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Enimen Reunites With Original 'Stan' Actor 25 Years Later
Released in November 2000, "Stan" is called one of Eminem's best and is considered his signature alongside "The Real Slim Shady" and "Lose Yourself". The song became iconic, with the music video following its fame, directed by Dr. Dre and Philip Atwell.
The music video is a literal interpretation of the song, starring Devon Sawa as Stan. Sawa was 23 years old and well into his acting career, having led Final Destination as Alex Browning. In the "Stan" music video, Sawa played the titular character of an obsessed superfan who begins writing letters to Eminem and grows increasingly unhinged when he doesn't reply.
Now 25 years later, Eminem and Sawa reunited at the rapper's New York City premiere of his documentary movie titled Stans. According to Entertainment Tonight, Eminem not only snapped a photo with Sawa, but with the actor's 11-year-old son, Hudson.
Looking back at the music video, Sawa commented, "I'm very flattered that I was in a music video that's lasted so long. I mean, clearly Eminem's ahead of his time."
"Eminem's still as gracious and kind as I remember him from 25 years ago," added the actor. "The bonus was meeting my son, who gets to go into middle school with what might be the coolest what did you do over the summer story."
In an interview with The Daily Mail, Sawa looks back to filming the music video and remembers not having a lot of scenes with Eminem, "but I remember him being focused and just there to work. He was there to work - that's what I remember."
When it comes to how he got the "Stan" role in the first place, Sawa admits he doesn't know why he was offered the role over Macaulay Culkin.
"I'll never really know the answer to that, but what I heard was that Dr. Dre [Eminem's longtime producer] was a huge Final Destinations fan and made a suggestion to the team about me, and somehow a friend of a friend knew somebody - a call on a landline - back in the landline days, and they were like, 'Do you want to be in the music video?'," explained Sawa.
He met Dr. Dre for lunch one day to discuss the music video, met Eminem a few weeks later, and the rest was history.
Eminem's Stans movie is currently in theaters for a limited time only.
Enimen Reunites With Original 'Stan' Actor 25 Years Later first appeared on Men's Journal on Aug 8, 2025
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