Lucky in love Christopher Briney may play one-third of an iconic teen love triangle on Amazon Prime’s The Summer I Turned Pretty series — but in real life, he’s happily taken.
The Summer I Turned Pretty, which debuted in June 2022, features Briney’s character Conrad Fisher — a brooding and emotionally unavailable bad boy — as one of two main love interests for series protagonist Isabel “Belly” Conklin (Lola Tung). The teen romance-com is based upon a book trilogy by the showrunner. Jenny HanBelly is accompanied by Conrad on her adventures at Cousins Beach.Gavin Casalegno).
Conrad is the series’ unmistakable heartthrob, the boy Belly has inexplicably swooned over since she was a child. Despite her endless flip-flopping, it feels inevitable that Belly’s heart will always belong to Conrad — something Briney didn’t quite understand when he first stepped into the role.
“When I first read the book and when the script started coming in, I was like, ‘This dude kind of sucks,’” he revealed during a June interview with POPSUGAR. “He’s really rude and he’s not telling people how he feels, and that’s why he’s in all this trouble.”
As time went on, however, the Connecticut native realized that Conrad, who is holding onto secrets about both his dad’s infidelity and mom’s recent cancer diagnosis, is just a teenage boy trying to deal with his own emotions.
“He’s just young and … just trying to keep it together for the people he loves,” the actor explained. “Yes, he owes an apology to some people in the world, but he’s 17. He is capable of making mistakes. He’s going to continue to make mistakes, and he’s just hurt.”
Briney said that although the show is centered around the romantic tension between the characters, the cast is more like a family.
“It was such a blessing to be able to make those actual friendships because they gave us time to get to know each other, spend time with each other, and actually go to the beach and get up to trouble with each other,” he told POPSUGAR. “By the first day [of shooting], it felt like we’d known each other for years.”
Briney is a lot more decisive in his romantic life than his onscreen counterpart. He’s been dating Isabela Rose Machado since 2021, and the two walked their first red carpet at The Summer I Turned PrettyPremiere in New York City earlier in the month.
“Get you some friends like these 😍,” Briney wrote alongside a photo of him and Machado hugging at the event.
They have kept their relationship low-key, but they do occasionally use social media to express their love for one another.
The twosome celebrated their one year anniversary together in June. Briney wrote via Instagram at the time: “A whole year?! I could never want anything else,” alongside a sweet snap of the pair. Machado, for her part, chose to honor their “feelingsaversary,” in May, writing via Instagram, “ So glad we kiss now,” to which Briney replied, “I never want it any other way 💘💘💘.”
Scroll through for everything to know about Briney’s real-life “Belly”:
