By Trishna Rikhy

Copyright gq

Chatting with Drew Starkey feels easy and familiar—the kind of companionable chit-chat you get when you’re waiting in line for something, or walking somewhere, and using your handful of downtime minutes to FaceTime an old friend and say, “What’s up?”
When the actor and I first met over dinner in New York last October, Starkey was in the midst of a white-hot press tour for Luca Guadagnino’s Queer; when we talk again on a sunny Saturday morning in mid-September, he’s phoning in from Charleston, South Carolina, where he’s spent his summer filming the fifth and final season of the hit Netflix series Outer Banks, which is due out in 2026.
“This is our sixth year doing it, so there’s such a familiarity to it,” Starkey says of the show. “I’m feeling good and sad at the same time.” Predictably, he’s under the iron fist of Netflix NDAs when it comes to spoilers, and can’t share much about the end of OBX. He can, however, dish on everything else that’s been keeping him busy this summer: spending time with family, sharpening his (already quite refined) music taste with some early David Bowie and the latest Turnstile, and joining the YSL Beauty family as a new campaign star—alongside NBA MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander—for the label’s latest fragrance, MYSLF Absolu.
While on break from filming in the fictionally danger-ridden marshes of the Outer Banks, Starkey chatted with GQ about the end of the OBX era, the album that defined Starkey’s summer, his kismet connection to YSL Beauty, and what’s next on his roster.

