Eighteen-year-old Anton Yelchin immigrated to the United States from Russia with his figure skater parents before he was even a toddler. Even though he’s grown up here, though, it’s that latent outsider’s perspective that has informed his own personal sociological curiosity, and helped him establish an occupational beachhead playing a variety of wide-eyed innocents, including in 2001’s Along Came a Spider and Hearts in Atlantis; in David Duchovny’s 2005 directorial debut, House of D; and in last year’s sweaty teen kidnapping tale, Alpha Dog.

Fierce People, with Donald Sutherland, Diane Lane and Chris Evans — felt an affinity for his character. “He’s 15 (too), I get what he’s feeling — he’s undergoing emotions natural to somebody that age,” says Yelchin, whose genial speech is peppered with copious “likes” and wide smiles. “I think the type of kid Finn is existed 100 years ago, he exists now; he’s kind of a smart-ass kid who has to take care of this mother, who he loves. It didn’t seem like anything that wouldn’t be relevant today. I suppose if it were of a story about some hippie kid in the summer of love, dropping acid, then I’d have to do more research about the time period and everything, but this is just a regular guy.”

Spanning time, though, will soon become second nature to Yelchin. After all, he’s set to bring to life the role of Pavel Checkov in J.J. Abrams’ reboot of the Star Trek franchise, which starts filming in November. “I’m waiting to read the script, actually,” says Yelchin. “I guess they’re withholding that until they get casting done or whatever. I plan on… becoming as much of a Trekkie as a I can in the couple weeks before we start shooting — just renting all the box sets, not going outside, not seeing the sun rise, just having the shades drawn.” For the full interview/feature, from Reelz, click here.