Zac Efron: The Movieline Interview

But they've come to you before, and it hasn't been the right one or the right time?

It hasn't been the right time necessarily, or it's too early. I don't feel that I've earned it quite yet, to be honest. The people that you see them find for superheroes, you go, "Oh yeah, that's great. That guy is perfect, what a great idea." Ryan Reynolds as Green Lantern? You go, "Finally, he's going to do something great! We've been waiting for it, he's done all these other things and now I want to see him as that character."

Or they go and cast someone like Andrew Garfield as Spider-Man, who isn't generally known to a wide audience.

But that's a whole different thing, you know? He's coming in as an unknown. Once you sort of establish yourself...I'm in-between, you know what I mean? Andrew Garfield is going to be amazing in that movie because he's got a brand-new, fresh perspective, and to be thrown into that character so quickly, he's going to be able to redefine that brand in a way that we've never seen before. It'll be amazing. You've sort of seen me before. [Laughs] I don't know. I think you really have to pay your dues once you've been established.

When you say you have to earn it, who do you have to earn it with: the audience, or yourself?

I think for me. I need to have the belief in myself to be able to go and do that. Also, I have a self-awareness of what is out there: Right now, if I was looking at me from someone else's eyes -- like the eyes of the guys who are going to go watch a superhero movie -- I can't say that I'd be "two thumbs up" for me to star in an action movie right now.

Why not?

Why would I be? I haven't done anything to pay those dues yet, I haven't made any movies for those fans yet. I think you have to earn the right to hold a gun. You have to earn the right to shoot web.

Would remaking a movie like the thriller Snabba Cash put you a step closer to that?

You know, maybe. I don't look at movies as an interim to doing something else, but Snabba Cash, I look at that character and I see someone who's driven by a naiveté and a classic class struggle. I see a way into that character that I could believe myself in, and that's few and far between these days. I read scripts, and people tell me, "Matt Damon was going to do this project." And I'm like, "Of course Matt Damon was going to do that project, it's f**kin' crazy! I can't do that." [Laughs]

You're much more self-deprecating than I thought you would be, Zac. You talk about having to learn technique and earn the places you want to go...does it worry you to have to do all that learning in the spotlight?

No, that part's fun, man. The stakes are high, but that's why it's interesting. I'm ready, man. That's the thing: I'm willing to put in that work to get there. I know that given the right time and the right guidance, I can do it, and I'm confident in myself in that way. I'm not shy about that. I know I will be able to do it.

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