CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. – Outside a movie theater, a rallying cry has launched.  "When I say 'Zac,' you say 'Efron!' "  On a warm, sunny day, a crowd of more than 1,300 teen daughters and young wives of deployed Marines have gathered (along with a sprinkling of men), each waiting anxiously for the arrival of Zac Efron. Or as he will be known Friday, Hollywood's most freshly anointed Marine.  Efron, 24, is here to screen The Lucky One, a Nicholas Sparks-born best-selling tale that follows U.S. Marine Sgt. Logan Thibault from battle in Iraq to the door of the woman (Taylor Schilling) whose stray picture becomes his good luck charm.  Against a barricade, Bailey Wilson, 18, holds up a poster from the film, which shows off the bulkier, bearded star. "He looks good with the scruffiness," says Wilson, who slept outside the theater overnight to be here. "Pretty manly. Pretty hot."  Sheila Maestas, 24, agrees. She drove two hours with her best friend from Norwalk, Calif. But as a fan of the Sparks book, she says she initially resisted Efron's casting. "At first I just thought High School Musical," she says, wrinkling her nose. "But when I saw the previews, yeah. He grew up."  Suddenly, a cacophony of Beatles-sized shrieks begin when Efron, dressed casually in a black T-shirt and burgundy trousers, walks out of the theater. It's a James Dean moment: His hair is slick, his grin is instant and those famous twinkling blue eyes are shaded by a pair of brown plastic Persol frames.  The crowd goes berserk. Hallmarks of his career are thrust in the air, from Lucky One posters and High School Musical DVDs to his recent Men's Health cover and stray copies of 17 Again. A young girl offers up her small, pristine white Keds sneaker. On each, Efron scrawls "Zac E."  Suddenly, a teen half-lunges over the barricade to plant a red lipstick kiss on his cheek. Efron's barely fazed, and his publicist calmly finds a tissue and wipes off the stain. Nearby, another girl has hurled herself toward a 6-foot-tall shrub to get closer. She has landed in it with the top of her head barely reaching through the leaves. Efron spots her and signs her poster.  Finally, the actor turns to go inside the theater. "Take off your shirt!" a female voice hollers.  This crowd is screaming just as loudly for Sparks, the author who has turned writing emotionally charged, silver screen-friendly romances into his own cottage industry.  "I love Zac Efron, but I came for the book," admits fan Megan Day, 20, who traveled from Littleton, Colo.  "These movies kind of have their own brand," says Sparks, adding that Efron "fit the mold" of his character exactly. His string of adapted hits, spanning Message in a Bottle, A Walk to Remember, The Notebook, Nights in Rodanthe, The Last Song and Dear John have also made careers — or at the very least, widened the audience of their respective stars. Just ask Ryan Gosling, Channing Tatum and Liam Hemsworth.  "His books have phenomenal stories and great characters that make great movies," says Efron, who calls The Notebook "a damn near perfect movie." And playing Logan, who returns to the USA and finds love with a single mother after three tours in Iraq, "looked like a challenge," he says. "The character wasn't exactly like anyone that I'd played before. Marines have a different sort of persona than I think I carry personally and … I thought there's a chance I could pull it off with the right amount of hard work, and it would be worth it to transform."  Mission accomplished, says his director.  "His desire to play the part was palpable," says director Scott Hicks (Shine, Snow Falling on Cedars). "My question to Zac was, really: 'How are we going to do this? Obviously, on the face of it, you're not built like a Marine.' "  What ended up on screen is a departure. Efron, who cites Black Hawk Down and Saving Private Ryan among his favorite combat movies, buzzed off his trademark locks, put on 20 pounds of muscle, grew facial scruff, underwent two to four hours of training a day with a retired Marine and heard first-hand stories of war at Camp Pendleton.  "He's just like young Marines that I always worked with," says Sgt. Major James Dever, who previously whipped actors such as Nicolas Cage, Tom Cruise and Aaron Eckhart into fighting shape. "That's what I loved. He liked to kid around just like the young Marines do, but he also takes it seriously, too."  Efron's co-star saw his commitment first-hand. "I'd roll up to hair and makeup at 6 a.m. for our call (time) and would be kind of bleary-eyed, and Zac would already have been at the gym. He'd have woken up at 4 a.m. to do his workout," recalls Taylor Schilling, who plays divorced single mother Beth Green, the woman in the picture whom he ultimately falls for.  Over time, his tough, introspective Marine was born. "When I first saw myself (on screen), I didn't really recognize myself at all," Efron says.  It's a new rung of achievement for the actor, who graduated from Disney's High School Musical trilogy in 2008.  "I think if you play your cards right and do the work you can find a role that will separate you from your past," says Efron, settling into a small dressing room crowded with publicists behind the theater.  Inspired by the evolving résumès of Matt Damon and Leonardo DiCaprio, in the past five years, Efron has veered off of teen fare, instead trying obscure drama (2008's Me and Orson Welles), headlining a rom-com (17 Again), and digging deeper emotionally (2010's Charlie St. Cloud). In the critically panned, celeb-packed New Year's Eve, Efron was a bright spot; Rolling Stone's Peter Travers wrote that he delivered "the film's one appealing performance." This year, Efron has voiced animation in Dr. Seuss' The Lorax and saw his new indie comedy Liberal Arts go to Sundance, where it received a standing ovation.  In The Lucky One, palpable tension launches from the first shots of a midnight raid in Iraq. Efron, in full combat gear, shot it in "this dilapidated old building, kind of crumbled, at two in the morning," he says. "It was me and a fellow actor and like 50 Marines, real Marines. So I would just say to the guys, 'Tell me if there's anything I'm doing that doesn't look legit. Get my back here.' " He grins. "And they were so great. That was probably one of the most fun days that we had. Just thinking back to High School Musical, I never thought I'd be doing that."  Adult themes continue with a steamy love scene with Schilling, his first on camera. But Efron, who is thoughtful but practiced at these conversations, shrugs off any awkwardness. "It was pretty easy to get lost in the moment," he says.  It's only at the mention of a love scene in this fall's erotic thriller, The Paperboy , with Nicole Kidman that gets the actor grinning sheepishly. "That one my heart was racing for," he admits. "I'm a big fan of Nicole's for a long time. I felt like I was stepping into Moulin Rouge."  Director Lee Daniels (Precious) says Efron's title role, played alongside Matthew McConaughey as the two chase a murder case in Florida in 1969, will surprise his fan base.  "Bye bye, Disney," says Daniels, who was initially against casting Efron in the dark film due to his squeaky-clean image. "I have to say that I was nervous in the beginning about working with him, and I was completely wrong from day one. … His timing, his humor, his instinct, is extraordinary."  The actor is also unfailingly polite. After sitting down, Efron realizes he's chewing gum and ditches it, and later doubles back after an interview to shake hands and express thanks. When pal Lily Collins calls during an interview, he picks it up, tells her he'll call her back in 10 minutes, and then quickly apologizes. "Sorry, excuse me, that was rude." (He maintains that he is single.)  Efron's charm, "is not a mask," says Hicks. "That's who Zac is."  But his heartthrob status means that paparazzi are literally always following him, from hotel room balconies to the golf course. Efron shrugs it off. "I just try and stay out of their viewfinders as much as possible and keep it about the work."  That Marine-like laser-focus is about to pay off. "I had a specific goal that I set to achieve which was, 'How do I get from where I was at professionally and sort of move on to more mature roles in a graceful way, without cashing in and keep my integrity?' " says Efron. "I feel like I've done that. This movie kind of marks that for me."
The former 'High School Musical' star has matured into a romantic hero in the film based on a Nicholas Sparks novel.