GQs Best Stuff visited the newlywed actor, author, and advocate in his Brooklyn home to get wellness tips and take in a whole lot of religious iconography.
by Liz Raiss for GQ
There are many, many avenues to discovering the multi-talented Nico Tortorella. You might watch TV Land’s Younger, the sitcom he stars in alongside Sutton Foster and Hilary Duff (which just returned to television for its hotly anticipated fifth season). Or maybe you’ve caught his podcast, Love Bomb, where he explores love and the labels associated with it. You might have picked up his book of poetry, All of It Is You.written in an impressive 43-day crash session of passionor seen a video of him performing spoken word over looped samples on Instagram. And perhaps you absorbed some particles from the media explosion that followed his recent marriage to his longtime partner, Bethany Meyers, with whom he maintains an openly polyamorous and fluid relationship.
This modern-day polymath, who considers his cis appearance a form of performative drag in and of itself, may be everywherebut still he’s impossible to pin down. Well, we’re pleased to expand the world’s sum knowledge of and exposure to Tortorella through another intense experience: moving (a blur of angst and emotional rawness for any of us). Any way you define it, Tortorella moves a lot. We spoke with him in the midst of him vacating his Brooklyn apartment for a new home upstate. Luckily, we were able to slow down this speed demon long enough to check out his place and a few of his favorite thingsand to hear how he copes with change.
On Candor and Sexuality
“I started having really public conversations about sexuality and gender identity on my old podcast, Love Bomb. Once I started taking that conversation public, I just wanted to download a large amount of information in a short amount of time, and theres no better way to do that than through books. People would listen to what I was saying, not necessarily because of what I was saying but because of what I look like, and what I represent, and as ridiculous as that sounds, theres a responsibility that comes with that privilege that I have. And I wasnt going to let it go to waste. I wanted to inspire other people to speak up.”
Liquid Diet
“I do a lot of scallions, a lot of greens. Im Italian, so once a week Ill get a big pot of gravy going and then eat it throughout the week. I mean a red saucenot a brown sauceand Ill have that with gluten-free noodles or on its own. Most of the time, Im on a liquid diet. I do shakes and smoothies and juices. I was a raw foodist for like three years back in the day, and that really drove my life toward superfoods in a really amazing way. Now I do organic coffee every morning with organic ghee, raw maca, raw chocolate, collagen, and cinnamon. Im big on a green drink before I go to sleep, which is spirulina or E3Live.”
Live, Laugh, Charcoal
“I am pretty keen on activated charcoal right now. I take supplements, I have charcoal toothpaste, I have charcoal deodorant and face masks. If Ive eaten something that isnt great, Ill take some activated charcoal at night to kind of detox from it.”
Mic Drop
“I do a lot of spoken word, so I just got this fancy new microphone, a Shure Super 55, with a modulator and a PA sound system. I do a lot of weird looping with music and poetry. Its a new purchase, and Ive been doing a lot of playing around with it.”
The Essentials
“Funny enough, Ive been writing on my phone for the past few years. When I got a book deal, my publisher and my agent made me buy a computer; I hadnt owned a computer for the last eight years. Ive just done everything on my phone. I wrote all new material for the book, but I found out I had 254 8 x 10 pages of poetry on my phone. The problem is Im so terrible with technology, I lose things! I had nothing backed up anywhere. I just got an iCloud.”
Required Reading
“Ram Dass, Be Here Now. Kahlil Gibran, he wrote The Prophet. I have his entire collection. Hes a Lebanese poet. There are some modern-day poets like Travis Alabanza and Alok Vaid-Menon, two trans artists that are just doing incredible work in the poetry space. I love Tom Wolfe. I just became an avid reader in the last couple years, so I feel like theres a giant world in front of me. Its almost like time travel. I open up a book and just get taken. But Im a newbie in the lit world.”
Religious Ephemera
“I have a few pictures of Jesus. Religion is pretty much my driving force. Its not necessarily religious-based, I have a strong connection with Jesus and with Judaism and Buddhism. I kind of take the pieces that I like from each religion and leave the stuff I dont like. In terms of spirituality, I work with a lot of different energy healers. I just got my Reiki 1 certification. I do a lot with crystals, channeling, ceremonies. I work a lot with psychedelics, Ill do a lot of mushrooms in my apartment. Ive done Ayahuasca ceremonies. All of my crystals are next to my bed. I have lapis, moonstone, Jasper, citrine, quartz. I have a bunch of dried flowers because theyre easier to maintain. I have a last rites box in the bathroom over my toilet. If someone were dying, the priest would bring it to their house. I have a few of those, actually.”
Taxidermy
“I have a piece of taxidermy next to my bed that is the body of a white dove with the head of a white bunny rabbit. I found it on Etsy, actually. I grew up in an antiques store in Chicago, we were always going to estate sales, my grandma collected taxidermy. I have a stuffed baby white tiger that my grandma gave me that I keep in the middle of my living room. Its a baby, hes small, hes probably only three feet wide.”
Arts & Crafts
“I draw a lot. Ive been drawing collections of non-binary bodies recently. Ive done embroidery. I do a lot of leather work. I want to start doing bigger projects, sculptures. Im gonna start doing that at the house upstate, which is 32 acres. Im not picky: Im the type of person who loves all mediums and will use whatever I have in front of me. Ive been drawing on poster board. Its all very experimental and for myself right now.”