GQ: Drew, I’m so glad to be talking to you today.
Drew Starkey: How are you? It’s good to hear you again.
Yeah, yeah. It’s been a while—it was last October when we got dinner. How has your year been?
Oh, my year’s been so fast. It’s crazy how quickly it’s gone, but it’s also been very…event-filled. I’ve been busy, but it’s been a healthy balance for sure.
Where am I catching you from today, by the way?
I’m in the good state of South Carolina. I’m down in Charleston. I’ve been in Charleston since about June, and we’ll be here for another month. We’re right in the middle of filming the last season of Outer Banks, so, yeah, I’m in Charleston. And Charleston feels like a second home in a way. It’s such a happy place.
How’s filming going? I hadn’t seen Outer Banks when we last talked, but I’ve seen it since, and even I’m feeling bittersweet about it coming to an end. I can’t imagine how you’re feeling.
[Laughing] You got the crash course.
Yeah, I binge-watched it and I was like, whoa, I can’t believe I haven’t been watching this the whole time.
I have so many friends who’ve done the same thing you’ve done, and I feel like it’s such an emotionally taxing but also exciting way to watch the show, all at once. It’s been going really great. This is our sixth year doing it, so there’s such a familiarity to it—it’s like, you can come back. We always come back at the beginning of each season, and there’s always such a shorthand between the cast and the crew and everyone involved. It’s like seeing your family you haven’t seen in a while, and you just pick up where you left off. So I’m feeling good and sad at the same time. Also feeling bittersweet.
I feel like I already know the answer to this, but is there anything that you can say about what’s coming up in the season?
Absolutely nothing. I don’t know much either. We’re gonna be here in Charleston for another month or so, and then we go overseas, out to Europe to film, and I think we’ll come back to Charleston to wrap it up.
You guys always have a little overseas subplot going on in there.
I know. We’ve all had such great fortune to see some really interesting places in the world, because of the show. We always kind of take bets before the scripts come out to see which country we think we’ll end up in next.
No way. Have you ever won a bet?
No, never. It’s always unpredictable.
Who wins the most?
I think JD [co-star Jonathan Daviss] probably has a good finger on the pulse. Yeah, I’ll give JD that one.
Okay, tell me a little bit about this YSL Beauty campaign. How did this whole thing come together?
What’s funny about all this is, just in terms of fragrance, I’ve been wearing YSL fragrance for the past, I don’t know, eight or nine years. That’s been my fragrance. And so when this came along, it felt so right. It felt like it wasn’t a stretch. It felt like it was a part of myself anyways. But it came together quick and I went up to New York for the shoot, and it was a blast. It felt creative and open and fun, and I’m thrilled and excited and incredibly fortunate that I get to be part of this.
What do you love in a fragrance?
I think I’m drawn to fragrance that sparks memory for me. I think your scent should reflect a sense of home in a way, whatever that means to you. Specifically with YSL, there’s something kind of—well, of course, there’s something familiar about it, and there’s something energizing about it. It’s kind of like the last touch on my identity, in a way.
Tell me more about that. What kind of scent evokes home for you?
I think smell is the sense that truly triggers memory the most. I think there’s something fresh in it. It always either smells either like the first day of spring or the first day of autumn, in a way. Makes me think of my mom’s house growing up. But then there’s a boldness to it that I think is unmistakable. But, yeah, I don’t know. I think that’s the great mystery. Why do certain things make you think of the past and feel optimistic for the future? In a way, it’s something about comfort. And I don’t know if I can put my finger on it.
I feel you. Scent memory is such a real, strong thing.
It’s like an immediate—I mean, it’s like a time machine. It’s such an immediate feeling. Something from your childhood just floods your senses with memories.
Speaking of the future, I want to know what’s coming up for you. Aside from Outer Banks, what’s on the roster?
I’m just pretty tunnel-vision and focusing on the show. And then since we talked last, I got to shoot for a film called Onslaught that Adam Wingard directed, and I’m very, very excited about that. And then I shot for a limited series on Apple TV called Lucky with Anya Taylor-Joy. And that was an incredible, incredible experience. So I’m excited for both of those. I think both of those are also very wildly different, so I’m excited to see how they’re juxtaposed against each other.
I feel like you’re always doing things that are totally different from one another, which is awesome. You never really know what’s coming next.
I hope so. I think that’s a goal of mine, and it makes me feel eager to jump into something when it feels like it’s unknown territory for me.
Okay, I’ve also been wanting to talk to you about music. The last time we spoke you had such a good playlist going on, I remember you were talking about Led Zeppelin and watching some old Kings of Leon performances. What’s been on your summer playlist? What’s your song of the summer?
Oh, my gosh. Summer playlist. I gotta pull up my music now.
Yeah, pull up your music.
I’ve been on some David Bowie.
Like Hunky Dory vibes, or—?
Hunky Dory vibes for sure. The Commodores, Beach Boys. Some newer albums, like Mac DeMarco’s new album. And you know what’s probably been my most listened to album this summer? I was like, obsessive over it. It was that new Turnstile record.
Oh, my God. Yeah. That was crazy good.
I think that may be the album of the summer, for me. That was a non-stop play.
Honestly, such a good choice. Give me a word for what your summer vibe has been.
Hot. So hot in Charleston. I don’t want to simplify it, but I think that’s dictated every emotional status that I’ve had over the summer. It is hot.
We had this crazy heatwave in the South and we were working in it, which was pretty brutal. But then I would have a week off or so. I was like, “Okay, great, I’ll go out and be productive, and get some things done and maybe drive around in Charleston.” And I open the door, and it’s just—you’re met with an unbearable amount of heat. So it caused me to stay inside a lot more this summer, which is good. I got to get a lot more reading done and watch a lot more movies.
What’d you read? What’d you watch?
I’ve been reading this book called North Woods [by Daniel Mason], which is fantastic. And then a whole slew of the most random collection of films I can pick up on. Oh, another word, maybe an alt word [to describe my summer], is family. I’ve had a lot of family come down to Charleston this summer and stay with me. I’ve had a very full house.
Do you have your own place there?
I’m renting, but I’ve got a great little house here. It’s been packed full the whole summer, which has made me really, really happy.
Oh, I love that. Drew, thanks for catching up.
Of course. I hope to see you—not in another year, and hopefully sooner. And I hope New York’s going great.
Yeah, it’s good. Also been hot, but you know how it is.
I know how it is.
This interview has been edited and condensed.