Zac Efron

In The Iron Claw (2023), Zac Efron's Kevin Von Erich looks built for wrestling and ill-equipped for a conversation with his father. His neck and shoulders fill out a body he seems uncomfortable inhabiting, and Efron keeps his mouth shut long enough for us to notice the frightened boy in it. The physical work is conspicuous, but the performance does not keep asking us to admire it. We rate him most here, where looking strong does nothing to make the character feel secure.

He became a teen idol playing Troy Bolton in High School Musical (2006), but the useful change was the move into adult comedy with Neighbors (2014). Cockiness gives his comic timing something to work on, and he is good at playing the sort of man whose confidence can become a nuisance. The Greatest Showman (2017) put his singing and dancing to work again, so this was no simple progression away from musicals. We would not mistake a departure from musicals for an improvement in itself.

Sean Durkin gives him more to work with in The Iron Claw than the altered physique. Alongside Harris Dickinson, Jeremy Allen White and Stanley Simons, Efron is convincing as one of four brothers who enjoy being together, particularly when they crowd onto a bed too small for them. Lily James's Pam brings a welcome lightness to her scenes with Efron, which the rest of the film could have used more often. These exchanges are a reason to cast him in dramas that allow him some ordinary company, rather than merely another physical challenge.

Durkin's film hurries through grief that needs more time, and Efron cannot make every rushed passage register. We were moved more than we expected by a late scene involving Kevin, because he does so much with his face and only a couple of lines. That feeling also made the earlier haste more frustrating: the actor was capable of reaching us, and the film had too often hurried on. We would happily watch him attempt another part this quiet, preferably in a film less anxious to move on.