Amy Klewitz Beauty

For Darren Criss (Darren Criss), there’s something about live performance that can’t be replicated anywhere else. It’s immediate, unpredictable, and, most importantly, a direct exchange between performer and audience. And for someone obsessed with communication, it perhaps explains why he’s continually drawn back to the stage, even after building a successful, award-winning career in television.

He loves that the stage allows him to make every performance different and subvert expectations in real time. It’s something he describes as “zigging where he’s expected to zag.”

Learn more about the multihyphenate performer, his Tony-winning work as a producer and star of Maybe Happy Ending, his instinct to defy expectations, and what he has planned for his upcoming concert at London’s Royal Albert Hall. Hint: it’s not what you’d expect.

Read the full story in GQ Philippines’ September issue, available today at sarisari.shopping.com, and on newsstands. 

 Darren Criss wears Louis Vuitton, Fendi, Hermès, Gucci, and Tom Ford. 

Story by Chino Rondain Hernandez
 Photographed by David Urbanke
 Styling by JUNGLE LIN
 Grooming by Amy Klewitz Beauty
 Local Production 1 9 9 X
 Produced by Daköta
 On-set Producer Rea Ioannou
 Photo Assistant Sequoyah | NYC Photographer
 Videography by Ken Martell
 Set Designed by Chancey Bridges

“I have an insatiable appetite for communication and everything that means. I happen to be able to communicate through the performing arts,” Darren Criss ( Darren Criss ) tells GQ Philippines. “Why do we communicate? It’s to bring ourselves closer and to have a closer understanding of each other, particularly to people we’ve never met and to strangers we have not communicated with. That is everything to me.”

For Criss, communication takes many forms. In our second September cover story, Chino Rondain Hernandez sits down with the Tony winner to explore the languages that have shaped his career and identity: the language of performance, which has made him a multihyphenate talent across art forms and allows him to connect with global audiences; the language of heritage, as a Filipino American navigating the world stage; and the language of success, and how he has handled and defined it over a 16-year career.

Photographed by David Urbanke 
Styling by JUNGLE LIN 
Grooming by Amy Klewitz Beauty 
Produced by Daköta 
Local Production 1 9 9 X 
On-set Producer Rea Ioannou
Photo Assistant Sequoyah | NYC Photographer 
Videography by Ken Martell 
Set Designed by Chancey Bridges 



Grooming yesterday on the extremely talented Tony nominee .

Grooming & HMU:
PR:
Styling:
Cut:
Tailor:

Such an incredible day grooming Tony nominee and HMU on the lovely . 💜 These people!

PR:
Styling:
Cut:

HMU on the amazing for . Photo by

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