Matthew Gray Gubler for BELLO Mag
At approximately 4:45PM, on another predictable sunny day in Los Angeles, I get an unpredicted call -- it's Matthew Gray Gubler's publicist asking me if I was able to start our interview earlier. An interview that was to take place 15 minutes into the future. She informed me that Matthew had gotten off of work early and thought to call and check if an earlier start was possible. Having a hectic day already, I appreciated the gesture, and although I declined to start earlier than scheduled, I knew right off the bat I already liked this guy. He was thoughtful and prompt. No, more than prompt, he was early-- and one being should never say anything less than positive about a person who's early, rather than late. Having heard stories of what fun company he was a couple days back at his cover shoot, I was excited for the chance to have a conversation with Matthew, or as most of America knows him 'Criminal Minds' very own, Dr. Spencer Reid. When he greets me, he does so with a long and loud "hello"-- as if we had met. As if he was excited. Naturally, those two exact feelings materialized, whether they were true or not. I was excited, and thanks to him, I felt like we'd spoken before. The actor who has an online presence, close to that of Ashton Kutcher's, is very active on twitter, as well as other platforms like, Whosay and tumblr. He even has his own website. Not the kind where you'll find his resume and the latest shots of him caught off-guard while getting coffee. Instead his site, like very much his life, is another vessel and stage for entertaining. "I don't do anything out of necessity," explains Gubler. "I only operate out of what's fun. It's great and it's wonderful to have these platforms. Being an entertainer is kind of strange because in a weird way, someone's listening or paying attention to what I'm putting out there. I don't have to wait for a TV show or a movie, or any project to put myself out there. I get to hopefully make people smile, every hour if I wanted to."
Gubler's tweets generate an average of over 2,000 retweets, and favorites per tweet. With a twitter following racking up to over 500k, it's not hard to imagine how quickly the numbers rise once he puts something out into the world.
His website, Gubler Land is equipped with music videos, short films, pieces of writing, and also showcases a lot of his art-- almost unexplainable but undoubtedly cool images he likes to describe as "Friendly Faces." Like a true artist, he tells me his drawings are simply things that he's made and that he's proud of. Nothing more to it. His paintings range from that for a woman to a fictional animal playing a piano. There's even one of him and a drawn out version of himself directly next to him, naturally the doppelganger's arm a propped on Matthew's shoulders. "When I started acting early on, I noticed there was a lot of down time. Being stuck in this plane where you're being told you have no time, but really having a lot of time. It was something I could always be working on, and I sort of let my mind wander on that," he explains. "The future is amazing. I'm so happy to be making stuff in this day and age. You're lucky to have one follower, and to have someone be interested or entertained in what you do. All I want to do is entertain people," he says with the upmost sincerity. Although he expresses having had his art showcased multiple times in galleries, and humbly succeeding, his first thought isn't to organize a viewing. "I'm lucky to have a wonderful Internet presence. So when those people like my work, that makes me really happy." With Matthew, he's one of those people that it's not so much about what he says, but how he says it. Or better yet his actions. Having said that, when he does have something to say, you'd be a fool not to listen. However, he's not spitting out murder theories or mathematical equations or lab formulas like his TV counterpart.
"Spencer, in a weird way, is the reversed of me. He's very brilliant when it comes to science and facts. In real life, I don't know if I'd be able to hold a conversation with him," jokes Gubler.
Born in Las Vegas, Nevada, life would take Gubler east to New York to study at New York University's Tish School before he came back west to Los Angeles, ultimately falling into his niche. Four years later, he would graduate with a degree in film directing from the prestigious university.
"I always loved acting. I grew up in Las Vegas, and that's sort of the entertainment capital of the world, and I wanted to be a magician for most of my young life," he laughs at the irony. Yet, Gubler somehow possesses that of a magician. The playfulness of one most of all. He continued, "I love acting, but I felt this sort of cowardliness. You're an actor sort of waiting around for people to tell you that you can do something. That's kind of the reason I started making my own movies when I was younger. I could control the movies, I could do whatever I wanted. I always loved acting, but you kind of tend to pursue the things that you have more control over, and then luckily it went back to acting. It's been a real tremendous voyage." With a number of projects under his belt, and over 100 episodes of Criminal Minds alone, he's doing quite well for himself, never letting it jade his personality though. "I don't understand why I do it and how I do it, but I love doing it. And I'm thoroughly infused in it, like, my blood and everything," he says referring to the meaning and creation behind all the art forms he takes part in.
At 33 years old, Matthew Gray Gubler's energy is almost radioactive. And at the end of the day, he's a little mad-- all the best ones are. But most of all, he's too dimensional to be explained on paper.
Source: BELLO Mag
HQ Images via ToyBoxBoy@Tumblr