DIVERGENT Stars Christian Madsen And Ben Lloyd-Hughes Walk The Red Carpet At St. Louis Screening

Even though the people that occupy the future-set world of Veronica Roth’s novel are separated into different factions with different characteristics, all of the people at the Ronnie’s 20 Cine in St. Louis Tuesday night were clearly all gathered for the same thing: DIVERGENT. The young adult series that has spawned three books and a legion of fans is making its way into theaters with the film DIVERGENT on March 21.

Fans of all ages came out to see two of the actors from the film for a red carpet premiere Tuesday night in St. Louis. Some of these fans were even lucky enough to be the first to see the highly-anticipated film.

Christian Madsen who plays Al and Ben Lloyd-Hughes who plays Will received a warm reception from fans who waited hours to meet the stars behind their literary heroes. Groups of young girls squealed with excitement when the two handsome actors made their way down the red carpet – meeting fans, taking photos, and signing books and movie posters. We Are Movie Geeks was there to talk to the duo about the upcoming film. Read below what they had to say about DIVERGENT.

Outside of becoming familiar with the source material, what other sort of training or preparation did you do both mentally or physically for the role?

Ben Lloyd-Hughes:

We had two or three weeks of physical training. We had a boot-camp and rehearsals with the director as well. What was great was that we could sweat together and feel the pain of training together. We got into the group effect where we had to look out for each other and we became as strong as only our weakest component.

Christian Madsen:

We did about two weeks of stunt training with the cast. It was sort of this Muay Thai fight style. Other than that, I read some books. I read MAN’S SEARCH FOR MEANING. It’s super heady but I wanted to sort of evoke this idea of staying happy in this terrible environment. I also read A FIGHTER’S HEART by Sam Sheridan which is about this guy who just picks up and goes to learn all these different fighting styles. He goes to Thailand to learn Muay Thai. He goes to Brazil to learn jiu jitsu. So I wanted to put myself into what he was thinking.

Ben Lloyd-Hughes

What was the one thing about the film that made you want to take on the project?

Ben Lloyd-Hughes:

I would say it’s the idea of choosing your future as a young person. It’s such a brilliant metaphor that was created in the book. There’s something so appealing about that world where you can choose who you want to be.

Christian Madsen:

I mean . . . I was being evicted at the time, so it helped me to stay in that apartment and stay in LA. But really, this is a dream of mine, to be an actor and . . . it was fading. So this was a light at the end of the tunnel. It had been dark for awhile. It was nice to have this dream be a reality. This is it.

Christian Madsen

Are you more nervous to hear what fans of the books have to say about the film or people who aren’t as familiar with these characters and this universe?

Ben Lloyd-Hughes:

I’m more nervous about the die-hard fans because the people that aren’t familiar don’t have images already in their heads of who these characters are or who they want them to be. I luckily haven’t read too much online about who they’d rather cast. I’m hoping they won’t be disappointed and hopefully they’ll be pleased.

Christian Madsen:

I’m not nervous with fans as much because Veronica (Roth) was on-set the whole time. I know we did a good job telling the story from the book. For the non-fans, I just hope they understand that this is a book about growing-up. This is a book about getting over hurdles. This is a female’s journey in the story, but I can connect with what she’s going through. I’ve been through stuff like this in high-school. For me, Al (the character) was the one I connected with the most. I sort of grew-up since then (high-school), I’m taller and bigger but I didn’t take the sports route. I decided to do theater instead. So yeah . . . there’s a lot of elements to the story I connect with.

On-hand for the festivities was former St. Louis Cardinal Jack Clark and writer Ridley Pearson. One of Pearson’s works is about to open in St. Louis at the Peabody Opera House this Friday.

PETER AND THE STARCATCHER is a Tony award winning stage adaptation of a novel that Pearson wrote along with Dave Barry. He spoke with me about his love of the play and how “it feels like the book.”

He went on to claim, “I’ve seen the show 26 times but I will be there Friday night!”

Ridley Pearson with his daughters.

The red carpet St. Louis premiere was capped off with a packed-house screening of DIVERGENT. Look for the official We Are Movie Geeks review of the film in a few weeks. For now, I will say that judging by many responses after the film, it sounds like the film may have enlisted quite a few new recruits to DIVERGENT’s fan-base.

DIVERGENT is the first installment in the Divergent Trilogy, which were the top three best-selling books of 2013 according to USA Today.

The story is set within a future world where people are divided into distinct factions based on their personalities, and Tris Prior, played by Shailene Woodley, is warned she is Divergent and will never fit into any one group.  When she discovers a conspiracy to destroy all Divergents, she must find out what makes being Divergent so dangerous before it’s too late.

DIVERGENT is directed by Neil Burger from a screenplay by Evan Daugherty and Vanessa Taylor, based on the novel by Veronica Roth.  The film stars Shailene Woodley, Theo James, Ashley Judd, Jai Cortney, Ray Stevenson, Zoe Kravitz, Miles Teller, Tony Goldwyn, Ansel Elgort, Maggie Q, Mekhi Phifer, and Kate Winslet.

DIVERGENT OPENS IN THEATERS & IMAX MARCH 21, 2014

For more updates on DIVERGENT:

Official Site: http://DivergentTheMovie.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Divergent
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Divergent
Instagram: http://instagram.com/Divergent
Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/Divergent/
Google+: https://google.com/+Divergent