Tom Blyth Gets Loose

Tom Blyth, best known for playing young Coriolanus Snow in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, could soon become known for something more surprising: his dance moves. His most recent film, Plainclothes, in which he plays a closeted police officer who is hired to catch gay men cruising in public restrooms — and then falls for one of his targets — isn’t exactly a laugh riot. But there’s a small, tender moment where Blyth’s Lucas and his mother, Marie (Maria Dizzia), dance around in the kitchen that’s truly transcendent. The prison drama Wasteman, out in February, in which he plays an unpredictable new cellmate opposite David Jonsson, also features a moment of letting loose when the two find themselves grooving in their claustrophobic space.

And then there’s the Netflix adaptation of People We Meet on Vacation by Emily Henry, whose fans well know how pivotal a dance scene can be. Out Jan. 9, the first big rom-com slated for 2026 — and the first of Henry’s books to ever be translated to the silver screen — stars Blyth and Emily Bader as Alex and Poppy, lifelong friends who have the opportunity to confront the depth of their feelings once and for all.

“Actually, I really like dancing. I like a bit of disco, house, and techno myself,” Blyth tells me. “As an adult, when you rediscover going out, and you’re not drinking to get drunk and you’re not trying to hide from yourself, you’re just truly expressing yourself. It’s f*cking awesome.” He laughs: “It becomes like going to church a little bit for people who maybe don’t go to church — a way of expressing yourself, a way to connect with other people. Nightlife is back, baby!”

Following his Bustle photo shoot, the 30-year-old British actor, who is dressed all in black and an enviable pair of Wales Bonner Adidas sneakers, cozies up cross-legged facing me; he’s ready to get into it: He’s just wrapping up a hell of a 2025, and with People We Meet, Wasteman, and likely the Claire Denis film The Fence, which premiered during last year’s festival circuit, on the immediate horizon, he’s bracing for what might be an even wilder 2026.

After taking a bite of a chocolate cookie (and and then regretting the decision when it, charmingly, gets stuck in his teeth), Blyth is an easy communicator, moving from one conversational thread to a tangent and back with aplomb. We find our conversation returning to People We Meet: He was just in New Orleans and will soon be in Chicago as part of the massive publicity tour that will continue after the holidays, and he’s begun meeting fans of Henry and the book — a process that he’s familiar with from his stint in the Hunger Games universe.

While he has the chops and the looks (the blue eyes in person are that blue, accented by the tiny silver hairs speckled in his dark hair), what Blyth might bring to the table as a future rom-com heartthrob of a wildly popular book is an infectious enthusiasm. In fact, he’s just as big a fan of the novel as any of us. When I mention my love of two of his co-stars Jonsson and Rachel Zegler (with whom he also co-starred in Songbirds & Snakes), he gushes not only their craft but about them as human beings who are like family to him; he declares that Jonsson will be “the godfather to my children” and describes Zegler as his “little sister,” going on to applauding her performance in Evita. (She’s only begun to scratch the surface of her capabilities, he tells me.) As for working with legendary French filmmaker Claire Denis? He insists he would be remiss if he didn’t relay her brilliance to Bustle readers.

The whirlwind of work and press hasn’t allowed for a ton of reflection — mostly accidentally mixing up dates of what’s upcoming, he says self-deprecatingly — but there is one thing on his mind for the future: the chance to do some theater. For now, though, Blyth’s focus is on letting the excitement sweep him into what will certainly be another momentous year.

After the Hunger Games, it seems like you could have gone the Marvel or blockbuster franchise route, but so much of the work you’ve done recently has been with first-time filmmakers. Why did you end up pursuing a different lane?

I mean, first off, I don’t know if Marvel would have just come knocking. I could have definitely gone down a more mainstream route. But the thing is that I never saw myself doing a Hunger Games. It wasn’t where I envisioned myself when I did imagine myself being a working actor. It just kind of happened that way. And I almost didn’t do it. Then I did it, loved it, had an amazing experience, loved what we made. I was proud to be part of that world that is really beloved by people. And that the film actually has something to say about imperialism, propaganda, and dictators.

As we’re slowly slipping into fascism.

I just feel like we’re f*cking living in the Hunger Games right now. But it was an opportunity for me to go and do what I actually always set out to do with great indie films. Shortly after it came out, Luca Guadagnino asked for a meeting because he’d seen it and loved it. He told me he’d seen it three times. We had a couple of meetings that came off the back of that. I’m such a big fan of Luca’s.

Well, hopefully, you’ll work together. That man’s always making movies.

We’ll see what happens. We talked about it. But it was a reminder that on paper, you might think, “That’s some big glossy kind of barnbuster movie,” but people care about those films and can see the work that goes into them. It allowed me to then go back and do the films that I always wanted to do, the kind of films that I grew up on. But every now and again, you also want to do something that is a bit easier and a bit lighter and a bit more joyous. So then you do a rom-com for Netflix!

