Unbeknownst to me, [I’d] signed an invisible contract which required me to enter into a strange new echelon of society,” he continued. “People suddenly wanted to take pictures of me on the street, and journalists were interested in what sort of socks I preferred. It was an environment from which I instantly wanted to retreat. I detested the superficial elevation and commodification of it all, juxtaposed with the grotesque self-involvement it would sometimes draw out in me.”
It’s worth noting that Gleeson has also been very
quick to express gratitude for his success and all that it has afforded him: “opportunities which I see as truly once in a lifetime.” Still, he brilliantly questions the need for how far it goes, asserting that the downside of the artificial elevation inherent to fame far outweighs any benefit derived, by, well,
anyone.