Glen Powell doesn’t quite understand internet lingo.
The Anyone But You actor, 35, and his costar Sydney Sweeney sat down to review some “thirst tweets” written about themselves, proving that Powell has a long way to go when it comes to learning Gen Z slang. In an installment of Buzzfeed’s viral interview series published on Tuesday, December 19, the rom-com leads took turns reading “thirsty” tweets targeted at them — one of which caused significant confusion for Powell.
After reading a tweet that said, “Sydney Sweeney is mother,” Sweeney, 26, turned to Powell and asked, “Do you know what that means?”
Powell expressed confusion, leading the Euphoria actress to try to explain by giving other examples like, “Taylor Swift is mom … Beyoncé is always mothering.”
“I still don’t get it,” Powell replied. “‘Mothering,’ like, are you maternal? Or are you ‘mom’ like queen?”
“It’s similar to queen,” Sweeney said.
Powell, still confused, asked, “Why don’t you say queen?’ to which Sweeney replied simply, “Because we say mother now.”
The Top Gun: Maverick actor still couldn’t fully grasp the concept and jokingly attributed the term to “psychological s-–t we need to break down.”
“I don’t know why Sydney Sweeney is mother,” he added. “You would make a great mother, but you are not mother.”
At the end of the video, Powell reflected on the tweets he and Sweeney reviewed and noted that “the mother one is still throwing me.” Sweeney said that the internet might label him “daddy.”
“Am I daddy?” Powell asked.
“Do you wanna be daddy?” Sweeney replied.
“I could be daddy,” Powell answered with a laugh.
Fans in the video’s comments are loving the hilarious moment between costars. “Sydney explaining ‘mother’ is a perfect representation of me (gen z) talking to my millennial friends,” one wrote. “Syd explaining ‘Mother’ to Glen is everything,” said another.
In Anyone But You, which lands in theaters on Friday, December 22, Powell and Sweeney play two exes who pretend to be dating in order to make it through a destination wedding held in Australia.
Powell and Sweeney’s obvious chemistry throughout the film’s press tour swiftly sparked dating rumors, which they have denied. On a Today show appearance earlier this month, host Hoda Kotb asked the costars if there was “a little romance” between them, despite the fact that Sweeney has been engaged to Jonathan Davino since 2022. During the filming of the rom-com, Powell was dating Gigi Paris. Powell and Paris have since split.
“No, no, but we do love each other,” Powell told Kotb. “Honestly, this is one of the most spectacular humans I’ve ever met. She’s really incredible.”
In an interview with Entertainment Tonight, the actor explained that the costars merely have great chemistry, but added that Sweeney was “very easy to pretend [to] fall in love with.”
“A great rom-com doesn’t survive without great chemistry, and Sydney is the easiest person to have chemistry with,” he told the outlet. “I mean, immediately, it was like we’d known each other forever, and I think anybody that’s been on the set realizes I never get tired of talking to Sydney.”