Justin Timberlake drew from ‘experiences being a dad’ for his role in ‘Palmer’

Ahead of the release of his new movie, Palmer,  Justin Timberlake  is letting us in on how he prepared for the unique role.

“I think even with generations before me I thought of my grandfather I thought of my father, I thought of my experiences being a dad as well and they definitely, there was a lot in the tank to draw from,” he said during an interview on The TODAY Show.

JT is a father to a 5-year-old son, Silas Randall Timberlake, with his wife of 8 years,  Jessica Biel .

In the film, he stars alongside newcomer Ryder Allen, 8, who joined the singer on TODAY to talk about the making of the film.

“We tested a big group of young actors and I remember from the first moment that Fisher Stevens, [the] director, and myself, within about two minutes of testing Ryder there was just so much soul and something that just came out of this young boy,” Timberlake shared. “Ryder and I have a lot of inside jokes and we created a real bond and it was a really special experience, for everyone, all the actors were fantastic and I feel like Ryder is my little buddy right there.”

Funnily enough, even though the 8-year-old is the one new to the acting game, he wasn’t very impressed with Timberlake’s stardom--because he didn’t even know how famous he is. 

“Actually, at first, I had no idea who Justin Timberlake was,” he said Wednesday on TODAY, drawing laughs from the room. Timberlake replied, joking, “You’re aging me.”

Luckily, they ended up really hitting it off.

“It was amazing working with Justin, I think, obviously, one of the best parts about working with Justin is the experience that I got with him,” he said. “All the notes, all the jokes, all the, just experience, including, I think which is a day-to-day friendship between us. So, really great time filming with him, still great time, even seeing him, so he’s my best friend, best movie friend.”

Elsewhere in the interview, after his thoughts surrounding fatherhood and his new film, Timberlake also spoke about what it was like performing at the inauguration event called Celebrating America.

“Between the film and the inauguration, it feels like, hopefully, the theme of 2021 is redemption,” he explained. “I am very excited, there is a song that I wrote with a new artist who was just nominated for a Grammy, Ant Clements, we wrote a song called ‘Better Days’ and we are gonna be performing it at the inauguration.”

 Palmer   premieres January 29 on Apple TV+.