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There's a revealing moment in Lukas Gage's new book where he refers to it a "early celebrity memoir". It's a humble quip, of course, but it's also accurate. Gage isn't megawatt famous – at least not yet. Likely, though, if you've seen him then you won't have forgotten him. In 2020, he went viral after sharing an audition video where the filmmaker – not realizing he wasn't on mute – was heard criticizing his apartment. "These poor people live in these tiny apartments," he states, before Gage steps in to let him know he can hear every word. The next year, Gage starred in the first season of The White Lotus: in one scene, his role Dillon is discovered by a visitor standing completely undressed in the manager's office, while the manager performs a sexual act on him.

"I thought: I don't have too much to do in the show so I'd better put my mark on it big," he remarks with a grin today. "I wanted to give people something to remember me by – and I did!"

Messy Roles and Life

Gage excels in characters whose lives are messy and disordered – just like his own. That life is all laid on the line in his autobiography, which – here comes another modest joke – is titled I Wrote this Book for Attention. Although humorously engaging, its subject matter is anything but light. We begin with Gage's feelings of abandonment by his father, then progress to drug use, sexual abuse, family dysfunction, addiction, personality disorders, shame, rocky romances and emotional pain. What we aren't shown all that much of is the glamour of fame. Gage freely acknowledges he is at the start of his profession. He has no vast reserves of knowledge to impart on success. So what was the reason of penning a memoir?

"I think it's cathartic for me to share my journey," he explains over a online call from New York. "Throughout the Hollywood writers' strike I had the free time to really dig in and go profound, so I just said: screw it."

Early Life and Validation

Gage, 30, grew up in San Diego, and from an young age he was aware of his persistent need for validation. He remembers a party where he appeared, aged four, wearing high heels and Playboy bunny ears; in especial, he remembers being hurt by his dad's obvious disgust at what he was doing. Their relationship never really recovered – Gage's dad left and became progressively remote with his sons (Gage has two siblings) before settling down with a new family.

Gage struggled to fit in at school. He was a born actor, but this meant it was often hard to know who the real Lukas was. "I found myself constantly adopting different hats and identities, which I think was quite polarising for people," he says. It also had its benefits. Gage could easily adopt the character of a clean-living football player while secretly stocking his bag up with alcohol at the rear of the shop. He was sometimes paid by classmates to call up and imitate their parents to get them out of class. "Transforming into different people was effortless to me," he says.

Addiction and Family Struggles

The book addresses addiction – predominantly his sibling's struggles with heroin that turn the cool sibling he idolised into a frail zombie, but also his mother's obsession with gambling devices. An initial win meant the family could afford to make the down payment on a bigger house, but Gage laughs when I inquire if she actually made money from gambling. "Ultimately, how much she used was definitely a lot more than that."

It is funny, he says. Until she had gone through the book, his mum hadn't really reconciled with this side of her character. "She talked to my other brothers, like, 'Do you guys feel this way too?' And they were all like, 'Of course, we've been saying this since we were kids.'"

Gage has a lot of affection for his mum, who obviously raised her children up in challenging conditions. But she had a difficulty reviewing it. "She believed as if she failed as a mother and I did not want her to think that way at all. I believe like even though there's these chaotic things that happened to me, tough things, I truly appreciated the way that I grew up."

Finding Identity and Trauma

Gage didn't start to locate his true self until he was sent to an performance program as a child, where being boisterous, theatrical and attention-seeking was actually supported. The time was life-changing in positive ways, but also in a terrible one. One night, he was accompanied in his shelter by a camp counsellor who told Gage and a girl camper to kiss, take off their garments and press their selves against each other while he masturbated. For years afterwards, he tried to ignore the shame it imprinted him with.

"As with a lot of people who experience being molested, I felt like there was a complicity on my part because my body just disconnected. I knew it was inappropriate. I knew that the situation should not be happening. But I just ploughed through it."

Self-Criticism and Professional Journey

Gage is hard on himself in the book – and continues to be. He confesses to looking for "harsh reviews" of himself on the internet. "I dislike that I don't always hold my acting and writing in the best light," he states. "I desire I could have more empathy with that part of myself."

Yet he acknowledges that this doubt motivates him forward too. In secondary school, he appeared in a wart-removal commercial and spent the day on set inquiring about every query possible about audio and the role of crew. Despite his mum's reservations, he departed San Diego for Hollywood at the age of 18, staying in the Alta Cienega Motel where his idol Jim Morrison stayed, on and off, between 1968 and 1970 (Tripadvisor reviews – "Avoid completely from this DUMP!" – indicate it might not have been the most comfortable of accommodations).

Gage's major opportunity should have come when he landed a small role in Mad Men, as Sally Draper's love interest. He told his whole family about it, but during a wardrobe session he was forced to reveal the tattoos he'd had done on his ribs, back and calf. "I had these representatives saying to me: how could you damage this? How could you mess this up? I don't think that was the greatest thing for a teenager to hear when they've just lost something that big."

These days, such tattoos would be covered up in minutes, but at that time he was dismissed and back to square one. The relentless cycles of tryouts and refusals were harsh, but at least he had been prepared well for them. "Whenever I got rejected for a job, I would always think: it's fine, it's not as bad as my dad leaving me for another household and kid," he says.

Persistence and Breakthrough

Gage persevered. The story of how he deceived, begged and manipulated to get an audition for Assassination Nation, which ultimately led to a role in the hit show Euphoria (as Tyler Clarkson, black-eyed and in a neck brace) and then The White Lotus, could take up a book in itself. Gage remembers the strangeness of filming The White Lotus in 2020, sequestered in a high-end Hawaii hotel while the pandemic and the US election raged on. It was in fact Gage, along with co-star Murray Bartlett, who suggested the idea that their sex act should be something a bit extra – and creator Mike White happily approved. Gage laughs remembering his mum's response. "She sent me a message, like, 'Such a cute bum, but maybe next time provide a heads-up that's going to occur when I'm viewing with my friends.'"

It was while on set that Gage showed colleagues the audition video in which his apartment was slated. Their response – surprised, entertained, supportive – persuaded him to post it online. He wasn't ready for the feedback it received: numerous articles, expressions of support from peers and unknown people alike, and a campaign against the director in question, none of which Gage had any control over. "I felt like people were much more angry about it than I was, which confused me," he {