Here's why Hollywood is in love Julian Dennison

After our interview, he picks my digital recorder up off the floor where it's sitting beside his chair and hands it back to me. It's the first time a Hollywood star has ever done this.

Because, yes. Dennison is now a Hollywood star. But you don't have to take my word for it. Instead take the words of his Deadpool 2 co-star, Ryan Reynolds!

"I fell in love with him from Hunt for the Wilderpeople," Reynolds says. "We didn't read anyone else and we didn't see anyone else. It was Julian right from the get-go."

In the movie, Dennison stars as Russell Collins, a young superhero who goes by the alter ego Firefist.

"Julian is such a gifted actor," Reynolds says. "What he brings to the table, I mean, raw, unfiltered innocence. And a really oddly complex sense of humour, Julian is a sniper. He's a special kid."

Julian said: "It was really cool because they took the time to look into the haka, especially Ka Mate, the one that the All Blacks do," he grins. "They really wanted to inspire it from that. The haka is this war dance that's supposed to bring rage and energy and mana and power. So it was really cool that they based it off that. Being a Māori actor on the global stage, it was really cool representing it."

The other thing he was stoked about was "being able to keep my accent" and while New Zealand gets a shout-out in the film it's never explained why this Māori kid is such a long, long way from home.

"Oh yeah, eh!," he grins "Could be a solo film? Maybe an origin story... Nah, it was really cool because Ryan has actually been to New Zealand before. He told me that he's been to New Zealand once before and he was like at university or high school and he came to play rugby. And he got smashed."

Then laughing loudly he says, "I think he found acting after that."

This article was first published on nzherald.co.nz and is republished here with permission.