Shailene Woodley, 34, said in a Thursday interview that her friendship with former co-star Ansel Elgort, 32, goes beyond “best friend,” adding that he feels “like family” to her. The pair first bonded on the set of Divergent in 2014, later reunited for The Fau
When Shailene Woodley described her friendship with Ansel Elgort, she didn’t reach for a careful, industry-approved compliment. She went straight to the kind of closeness that sounds lived-in.
In an interview shared via Variety’s YouTube page on Thursday, May 21, Woodley, 34, said, “Ansel Elgort is to this day one of my best friends.” She added, “I feel like he transcends the label of best friend. He is like family to me. I love him so, so deeply.”
Woodley and Elgort worked together on both The Fault in Our Stars and the Divergent films. They met for the first time on the set of the first Divergent film, which premiered in 2014. In those movies. they played siblings—Woodley as Tris and Elgort as Caleb—and their relationship formed quickly as they got to know each other on set.
“When we were doing the first divergent movie. we really connected. and we became sort of instant siblings. ” Woodley recalled on Thursday. “The dynamic between us is always very sweet. and it was very supportive. and he would come over to my house. and we would cook and just talk for hours after work.”.
Their closeness followed them back to the screen. After working on Divergent, Woodley and Elgort reunited for the 2014 movie The Fault in Our Stars, where they played love interests—Woodley as Hazel and Elgort as Gus. Woodley said she heard Elgort was auditioning and felt genuinely surprised.
“When I heard he was auditioning for Fault in Our Stars. I was like ‘Oh that’s sweet. but like obviously it’s never gonna happen because he’s my brother in Divergent. like there’s no world where [that happens] … And then he was cast. ” she said. “You know, he’s kind of the only person on Earth who could’ve played Gus.”.
Woodley also linked that off-screen bond to the feel of their on-screen chemistry. She said their connection helped make the relationship on screen more tender.
“I think actually what made our relationship in that movie as tender as it was and as truly like unconditionally loving as it was [because] Ansel and I do genuinely love one another. ” she shared. “It’s so rare that you get to see love explored without intimacy. and although there is intimacy between Hazel and Gus. the core of it is just unconditional love. It’s two people walking each other home. It’s two people who have a desire to only be supportive to one another. and make the other person feel a little less lonely in a chaotic world.”.
The film is based on the best-selling novel written by John Green, and Woodley said the script demanded more than just emotional closeness. In the movie, Woodley and Elgort’s characters had multiple romantic scenes. She confessed that filming those intimate moments was “awkward.”
“Of course it was awkward when we had to do intimacy scenes together, cause I remember [us] laughing in between takes a little bit together,” Woodley said. “I know everything about you, that is so weird that we have to take our shirts off.”
Woodley and Elgort last worked together in 2016 on the final installment of the Divergent series. Since then, they’ve stayed close, including taking a trip to Italy together in 2022.
There’s a specific kind of comfort in Woodley’s words: not just friendship after a successful collaboration, but a relationship she describes as family—something steady enough to survive different roles, long breaks between projects, and the ordinary distance that comes after a franchise wraps.
Shailene Woodley Ansel Elgort friendship like family Divergent The Fault in Our Stars Tris and Caleb Hazel and Gus May 21 interview