"I was insulted for half a second, and then I even felt better about myself," said Justin Hartley

Justin Hartley Pretended to Be Ryan Reynolds for an Adoring Fan — but He Got Busted

When you’re Justin Hartley, you get recognized as one of the This Is Us heartthrobs all the time — and other times, people mistake you for very different Hollywood heartthrob.

During an appearance on Tuesday’s Tonight Show, the actor told host Jimmy Fallon the hilarious story of when a fan mistook him for Ryan Reynolds — and why he went along with it.

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Asked if his life has changed since the success of the hit NBC series, Hartley, 40, said he definitely gets recognized more often.

“It’s wonderful, because you get to do these charity events and you actually get to raise money for good causes and things like that, so that’s the good part of it,” he said. “People recognize you, and they’re really nice to you.”

Hartley explained that he was recently at one such charity event, when a woman standing next to him did a double-take.

“She was standing right next to me, and she made this [shocked] face — I thought she was going to tackle me, “he said. “I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is amazing. She really likes me.’ I was feeling pretty good about myself.”

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The woman began showering Hartley with compliments — “She starts telling me how great I am and how in love with me she is, and it’s really great” — until she suddenly dropped the first hint of the glorious mixup.

“She asks me how Blake [Lively] was — I didn’t know what she was talking about, so I just said, ‘Great!’ ” he said. “Then she asked me if I knew Deadpool was going to be that big of a hit.”

“So I was insulted for half a second, and then I even felt better about myself,” he continued. “I didn’t have the heart to tell her it wasn’t him, so for five minutes I just pretended like I was the coolest guy on earth, Ryan Reynolds. Then on my way out the door I caught her — I wanted to give her one last wave and she just was staring death at me. Somebody told her.”