Thorne shines brightly in role of stricken teen in ‘Midnight Sun’
LOS ANGELES — In “Midnight Sun,” Bella Thorne plays Katie Price, a teen coping with a rare disease as she unexpectedly meets her soulmate.
Katie has an immune disease where the slightest exposure to sunlight is fatal.
Raised indoors, sheltered by a supportive widower dad (comedian Rob Riggle, switching gears), Katie, at 17, goes out at night to play guitar at the train station, where she meets Charlie (Patrick Schwarzenegger), who turns out to be her true love.
“The script is so beautifully written,” said Thorne, 20, who was 10 when her father died.
“I liked Katie’s relationship with her father. I’ve always wanted that and I’ve looked for that type of relationship. And Katie being raised by a single parent, I related to that as well.”
Thorne was seemingly born to act. “Six weeks is when I started modeling. My mother tells me I had something booked” — a magazine cover shoot — “before I was out of the womb.”
A Disney star at 13 in the “Shake It Up” series opposite Zendaya, Thorne supports several charities, communicates with 20 million followers on her multiple social media platforms and has been forthcoming about her childhood sexual abuse and being bullied, dyslexic and bisexual.
With “Midnight Sun,” Thorne does the drama’s heavy lifting — and plays guitar for seven songs.
“Definitely, acting is the thing I’ve wanted to do since I was little and was told, ‘That will never happen because you’re dyslexic.’
“With ‘Midnight Sun,’ I didn’t want to make a movie that is just glorifying this disease. I met Scott (Speer, the director), who was, ‘This is a big component in the movie but it’s not just a movie about a disease or a girl with a disease.’”
Added Speer, “I went after Bella for Katie because I wanted someone who could be completely raw. She has the ability to be unvarnished — if you see her Instagram you’ll understand.
“With Bella, it’s what you see is what you get. Very intuitive.”
Initially, Katie would sing just one song because of Thorne’s reluctance. “I didn’t like singing,” she said. “I’ve never been a singer, I’ve never been a
great singer.”
Speer said she’d canceled five recording sessions.
“Scott is exaggerating,” Thorne said with a smile. “We discussed one song and I got in there and it went so well, we added six or seven more songs. This got me liking singing again.”