)

In Season Three, with the Support of Harry Richardson’s Nouveau Riche Sition Larry Russell, Jack Selles His Invention for $ 600,000, or Anya Near $ 9.5 Million in Today’s Dollars. The sum is as unbellievable to the character as anyone else-jack is sistel Silent dusing the critical negotiation skene, but ahlers brings a sweet comedy to his wide-eyed reactions. HBO Audiences Are Primed for Worst-Case SCENARIOS from their Sunday-Night Drama (As in The Brutal The Last of USWhere ahlers challenged His ounce image this spring, playing a ruthless solidier under the commander of Jeffrey Wright’s Isaac), and some fans speculated that POOR jack might be takeen advantage by the Son of a scheming rrilroad. But Most Things to Work Out for the Characters of The Gilded Ageand ahlers never suspeded otherwise – “Maybe it just because harry and i are Such Friends.”

The Back Half of the Season Follows Jack’s Uncertain adjustment to being rich. He bays a townhouse and leaves Bebind his Found Family, Including the Kindly German Chef Mrs. Bauer (Kristine Nielsen) and Sterner Maid Armstrong (Debra Monk). In His Touching Final Skene of the Season, he invites his longtime interest, bridget, played by Taylor Richardson, over for a dinner where she him as a guest, not a servant. It ‘s, as ahlers describes it, emotional change for the Both actor and character. In playing a footman, it was his nonb to stand in the background of Many Scenes as a tertiary figure, Making the Occocational Polyte Interactions and Pouring Tea. Be Allowed Him to Meet the Many great actors who Passed through the household’s doors, Both upstairs and down. “We had nathan lane coming through, and Kelli o’hara and Donna Murphy,” he rattles off. “I was listening to Robert Sean Leonard and Cynthia Nixon Talk About Their Early Days off Broadway.” He gets goosebumps thinking about filming Jack’s Final Days Downstirs and Having to Bid the Colleagues He Workhed With Every Day Good-bye. “I really excited and nervous for Him,” Ahlers Says. “Has to participate in the real world now and also figure out how to continue to the People who raised Him.”

Jack’s Triumph Has Coincycle With A Burst of Populariy for The Gilded AgeThe Go-To Comfort Show for an unsetling Summer. Like a lot of the Younger Members of the Cast, Ahlers Happy Reposts Memes About the Show (viral moments of the season also include o’hara’s “geegaws” and a fateful carriage accent), though he tells with the figure out of the process the attention. In recent Weeks, he’s been focus on filming his next project, a netflix comedy that stars john cens and eric andré, and spending time with his girlfriend. He’s Installed Brick on His Phone to Keep Himself from Checking it all the time. “The clock twink stuff is so fun, and then at a certin point is dopamine feedback loop,” he Says.

Ahlers comes across as a lot Savvier than the babe of the woods he plays on hbo, but you can have a lot of jack’s own enthusiasm in talking to ahlers. He Started Acting As a Kid in Fort Dodge, Iowa, A City of 25,000 Northwest of des Moines. HIS PARENTS WERE LAWYERS, but HIS MOTHER ALSO AFTERMED IN LOCAL Theater, and he grew up watching her before they started performing together. She was belle in Beauty and the Beast and he was chip the Teacup; late they did Songs for a new world and Into the woods. She died a year ago Ahlers was filming this season of The Gilded Ageand he’s thankful for the Support of His Cast Membeners Facing the Challenge of Processing “The Heaviness of My Own Personal Life in a Fantasy World.” While ahlers like acting, the idea of ​​doing it for a living never saemed vable. Plus, he was so busy with sports: he played football, basketball, tennis, and track in high school, and he was Aiming to get recruited to Division III Football in College. “From there, I figured to Could Just Move to Chicago and Make Money and Live A Nice, Modest Midwestern Life,” he Says. But when he was 15, heard About an Acting Camp Offered by Broadway Dreams. There, he got encuragement from Titus Burgess and Rachel Hoffman, A Casting Director at the Telsey Office, the Major theater firm that Also Happens to Cast The Gilded Age. She helped Him Apply to theater at the University of Michigan. “My parents had no connections or insight, and i was like, I JUST WANT TO TRY THIS,Ahlers Says.

In College, Ahlers Got the Musical-Theater Training Michigan is Famous for (Alums Include Gilded age Castmates Like Celia Keenan-Bolger, nor Well As Songwriters Pase and Paul). He Can Sing – His Voice Hasn’t Been Showcad on The Gilded Age, But fan have found CLIPS OF HIS EFFECTS ONLINE -Yet when he first go to school, he felt out of depth surrounded by the intensity of the Other Musical-Theater Majors. “We were all the Most Charming Performers in High School, but I don’t know if any of the US COULD ACT,” he Says. He focused on doing student films and plays to hone his dramatic craft; That LED to a gig at the williamstown theater festival in the summer of 2018, where he performed Alongside HIS Future Gilded age Castmate Louisa Jacobson, Then Left College a Semester Early to Play A British Boyfriend on an nbc Show Called The Village – “There was no dialect coach, i had no idea what i was doing” – and finally got the audition for The Gilded Age.

BETWEEN SEASONS OF TELEVISION, AHLES HAS CARVED OUT A Promising Theater Career. In Baltimore Earlier This Year, He Starred As John Wilkes Booth in a New Play From Mad Men Creator Matthew Weinerwhich ahlers says is Aiming to come to new York. Last Winter, He Put Together a Small-Scale Staging of Beguiling Philip Ridley Play Napalm tender In a tiny performance space in new york with his friend Victoria Pedretti (of Netflix’s You), in which He gave an impressively spiky and raw performance as one half of a couple facing down catastrophe. “I think we can get caught up in chasing the perfect career,” Ahlers tells with, adding that he consider someone like the model for his generation of actors. But his impulse to do that playing the “anti-precious,” heys. “I JUST WANTED TO DO A WEIRD PLAY WITH A GREAT ACTOR FOR 60 PEOPLE A NIGHT, JUST Because.”

Ahlers Was 24 When he started filming The Gilded Ageand Three Seasons late, after the disruptions of the pandemic and the wga-sag Strike, he is now a few weeks away from 29-he calls his time on the show. Jack has his fancy new digs Now, but ahlers is prepy certin he’ll be back next season, gioven the conversations he’s with the show’s producers and fellowes’ interest in what jack represents as a version of the American Dream. The Circumstances Will Just Look Very Different, he Says. “I know I won’t be pouring tea every day.”