February 22, 2022

Nico Hiraga | Anytime Will Do, Provided We Can See the Light

by Bree Castillo

**ONITSUKA TIGER** shirt, shorts, and shoes, **G-SHOCK** watch, **KARO KORU** necklace, and **CARTIER** bracelet.

We go about our days in a reckless blur, always moving from place to place and saying goodbye.Yet sewn into the intricate silence between sentences, in the sliver between two hands—and in that moment when electricity flows through our nerve endings and gives way to movement—we can find stillness. Twenty-four- year-old skateboarder and actor, Nico Hiraga, currently finds himself in a whimsical interlude of space right between silence and movement. For Hiraga, it can’t be easy to stand by, idly waiting for everything he’s worked for in the last couple of years to actualize. He admits, “I’m getting antsy. It’s just a waiting process, which I’m not that good at.”

**CELINE** vest, pants, and shoes and **CARTIER** necklace and bracelet.

Recently, Hiraga starred in the 2021 Netflix high school comedy, Moxie, directed by Amy Poehler, which might have been Gen Z’s first introduction to the 90s feminist punk movement, Riot grrrl. He also stood opposite Vince Vaughn, Ryder McLaughlin, and Aramis Hudson in Illegal Civ’s North Hollywood, and we would certainly be remiss to forget his role as Tanner in Olivia Wilde’s break-through feature, Booksmart, in 2019, where he was never too far from his skateboard. His next ontogenetic adventure comes in the form of Scotty for Hello, Goodbye and Everything In Between, alongside Jordan Fisher, Talia Ryder, and Ayo Edebiri. The independent feature is directed by Michael Lewen, and follows two high school sweethearts’ final night together before they leave for different colleges, figuring out what so many of us have been asked before: to stay or to go?

**GIVENCHY** top, **AMI PARIS** pants, **GIUSEPPE ZANOTTI** shoes, and **G-SHOCK** watch.

For most of us, we only come-of-age once. We realize the world is maybe not our oyster, and that following our dreams never leads us on a direct path—or anywhere close to a direction—and we endure each day as it wears down layer after layer of our naivety. But for Hiraga, a native of San Francisco, he has had the opportunity in his acting career to come-of-age again and again. “I really try and challenge the acting part of it,” he shares on revisiting this important juncture of self-formation, “because that’s what I’m interested in. I want it to be a challenge.”

**ONITSUKA TIGER** jacket, shirt, pants, and shoes and **CARTIER** necklace.

**PRADA** top, pants, and belt, **GIUSEPPE ZANOTTI** shoes, **KARO KORU** necklace, and **CARTIER** bracelet.

Hiraga shares his excitement for what might be next, whether it be another telling of youth or perhaps something different. “I’m so stoked on [my previous roles]. I’m just saying,” he laughs, “what if I was a yakuza boss, you know?” He creates his lists of people, places, and things he has had to become in the hopes that they take on a mimetic approach where his art imitates life, sharing, “Some of the stuff that I’ve been doing is all happy endings, and it’s not like that all the time. I think it’s cool to see both sides of the story, which is what a lot of films are doing these days.”

**AMI PARIS** shirt, **CELINE** pants and belt, **CARTIER** necklace and bracelets, and **PRADA LINEA ROSSA** sunglasses.

Hiraga spent the last days of 2021 filming in Taiwan for the upcoming film, Loveboat, Taipei. In the film, students enlist in a cultural immersion program only to be met with the trials and tribulations of young love (and the entanglements therein) and the wonder of experiencing someplace new. “I think the reason why I said yes to it was because it was an all-Asian cast,” Hiraga says enthusiastically, “and when you come at someone with that headline, it’s like, ‘Oh fuck yeah, I’m in already because there’s not a lot of those.’”

**ALEXANDER MCQUEEN** suit and **CARTIER** necklace.

Hiraga admits that being thousands of miles from home allowed him to become more in touch with his thoughts, creating a new appreciation for an intrinsic thinking, but with an evergreen optimism. “I wrote this poem when I was in quarantine,” he shares, “and in Taiwan, just kind of addressing my anxiety and how sometimes the happiest people can be going through it.” He summarizes, “The world will try to break you down, but just throw a left hook and an upper cut back, and keep it pushing, because there’s light at the end of the tunnel.”

Though the exact contents of the poem may remain something of a mystery (I asked, but our conversation naturally took another direction), I did observe after our exchange that Hiraga had recently added Pink Floyd’s “The Great Gig in the Sky” to his Spotify playlist. This particular song is known to famously whisper, “Any time will do, I don’t mind,” followed by what people say is a lyrical interpretation of death. What prompted him to add such a song to his playlist? Maybe this is what Hiraga’s coming-of-age truly consists of? A knowing that we will all occasionally encounter our minutes in despair, but the melody can and will always change. Maybe all we can do is listen and wait.