The Joe Alwyn Group Chat That Inspired Taylor Swift’s Album Is Not as Active as We Thought
Remember when Taylor Swift announced The Tortured Poets Department, and everyone immediately started drawing connections with her ex, Joe Alwyn? Well, Alwyn’s bestie, Andrew Scott, is opening up about their influence on the album’s title.
Let’s recap a little before we get into Scott’s new comments. Before the album’s release on April 19, Taylor Swift announced the title of her long-anticipated 11th studio album at the Grammys 2024 on February 5. Just a few days later, fans caught wind of the project’s name being a reference to a group chat Joe Alwyn shares with fellow actors Paul Mescal and Andrew Scott called “The Tortured Man Club.” (In case you need a refresher on how these three met, Scott and Mescal acted together in All of Us Strangers, and Alwyn was Scott’s costar in Catherine Called Birdy.)
Since he was the one to set up the chat in the first place, Andrew Scott was asked about their group chat inspiring the title of Swift’s album in a new interview with Variety and how they took it and, well, it’s not as active as one might have assumed.
Scott explained to the publication that he had set up the chat to connect Alwyn and Mescal since Alwyn had been tapped to star in the TV adaption of Sally Rooney’s Conversations With Friends, and Mescal had already led another one of Rooney’s TV adaptations, Normal People.
“So they were about to play these tortured characters, and I had played a tortured character in Fleabag. It wasn’t about our own characteristics!” the actor explained, seemingly alluding to fan discourse. He also added that the chat quickly died out. “I think there were three texts, like, ‘Hey, guys.’ You know those groups that you set up, and they just collapse?” We sure do.
