Hollywood
How Taylor Swift inspired Penn Badgley
‘You’ star Penn Badgley says that Taylor Swift played a part in his Tik Tok debut.
Penn Badgley says Taylor Swift’s song ‘Anti-Hero’ inspired him to make his TikTok debut.
The actor took to TikTok to post his own version of Taylor Swift’s ‘Anti-Hero’ viral trend. The trend uses Swift’s lyrics, “It’s me, Hi. I’m the problem. It’s me.”
Similar to Swift’s music video for the single, Badgley’s TikTok shows him running through his house, only to answer the door to another version of himself wearing a baseball cap, which is his character Joe Goldberg’s typical costume throughout the series.
Penn Badgley’s ‘You’ Character
Penn Badgley has played Joe Goldberg in the series ‘You’ for four consecutive seasons now. His TikTok pokes fun at Goldberg, who consistently avoids legal trouble throughout the series even though he routinely stalks and murders his love interests.
Part one of Season 4 of the series debuted on Netflix on Friday, with just five episodes released so far. Part two will debut a month later on March 10, with the final five episodes of the series.
In an interview with Rolling Stone, Padgley explains how his viral TikTok came to be.
“I thought for years, ‘I’ll get a TikTok when the time is right,’” Badgley shared. “And then when Taylor’s record came out, it just seemed the song wouldn’t have worked with anybody else. Me. Joe. Anti-Hero. Taylor Swift? It just was the perfect moment.”
He also went into detail about his role on the show: “I wasn’t sure I wanted to play Joe,”
“And so I bring that to it in a way. Joe is always struggling with who he is, and what he’s doing. There’s always like three levels of lies with Joe no matter what’s happening.”
Taylor Swift’s Reaction
Since Badgley’s ‘Anti-Hero’ debut on TikTok, he has since posted seven more short videos, and gathered 22.2 million likes and 2.7 million followers. Swift also commented on his first TikTok with the reply “OMG!!!!”
The ‘Anti-Hero’ Singer herself is also quite active on TikTok. Swift joined the app in August of 2021 and often posts short video clips to promote her new music, award nominations, or just hop on the latest viral trend with her own unique spin.