And why shouldn’t you!

It is the hardest thing I’ve done, I think because I grew up watching drama and loving drama and thinking that was a bastion of art. And then you go and do a rom-com, and you think, “This is going to be easy.” You show up, and it’s not easy. It catches you off guard. I’ve had other actors — rom-com people — say to me, “You have to put in a lot of work to make them feel light and funny.” And I was also playing the straight guy of a comedy duo. So Emily Bader goes all out, and she’s kooky and weird and fun, and I have to anchor the thing and be grouchy.

“We made a really hot sex scene, really genuinely, to the point where the director went, ‘I don’t know if they’ll let me put this in.’”

People are huge fans of Emily Henry’s work, and this is the first adaptation that we’re getting. Is that a bit nerve-wracking?

It’s so funny because I’m not obviously her target audience. Well, first off, I think anything that gets young people into literature and reading is f*cking awesome. And they’re about regular people in today’s world falling in love, and there’s something really beautiful about that. I appreciate the fans because they’re young, enthusiastic, and really intelligent, and they’re all readers. Readers tend to be more empathetic people, generally speaking. I’ve really enjoyed it. I’m always just trying to surprise myself and do something that feels like a challenge.

It’s interesting that playing Alex is a big challenge in terms of what you’ve previously done.

In a way, it’s the least character-y stuff I’ve done. I definitely think I thrive when I’m doing more character work. I like it when I’ve got someone to really push up against. And he is such a normcore boy next door — wears slacks and a button-up and New Balances. I find that I’m usually drawn to the more crunchy roles. So there were moments where I definitely was saying to the director [Brett Haley], “I can’t find the crunch. Where's the crunch?” He’s like, “There’s no crunch, man. It’s a smooth role. His edges are quite smooth.”

How was it working with Emily Bader and creating that chemistry? I texted a friend after watching it and was like, “This movie is going to overwhelm bisexuals.”

Oh my God, she will love that. It’s so fun because she gets to go off the rails and be larger than life, and then I get to counterbalance her. We’re both way more like Poppy, so I found it quite hard at the beginning to play Alex. He thinks of himself one way, and then he gets to loosen up as the film goes on. She’s so amazing and self-deprecating, but I think she’s proved to herself that she can do anything as well.

“I’m usually drawn to the more crunchy roles. There were moments where I was saying to the director, ‘I can’t find the crunch. Where's the crunch?’ He’s like, ‘There’s no crunch, man. It’s a smooth role.’”

Every good rom-com has a “rain scene,” and you got yours in this!

It’s a rom-com staple. That scene was steamy, but there’s an even steamier cut of it that didn’t make it in film because it felt like too much. We made a really hot sex scene, really genuinely, to the point where on the day, Brett went, “I don’t know if they’ll let me put this in, but we’re going to film it, and we can cut around it.”

Can we get the Snyder cut of the sex scene?

They’re going to be like, “Can we get the Brett Haley cut?” I really respected Brett for going there because I was like, “Yeah, let’s do it.” But I’m also like, we put violence on screen so easily, and no one questions it. Why is it that we’re so OK with watching someone get decapitated on screen, but we’re not OK with two people doing what everybody does all the time?

A director told me they had been told that it’s not chic to put sex in film anymore. And I was like, first of all, directors are the people who decide what’s chic and what’s not. The whole point of artists and filmmakers is that they’re supposed to be the tastemakers. And if you commit to it and you make it really good and authentic and beautiful and sexy and not gratuitous, people will come to it. It’s like build it and they will come kind of thing.

Literally.

I love it. Build it, and they will C-U-M.

Sex aside, the understanding and affection between Alex and Poppy makes you root for them. Like when they are talking to each other before they go to sleep on their first trip together — that’s one of the most intimate things possible.

My girlfriend [actor Daniela Norman] and I call it sleepover time. And it’s so nice because especially in today’s world when we’re rushing around and we’re all on our phones all the time, sometimes we have to be like, “Hey, let’s just put our phones away for a few hours.” There’s no better feeling when you lay down to go to sleep and then you realize two hours have passed and you’ve just been doing pillow talk and just laughing. Even if you’ve been with someone for a year or more, it makes you feel that feeling of when you’re a teenager, getting to know someone for the first time.

The parallel I see between People We Meet and The Hunger Games is that they both started a new career chapter for you.

What’s so exciting about this industry and what I feel very lucky to do is you get to have so many firsts. Your first time doing a big blockbuster, your first time doing a gritty indie. First time going to an awards show. You get to keep being surprised. People always say this, but you get to keep going back to that childlike wonder again and again. Which I think we all have to tap into from time to time — to not become bitter and not become shut down by the coldness of the world.

Top image credit: Dior clothing