Jordan Gonzalez is walking the walk

Jordan Gonzalez is dialling in from Santa Barbara, where he’s supporting a friend’s film screening. From the moment he joins the call, dressed casually in a white t-shirt ready for an afternoon at the beach, he’s all smiles and laidback introductions, a quiet confidence that easily translates through the screen. It’s been three years since the LAbased actor’s first mainstream role in Pretty Little Liars: Origins; now, he’s making the leap into film as Harkness in the adaption of Stephen King’s The Long Walk. Whether it’s a high school classroom or King’s commentary on the Vietnam War, Gonzalez has brought a hopefulness to each of his roles, built on considered research and a love for the industry that infuses his every word.

It’s an industry that, growing up, Gonzalez never imagined he’d enter. “I dropped out of college my senior year,” he says. “I was playing soccer in college, I had a scholarship and I wasn’t happy.” With his mum’s blessing, he packed up his car and chased a girl to California. “That did not work out, surprisingly,” he laughs. “Of course it didn’t.” While living in his car, Gonzalez worked a series of jobs until a group of actors he’d befriended suggested he try his hand at acting. “I was like, Why would I ever want to do that? Those people never make it.” Despite his hesitance, Jordan booked his first gig with short film Meta in 2020 and hasn’t looked back since.

The day before we speak, the red band trailer has just dropped, introducing Harkness to the world. As fifty boys bet their lives that they can outlast all of the other contestants for the chance to escape from poverty, Harkness sets out to document the walk, hoping to build something of a legacy through his writing. “The thing that made me most excited about it all,” Gonzalez explains, “is all of the fans who were commenting on it and were excited about how accurate my Harkness was. When you do an adaptation of such an incredible novel, whose characters have lived in fans’ heads a certain way for years, you want to make sure it’s as close to the original version of that person [as possible].”

But, given the large number of contestants in The Long Walk, not every character is covered equally. This meant Jordan had to deepen and expand on the material King had provided to get to the heart of Harkness. “I had to think, Okay, this is who he is from what I’m reading,” Gonzalez recalls. “This is his essence; his naivety and his excitement and his journalism.” He laughs. “It’s a scary thing to do, man. You’re not just creating this person out of who you think they are as an artist — the template already exists. You can really piss off some fans if you don’t take good care of that.”

Interestingly, though, the actor originally read for the part of Olsen. But when he got the call saying director Francis Lawrence loved the tape and wanted him to audition for Harkness instead, he had to start preparing from scratch. “I went outside in the morning, afternoon and at night,” he says. “I saw how the different temperatures would affect me, how the lighting would affect me — and then thinking about his cadence of speaking, coming up with where he was from.” Aside from the physical aspects, Gonzalez also had to delve into the character’s psyche. “I think he always knew in the back of his head that he’s not the strongest,” he says. “He doesn’t have a lot of friends in the walk. He wants to have a lot of friends, but he doesn’t. For me, the heart of him was his book — it told me he might know in his heart of hearts he won’t make it, but he’ll leave something behind. I immediately fell in love with him.”

Welcomed into a large warehouse for his fitting, the actor was given free range to dress his character from a selection of clothing evoking the style of the 1950s. The prop shop brought the actors even closer to their characters, inviting them to pick from around a dozen tables’ worth of antique mementos that would accompany the men on their walk. When Gonzalez took his stroll down to the prop tables, the choice was obvious. “For me, it was picking out the navy notebook [and] the contraband knife that he has to sharpen his World War II pencils — because the need and the want to create the book is greater than the actual risk of having the knife.” These small touches — like the yellow Winnipeg flower Gonzalez chose to tuck into his jacket to mirror Harkness’ gradual decline — are only visible for a few seconds. But it’s clear that, for him, every possible decision was made to develop Harkness into a character both he and audiences would mourn the loss of. The poignancy of this intensive preparation comes to a head as audiences watch Harkness meet his end. The miles have already taken many lives, and the introduction of an incline proves a breaking point for many. “Francis said to [co-star] Ben [Wang] and I, The hill is what breaks the both of you,” Gonzalez recalls. As boys are shot en masse up the hill, Gonzalez repeated the names and numbers of those who fell while filming out loud, believing that Harkness would continue to document the walk to the bitter end. “All these gunshots are going off. I turn, and I think they’re going to shoot me. That’s when I roll my ankle.”

The effects for Harkness’ death are among the most horrific in the film. Keeping up with the mandated three-miles-per-hour pace, Harkness walks until his foot is nothing but a bloodied stump. “It’s really incredible to me that the kid could do that,” the actor says. “[But] that’s any of us, if we’re in a situation like that. How bad do you want to live when your foot is hanging off? We’re capable of so many incredible things that we’re not even aware of, when push comes to shove.”

While most of the film was shot chronologically, demanding both physical and mental exertion from the actors, Harkness’ death scene was an exception. “They were shooting the day after my death before my death, so I came onto set to hang out with everyone,” Gonzalez recalls. “Nico [Nicolas Lepage, the production designer] said, We’re going to go up [to the hill] — do you want to come, or do you want to wait to see it? I said, I’ll come up now.” He fondly describes the walk he and Lepage took, tracing the steps of his character’s death in a pseudo-pilgrimage before they would be captured on film.

“[The view from the hill] is nothing but town — which is the most town you see in the whole film until the end,” Gonzalez says. Throughout The Long Walk, there’s little sign of civilisation aside from those who set up chairs or stand in their doorways to watch the boys walk the road through barren fields. The hope of returning home is something they all clutch onto — but for Harkness, a journey ‘home’ means a more final destination. Even now, reflecting on it, Gonzalez disappears back onto that hillside walk. He puts on an affected cry, but even through the kidding, Harkness’ death clearly still weighs on the actor. But all of a sudden, Jordan laughs and the emotional weight shifts, “Fuck, I’m sorry. I forgot your question.”

The Long Walk is, perhaps, unique in the strength of the bonds it built between its cast. Shooting the film largely in chronological order meant the team walked twenty miles a day, every day, together. It also meant the friendships formed between the actors, stunt guys and crew met a similarly abrupt end to their onscreen counterparts. “We start off with this big group of fifty and then as the days goes on it shrinks and you don’t even get to say bye to some of those kids,” Gonzalez says. More and more characters are euphemistically ‘ticketed’ (shot as they fail to keep at the mandatory pace). “When I got my ticket, those are emotions of mine that I didn’t have to pull out of anywhere but that moment,” the actor says. “I wasn’t pulling those tears from anywhere. That was because I had to say bye to all these people.”

For Gonzalez, The Long Walk is going to be a tough act to follow. “I always joke and say it’s all downhill from here,” he jests. After such an intensive shoot, the actor’s enjoying a break — but he does hint at plans for later in the year. And, for now, there’s only one thing on his mind: namely, celebrating his debut film in style. “They just put up our character posters all around LA, so I’m literally driving back to go take a photo with myself,” he laughs. “My mom said, When it’s finished, can you take that? I was like, Mom, I don’t think we need a twelve-foot poster of myself in my apartment.”

With one film under his belt and another mystery project in the works, I ask Gonzalez when he’ll feel as though he’s made it. “I feel that way every time I book a job,” he says. “It happened when I booked PLL and then The Long Walk came around. Right now it feels like it. I think the term ‘make it’ for me is not necessarily being a star — it’s the blessing of getting to create art and then the reward of people enjoying it. That’s the payout for me.” He chuckles. “And of course, driving down the street and seeing your poster on the side of the road. That’s cool.”