Heartstopper’s William Gao stars within the new Laufey music video. (Getty/Dave Benett)
Heartstopper favorite William Gao is an absent lover in a brand new music video from Grammy Award-winning artist Laufey and celebrated South Korean director Celine Track.
Within the video for “Goddess”, Laufey performs a girl let down by a associate who’s permitting the space between them to develop.
Because the music’s lyrics reveal, he’s in love with the glamorous Aphrodite (Laufey) that he’s seen on stage, however is tired of her as an individual once they’re alone.
Actor and musician Gao, finest referred to as Tao Xu in Alice Oseman’s queer drama Heartstopper, performs the aloof lover with ease. In a single scene, the pair start to get intimate as he strips off his t-shirt, however fairly than warmth up, the air between them will get frosty.
Gao will reprise his function in season three of Heartstopper from October, however Laufey advised Selection that she received to know the actor by means of his personal musical endeavours fairly than from the Netflix present.
Gao and his sister, Olivia Hardy, are is in a band collectively.
“I feel he adopted me and numerous my followers have been like, ‘Oh, Will from Heartstopper follows you? And I used to be like: ‘Oh, I didn’t even realise’,” the Icelandic singer-songwriter mentioned.
“I found their band on Spotify sooner or later, and it turned out that we have been on the identical label, so I used to be like: ‘We should hang around’.
“I messaged them once I was in London over a yr in the past, and we frolicked, after which we turned associates.
“Their band is known as Wasia Undertaking and I’m – as they are saying – ‘Wasian’ as nicely, which is half-white and half-Asian, [so] we bonded over these experiences as nicely. They’re half-Chinese language.
“When it got here to discovering anyone for the music video and dealing with Celine, it was fairly vital to me to seek out anyone who additionally had that type of shared background of coming from Asian descent.”
Laufey, whose full title is Laufey Lín Bing Jónsdóttir, additionally revealed that Wasia Undertaking could be supporting her on an upcoming tour.
The five-minute movie is directed by Track, the creator of final yr’s Previous Lives, which was nominated for the BAFTAs, Golden Globes and an Oscar. It’s the primary time she’s lent her abilities to directing a music video.
“Goddess” is the primary single from the deluxe model of Laufey’s album Bewitched, which received the most effective conventional pop vocal album award on the 2024 Grammys.
Followers on-line have known as the brand new video “jaw-dropping” and “haunting”, with one writing: “I can’t cease my tears whereas watching this.”