A few weeks ago I had this really cool gig for the PBS history show called “American Experience” where I played a 1940’s scientist. I am posting this entry now because I wanted to wait until I got some photos from the set to add to the post. I just got those today and they look pretty cool. One of the cool things about acting is that you get to see what you might look like in different social roles or different time periods. This time I got to see my self as a 1940’s science geek.
This episode of the American Experience was about the 30 year biological weapons program that America entered into in 1942; Nixon nixed it in 1972. The name of the episode is “The Living Weapon” and will air on PBS on February 5th at 9pm.; my birthday! The scene was 3 scientists meet with 2 military men in a top secret meeting at the pentagon to discuss the possibility of creating a biological warfare program. Here is a picture of that scene.
This shoot was really fun because they gave us our goals and told us a little about what was going on, and then they filmed us improvising the scene; I was told that my character was against the program. In the show there will be a narrator explaining what was happening at the time over the scene, so they did not record any audio. I think this could bring me some nice exposure, although I was not in the best spot for that as I think I was mostly in profile for the entire shoot. I look forward to seeing it.
‘Tis all for now.
Well I know I am repeating myself by saying networking is king in the business of acting but I need to say it again because I just got two new gigs without having to go looking for them. That’s right they called me and O’ what a feeling. The first is a student short film called “Caught” and the other is an independent short called “Paulie”. I discussed networking here.
The first short is an Emerson College student film about a drunken man who makes a very tragic mistake. I won’t tell you the end right now, but I may have a clip in a few months I can put up on the site. I was called by a good acting friend of mine called Michael Clark who was in the movie Swink with me. In that movie he played a sort of twisted science nerd who happens to work for the mob; he nailed the role and was a pleasure to watch on screen. He is currently producing this student film and called me in to play the lead. Very cool, as I stated in an earlier post they don’t write too many lead roles for guys with my body type, but when they do I really try and get them if I can. This movie will be filming this week, and I am looking forward to it as it will have some very fun challenges like trying to sell “drunk” and also dealing with rage and remorse.
The second one is about a man who finds silver linings in all the dark clouds. He comes into a bar and tells the tragic tale of his bad day, but finds good in all of it. A very cool concept and also very cool that I play Paulie the lead role. I was called by a guy called Peter Alberti who I met on the set of “The Forest of Black Fathom” in which I had a small part last year. He was helping to produce and film that movie and also wrote the original musical score for it. He and I have been trading emails on and off and he just sent me a very cool email a short time ago invited me to be the lead in his new movie that will start filming in 2007. They asked me if I knew anyone that could play the other leading role in the movie and I pointed them to my good friend William DeCoff lets hope he fits their vision and I get to work with him again.
All and all it has been a good couple of weeks so far!
‘Tis all for now!
Hey, so in some previous post (here and here) I mentioned that I was interviewed on a local cable TV show called “The Film Connection” and I promised that if I received a copy I would post some of it here. Well, I got the DVD and I took about 3 minutes out of the 30 minute episode and made a flash movie you can see below. We talked about a whole bunch of stuff concerning the film industry but I tried to make the 3 minute clip follow a theme so I stuck to acting advice. Check it out and let me know what you think. I had a lot of fun doing it and I was super pleased and honored to be asked to be on the show by Joe Conforti the host.
Enjoy!
T’is all for Now!
The screening was great! I did get some nervous feelings making my stomach tie in knots before the show as I was waiting to go in and see it; opening night jitters I guess. It was half negative feelings like worrying people would not like my character, or that I would not like my character. It was also half positive giddy feelings like I used to feel Christmas Eve waiting for Santa to arrive. My fears were not warranted though as I was happy to find that people seemed to love my character. And some even cheered when they heard my theme music start up and they knew I was about to appear again on screen. After the screening lots of people came up and said I did a great job and that I was a laugh riot. Mission Accomplished! I feel great knowing I made other people laugh and feel joy it is very important to me. Some other cool things in the night was that I had a chance to ride to the screening with my good acting buddy William DeCoff who played the lead in the movie. It is an hour and a half drive so having some good company on the ride there and back again was a good thing. Also some good friends of mine came to see me and there support was awesome to have. And last but not least I got to meet in person a very good writer and blogger named Ricardo who I have corresponded with on the internet for some time. We did not get to talk too much as he and his date had to work the next morning but he seemed to be a very cool guy in person as well as on the web. He wrote a nice review of the movie on his movie blog here.
‘Tis all for now.
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