The subject of time travel has been explored countless times in TV shows and movies, with the latest one on the local front offering a Singaporean twist.

In Mediacorp drama Future Proof, we follow the adventures — and misadventures — of Alan (played by Aaron Mossadeg), a charming but self-absorbed thirtysomething who unwittingly finds himself transported back to 1965, where he meets the younger version of his estranged father Seng Lee (Ah Boys to Men star Noah Yap) and gets involved in a top secret government agency.

This marks the first time Aaron, 29, has taken on a leading role after mostly being part of ensemble casts on shows like Kin, Faculty, and Tanglin.

Since Future Proof is about time travel, 8days.sg naturally had to pose this cliché question to the actor during our recent phone interview: “If you could go back in time and change something, what would you do?”

“As a fan of time travel, I’ve always known that that’s not a good idea as changing one thing can lead to bad outcomes, but okay, I’ll bite,” chuckled Aaron, launching into a story that might be a good lesson for those planning to travel again soon.

Back in 2019, Aaron had a 19-hour layover in Beijing en route to Italy, so he took the opportunity to sightsee before returning to the airport.

“I was early and decided to have a coffee next to the escalator that was going down to what I thought was immigration and the boarding gate,” he recalled.

Oh, how wrong he was

As Aaron found out the hard way, he still had to take a train and walk quite a distance to the very end of the terminal where his gate was, and even then, he needed to take another bus.

“So ‘cos I had that stupid coffee thinking I was early and all that, I missed my flight,” he sighed, adding that as a result, he ended up shelling out an extra S$800 to catch another plane, and the delay ate into the first day of his holiday plans in Italy. “So yeah, definitely would wanna change that!”

Adding insult to injury is the fact that ‘cos Aaron was overseas for two weeks on that trip, he had to miss out on playing Constable Mossadeg (yup, they kept his surname) in Last Madame, which went to Leon Lee in the end.

“[At first I was] like, ‘It’s fine, these things happen, you can’t help it’... but then after that, Last Madame was added to Netflix and I was like (swears)! (Laughs) So it was quite funny, but Leon’s a friend lah so I’m happy for him,” he said, clearly having put these very suay incidents behind him.

At least he got some awesome vacay pics

Since there isn’t much that’s known about the up-and-comer, we took the opportunity to find out a bit more and here’s what we learned: Aaron turns 30 this year (on May 31, to be exact), he attended Nanyang Polytechnic and the Singapore Institute of Management, and he was inspired to become an actor after watching Leonardo DiCaprio’s onscreen performances.

He owes his unique pan-Asian features to his English-Dutch mum and Malay-Arab father, but he emphasised that he is “very, very Singaporean”, despite what one rideshare driver seemed to have trouble understanding.

“A couple of years back, I took a GrabHitch with this lady, and before we even got out of the car park, she made like seven wrong assumptions about me!” he said, adding that he “grew up with people always asking where [he’s] from”.

According to Aaron, their (very awkward) conversation basically went like this: “She asked me where I’m from, and I said, ‘Oh, I’m Singaporean.’ ‘How long have you been here?’ ‘I’m Singaporean.’ ‘Where are your parents from?’ ‘Singapore!’ ‘Is your father Chinese?’ ‘No, he’s Malay.’ ‘So you’re Muslim?’ ‘No!’”

He’s a true blue Singaporean (who loves his cai png)

Speaking of not judging someone by their appearance, Aaron revealed that he’s actually “a pretty hardcore gamer” and spends “more time playing video games” than he does at the gym (something we honestly wouldn’t have been able to tell from his IG, which is filled with pics of his ripped bod).

We’re not the only ones. “A lot of people think I’m this gym bro and ask if I work out every day, and I’m like, 'Huh?' When I first got into the gym, and this was to get ready for the NAPFA test before NS, my friends had to convince me to follow them. Sometimes even in the gym I’m thinking of going home to play Dota. (Laughs)”

Even now, he admitted — with a sheepish chortle — that he still plays the video game “almost every day”.

“I think a lot of people just don’t see me as the gamer type and assume I’m this jock.”

He still works out enough to look like this, though

Here’s one more fun fact about Aaron: There’s another actor in his family, Lion Mums star Vanessa Vanderstraaten, and he would like everyone to know they are related.

“Someone considered casting me as a potential love interest for her in Lion Mums, so please get the word out there that she’s my cousin,” he laughed.

It’s through Vanessa, who’s also a writer, that Aaron learned the importance of having a side gig instead of just “waiting around for the next acting job”, especially in a country as small as Singapore. He used to be a part-time personal fitness trainer but hasn’t gotten his certification renewed as it’s not an area he wants to focus on right now.

This led us to ask Aaron if, as someone who is non-Chinese and doesn’t speak Mandarin, he feels like his acting career is even more limited in Singapore, where there is arguably a bigger market for Chinese language local productions.

Future Proof airs Thursday, 10pm on Ch 5.
All episodes are now available on meWATCH.

Photos: Aaron Mossadeg/Instagram