Sean Faris: Sleepover Girls' Big Crush

Cutie Sean Faris began his career as a model. At one point he was named Junior Model of the Year. The 22-year-old finally packed a car and drove to Hollywood where he landed a part in the blockbuster Pearl Harbor right off the bat! There were some lean times through which his entire family helped Sean out while he dumped modeling and concentrated on acting. TV was where the Cleveland native found his first success. You might have caught him on "One Tree Hill", "Smallville" and "Boston Public".

As Alexa Vega's mega-crush Steve in the summer teen action/romance Sleepover,  Sean has hit leading man status. Alexa has only good things to say about this hottie. "Sean is a very hot guy who is just the sweetest!" He is Alexa's character Julie's first kiss in the film and the two got to "practice" a lot! The tall, brunette actor talked with us in Beverly Hills, about his leading lady (who is 16 to his 22!) and how he got this fun lead role. Check it out....

TeenHollywood: Okay, Alexa has said that your two weeks of rehearsal literally consisted of kissing. Is that true?

Sean: (laughing) Every time  I came to the set, Joe Nussbaum, our director, would pull Alexa aside and pull me aside and send us over to the corner to kiss. He wanted us to be comfortable with each other. That went on about two weeks.

TeenHollywood: Aren't you robbing the cradle? She's 16 and you are 22.

Sean: That's exactly what all the producers were making fun of me and giving me crap for. I turned around and said, 'Well, you guys are the ones paying me to rob the cradle, so what does that say about you?'

TeenHollywood: We've heard and observed that Alexa isn't a diva on set and doesn't expect people to wait on her all the time. True?

Sean: Yeah. I have an understanding as to why people come out the way  they do from working in Hollywood, because it really is like that. They are always handing you anything you want, anything you need, and whenever you're working a lot I can see why when you get to your normal life you might expect the same kind of thing, but that's just not the way it is. On set someone's being paid to run around and do what you want them to do. In life you have to treat everybody with respect.

TeenHollywood: Alexa is pretty good on a skateboard in real life. How about you?

Sean: I've skateboarded all my life growing up, but then I hit a certain age where I just kind of gave it up and started rollerblading a lot. I did a lot of progressive in-line skating in Cleveland because we had some indoor parks.

TeenHollywood: How did you get this leading man job in Sleepover?

Sean: I was in New York City at the time and I was actually hosting  an award show. We found out about the script and wondered, 'Why don't we get in on this?' So we rushed back here and I took an audition on it and luckily enough things worked out. It's been a great opportunity for me. It's giving me a younger fan base. I get a chance to gain a little bit from the fan base that Alexa's already built up and it was great, because a major studio signed off on me, and ever since I've worked the entire year straight!

TeenHollywood: So Sleepover was a real launching pad for you?

Sean: Yeah, and now I've got a new show coming on. It's a new show on ABC called "Life as We Know It". It's a one hour drama and it's from the same writer as "Freaks and Geeks". It's very real, very good, and it will definitely be one of the hot shows of the new season. It's set in present day Seattle.

TeenHollywood: So we're going to be seeing a lot of you. Are you ready for possible heartthrob status?

Sean: You know, if it happens and people respond well to it, so be it. It's good because it gets my name out there and it helps me to have people know who I am, so that next time I go into the office (to try out for a role) it gives me that much more of an edge.

TeenHollywood: Okay, lets hear this from a guy's perspective. What are the five most important things a girl needs if she's going to plan a sleepover?

Sean: Toilet paper, a backpack, shaving cream, pizza and beer ... but I don't want to go there, this is a PG movie.

TeenHollywood: Any special sleepover memory in your real life?

Sean: Yeah, it was my 13th birthday party and my mom took us to the store and we   bought a big old 24 pack of Quilted Northern and we went back home, stuffed our backpacks full and about 1 a.m. we went out and TP'd about half the neighborhood. We got to a cul-de-sac and here comes a cop car, and here comes three more cop cars behind him. And we bolted and three or four of us got away, and the other ten got caught. So we ran home, I made it back and one of my best friends made it back, and we're climbing up to the back of the balcony trying to get into the house and I get halfway up and all of a sudden (makes police siren sound), the four cop cars pulled up in front of our house.

TeenHollywood: Your friends ratted you out?

Sean: Well, they were staying at my house. They're not about to tell them that they're going home to their houses. Their parents would have killed them! My mom was cool, she didn't tell anybody's parents or anything.

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Lynn Barker is a Hollywood-based entertainment journalist and produced screenwriter.