Review / interview in USA week-end

Garrett Hedlund : "Georgia Rule" actor holds his own with a payload of female star power. By Kevin Maynard

With only five movies under his belt, Garrett Hedlund, 22, confesses that he'd like to be a household name -- but not as an actor, the reason he's here today. He plays Lindsay Lohan's hunky love interest in the new movie "Georgia Rule."

His dream involves music. "If there's one thing I want to accomplish it's to record a song with Eddie Vedder from Pearl Jam," Hedlund says, over a cup of black coffee at a cafe off Sunset Boulevard. "And the crowds would go wild. It's my mom's fault. She gave me a karaoke machine when I was in seventh grade."

Although the Minnesota-bred, 6-foot-tall, blue-eyed blond already has inspired fan websites with names like Being Garrett Hedlund and Garrett Hedlund Addiction, he goes unrecognized during our interview. With a stack of books at his side, he looks like any other coffee lover, albeit a hunky Hollywood one.

Not that there's anything lazy about him. In just three meteoric years, Hedlund has kept busy onscreen -- from getting crushed on the football field ("Friday Night Lights") to slaying dragons ("Eragon") to dying twice in the midst of battle ("Troy," "Four Brothers"). Still, none of those tasks was as daunting as his latest challenge: being seduced by Lohan in the season's biggest estrogen-fest, "Georgia Rule." "I said to the director, Garry [Marshall], at the beginning, 'Look, I've done three films with a lot of guys,' " says Hedlund, who plays Harlan, a virginal ranch hand. " 'And now I finally get a chance to do a film with three beautiful women, and I gotta play a Mormon?!' "

Ever since filming started last summer, production on the comedy-drama was plagued with controversy. Morgan Creek Productions CEO James G. Robinson released a letter to the media calling Lohan "irresponsible and unprofessional" and a "spoiled child" when she failed to show up on the set. And then there was the sex scene between the two young lovers that takes place on a dinghy, making this Lohan's first starring vehicle to get an "R" rating.

As if this kind of steamy stuff isn't difficult enough to simulate, Hedlund really had his work cut out for him when he discovered it wasn't a closed set. "We were filming in a public park," he says. "So the paparazzi were in the bushes snapping pictures of everything."

Lohan calls Hedlund "a gentleman and a very sweet person," but director Marshall sums it up a lot better: "I knew they'd be great together onscreen because they are total opposites. For Lindsay, it's life in the fast lane. For Garrett, it's not."

Why he's on our radar

Why we think he's an up-and-comer: The lanky heartbreaker steals scenes from three generations of leading ladies in "Georgia Rule:" Lindsay Lohan, Felicity Huffman and Oscar winner Jane Fonda.

He's not just a hunk: Even with a short résumé -- just five movies-- Hedlund disappears into each role like a true chameleon character actor, from the tortured tailback in "Friday Night Lights" to a blood-lusting son of a dragon slayer in "Eragon."

Biggest claim to fame: His debut role as the slain innocent Patroclus, cousin to Brad Pitt's Achilles in the sword-and-sandals epic "Troy" (2004). "It was awesome," he recalls. "It was my first movie, and it was a nine-month gig. Brad really took me under his wing. He'd give me great tidbits of advice like, 'Be proud of the product no matter what it is.' "

Next up: Hedlund plays his first bad guy, who stalks Kevin Bacon's family, in Death Sentence, due in September. He's virtually unrecognizable, heavyset with a shaved head and tattoos. Gaining weight was easy, he says. "We were filming in South Carolina. They've got a lot of good fried foods." -- K.M.