Luther Ford’s start in this industry began with a teasing dare from his relatives.

The Londoner was already an admirer of the craft. He was studying film editing at a university in Bournemouth, on the U.K.’s south coast, but had never dreamed of being in front of the camera. Until four years ago, when a small Netflix series called The Crown — you might have heard of it — launched a country-wide casting call for the role of an adolescent Prince Harry.

“I did [it] as a joke,” Ford says through giggles to The Hollywood Reporter. “My brother’s wife sent it to me like, ‘You’re ginger. Get out there.’ And then I got the part.” Three weeks after that self-mocking self-tape, a Mercedes-Benz was waiting outside one of Bournemouth’s student accommodation blocks. Ford, with nothing but a well-timed resemblance to the redheaded royal, was due on set.

“The Crown was scary,” the 26-year-old recalls. “That’s a hard place to start because you’re literally learning while you’re doing it. It was so visible.” And yet, without any formal acting training, Ford’s taken that high-exposure Netflix credit and run with it. He secured an agent and landed supporting roles in 2024’s Keira Knightley-starring spy thriller Black Doves and last year’s historical miniseries King & Conqueror. And now, the young actor has pulled off a feat that will almost certainly render his university peers speechless: Ford is making his feature film debut in Ira Sachs’ heartrending, musical drama The Man I Love. “This film definitely feels like the first time I understood the creativity of acting,” he ponders. “[And] it’s definitely the pinnacle of being in a film, for me. There’s nothing more I would like to be a part of than a film like this.”

To have reached one’s career pinnacle within just five projects is, the newcomer concedes, a real blessing. It began with an audition that Ford nearly passed on — his impressive run of form has come with plenty of rejections, too — and a Sachs movie, he felt, was bound to be a real dogfight. Soon, Ford was face-to-face with the American filmmaker, a recent rewatch of Passages in his back pocket. “We spoke for two hours,” he says. “Talking about films, my local cinemas. And then [Sachs] was like, ‘What do you think about the film?’ We had a nice conversation about that. Halfway through, he was just like, very casually, ‘So, yeah, I’d love you to do it.’ He’s never seen anything I’ve done to this day.”

The Man I Love stars Ford as Vincent, a young British bachelor who’s moved into the same building as the popular, charismatic performer Jimmy George (Rami Malek) and his partner, the stoic, elusive Dennis (Tom Sturridge). Backdropped by New York’s ’80s AIDS crisis, the film sees Ford’s character develop a painstaking infatuation with Jimmy, despite the latter’s declining health. Sachs, in fine form, comes to the Croisette with a feature that asks his audience to peer into the space between life and death, and contemplate the sanctity of art in doing so.

Ford, in his first interview about the film, is still formulating his thoughts on it. “For Vincent, it isn’t a coming out story. He’s not someone who’s discovering that he’s gay, but he is discovering love — his version of love — which I think is really interestingly contrasted with Dennis’ version,” he says. “We always talked about him like he would have been from the suburbs of London. Maybe he’s never really left home, and is coming to New York for experience. He finds this person who maybe represents something so different, which is so exciting to him … It becomes this obsession where it’s almost like he wants to consume [Jimmy], and prove to him that his love is bigger than the stakes of death.”

The shoot took place last summer on location, Ford awed by colleagues Malek, Sturridge, Rebecca Hall and Ebon Moss-Bachrach. “That is kind of my favorite thing about the film,” he tells THR. “My first thought watching it was like, ‘Fuck, [Malek]’s really so good.’ Everyone is really good.”

Admittedly, Ford himself was a little shy among such seasoned players. His closest relationship was with Sachs, and securing the director’s trust was a buoying experience. Thus far, even with a Cannes photocall next to Rami Malek and Ira Sachs imminent, Ford has taken a lot of comfort from his unconventional showbiz start. “Being naive is really quite good, because you actually don’t understand how hard the industry is,” he says. “At times, you need to be fairly guarded and cynical to enjoy it. It’s very hard to feel a sense of security until you’re extremely successful,” he adds with a smile. “It’s such a psychological job.”

One thing’s for sure: This is absolutely his job now. He’s got a TV show in the works that he can’t talk about yet, but that’s a conversation for another time — here, in Cannes, Luther Ford has already peaked. “It looks deeply glamorous. It looks chaotic,” the Gen Z star says about what to expect from his first major film festival. And then, suddenly, all royal etiquette goes out the window: “I’ve been looking at pictures of the [Louis Lumière Auditorium]. It’s fucking huge!”