Zac Efron's Entertainment Weekly Photoshoot

On plotting his escape from the teen scene by transitioning from poster boy to Oscar contender: “I would love to just sit down and talk with Leonardo DiCaprio and Johnny Depp and pick their brains about their early careers, They do it because they love it, not because they enjoy being famous. You have to have good foresight and be really careful. If you don’t adapt and learn at a very young age, you can really mess up.”

On if he’s seen High School Musical 3: Senior Year: “I hope it’s better than the last one. (panics) I didn’t mean that the way it sounded!”

instead , he dodged leading roles in bombs like Speed Racer and waited until he found the perfect showcase for his specific constellation of talents — in Hairspray. Interestingly enough, the film's director, Adam Shankman, didn't initially think Efron was right for the role of Link Larkin, the swoony, Elvis-coiffed rebel harboring hidden depths. ''I felt he was too aw-shucks Disney,'' says the director, who ultimately cast him after requesting he not smile during his second audition. ''In High School Musical he had been asked to be handsome and energetic, and this role needed to have that sex appeal thing. He had to be de-Disneyfied.'' As it turned out, this slightly less vanilla-flavored version of Efron had girls screaming even louder — and helped drive Hairspray's box office far beyond expectations, to $119 million.

You don't often hear a 20-year-old superstar throwing around terms normally uttered between a couple of suits on the commuter train. But Efron hopes that by taking his job seriously, he'll make audiences take him seriously. Earlier this year, while shooting 17 Again, he worked a whole day on set despite excruciating stomach pains. Everyone joked that he had a bad case of gas and suggested he down some Beano. But Efron suspected something more dire. ''I'm sitting in between takes, just off set, debating whether or not an alien was going to pop out of my stomach,'' says the actor, who was later taken to the hospital with a case of appendicitis that nearly killed him. Even so, he was so worried about delaying the production that he was back at work two days later performing an emotional scene in which he breaks down in tears proclaiming his love for the woman (Leslie Mann) whom the grown-up version of himself had let slip away. ''I was one organ lighter, but I had to get back,'' he says nonchalantly. ''Not only was I putting 17 Again in danger of not finishing, but I was also potentially threatening Me and Orson Welles.''


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