This autumn, I'll be playing the title role in Omar Pierre's short feature "The Actor"
which explores how one's life outlives life's dreams and the degree to which one will go in order to keep it going.
I've worked with Omar before ("The Otherside") and I'm definitely a fan of his. The film was originally scheduled to shoot in January, but Mr. Pierre is putting
together a different production team. Godspeed to him in that effort.
The latest wraps:
On March 11th, 2010, I completed work on a student film by Jared Frost of the Art Student
Institute of New York, "What Would Jesus Do?", an irreverent and imaginative short in which I play God, a role I've
always hankered after.
On
March 6th, 2010, I completed production on a feature film, Moving Pictures LTD's "Theodore is Dying", written
and directed by Ryan C. Pomeranz. I played John, the current husband of the title character's ex-wife Sydney.
It was a small role (two scenes) filled with a lot of challenges. I look forward to seeing my work, but with much greater
anticipation to seeing the whole film. It is a wonderful script, the other cast members were gifted, giving actors,
the crew were young, energetic, and very serious about their work, and Ryan was a delight. This could be something special.
On December
22nd, 2009, I completed production on an industrial film called "Mashal Theatre" created by Kol Rom Media
of Baltimore, Maryland, for a non-profit organization's fund raising efforts. It was directed by C. J. Kramer and written
by Malka Josephs. The production consisted of several sketches with music. I played the King in "The King
and the Prince".
Between
November 13th and 15th, I shot an NYU/Tisch SOA student film "Carnival of Crimes", adapted and directed
by Eric Mann from a short story by Mark Twain. I played an old man who is determined once and for all quite literally
to kill off his conscience. This was a very grand conception and I'm very eager to see how it comes out.
On Sunday, November 7th, I appeared
as Dr. Bete in a reading of Jon Haddorff's blackly comic, insanely picaresque screenplay "Hollywood Baptism".
May it live to see its first communion.
On Monday, November 2nd, I appeared live at Alice Tully Hall after the presentation
of the industrial video which was shot for the Ohel Children's Home and Family Services charity by Kol-Rom Media, Inc. of
Pikesville, Md. This job, my first overseas engagement, took me to "the City of Golden Stones", Jerusalem,
for 3 days of shooting in mid-September. The piece, directed by C. J. Kramer and written by Malka Leah Josephs, is titled
"Musical Inspiration: The Journey Begins" and served as a video backdrop and virtual MC for Ohel's annual
benefit concert.
On The Internet:
On Sunday, August 16th, 2009, I shot a piece called
"The Caregiver's Resume" by Dwyer Jones, directed by Nancy McClernan for the NYC Playwrights "Project Monologue".
You can see it on their website or on You Tube at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0KpuxZtdxI
For those curious about the "early days", I just learned that
the first film I made is now on the net. Noah Lagin's NYU/Tisch School of the Arts project "Warsaw" is available
at http://www.haydenfilms.com/Festivals/Fest2008/film/28. The film dates from the winter of 2005-06, and I trust my craft has grown somewhat since then.
I also appear in two different roles within a 7 minute
trailer for a projected touring theatre program that is available on the net at: http://www.jenacompany.com/page.php?8. The touring production which will play various universities covering many states east of the Mississippi over
7 weeks early in 2010, will be a very ambitious effort of the Jena Company to capture the immigrant experience from early
in the second half of the 19th Century through the Zoot Suit riots in California in 1943. This trailer was shot in New
York last autumn.
On You Tube:
A short film in which I appeared early in 2007 is available on
You Tube. The film is "Tesla and the Bellboy" and is directed by a very talented recent NYU graduate named
Timothy Ziegler in which I play a farcical riff on a real life mad scientist. You can see this extremely low
budget but still quite stylish movie at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdD3MRvBvc4.
Recent Engagements:
On Stage --
On Sunday,
August 8th, I completed my delightful two month journey with the Infinity Theatre Company's production of Tom Jones'
and Harvey Schmidt's The Fantasticks, under the very able direction of Tina Marie Casamento and musical
direction of David Libbey. I played Henry Albertson, the Old Actor, surely one of the plumiest roles ever created.
The two young lovers were played beautifully by Anna Roberts Ostroff and Alan Ostroff who starred together in the NY Fringe
Festival production Alan's autobiographic play "Tradition!" in which I played his father back in 2006. We
played 9 shows at The Theatre at Cape Henlopen in Lewes, DE (while living at
nearby Rehobeth Beach), and 11 shows at the Children's Theatre of Annapolis.
The rest of the company, Michael Padgett as El Gallo, Robin Cannon as the Mute, Anthony Morelli and Gary Leimkuhler as the
Fathers, and the brilliantly funny Darron Cardosa as Mortimer were as polished an ensemble as I've ever known in my work.
Lest you think we on stage were the only ones having a good time, there were lovely reviews including Sabrina Daly's in DC Theatre Scene in which my work was singled out.
On
April 22nd, I played the Doctor in a reading of Noah Lukeman's imaginative, faithful and well-researched modern
sequel, The Tragedy of Macbeth, Part II, at the Cherry Lane Theatre in New York.
On
Saturday, March 27, I appeared in a staged reading of Somewhere Else by Stacey Kaiser Tomaschik,
directed by Maxine Kern, at the Frederick Douglass Creative Arts Center at 270 West 96th Street, in Manhattan. The play
was built on conversational, character-driven, actable dialogue and one of the richest Elyssian Fields evocations
I've come across since Dante, as a realm in which souls choose life or life ever-lasting based on which one exerts the greatest
pull on them. Ms. Tomaschik is a mentee at the center of Leslie Lee, the OBIE award-wining playwright of Last
Breeze of Summer (revived by the Signature Theatre in 2008) and the Managing Director of The Negro Ensemble Company.
Mr. Lee wrote Mina in which I appeared at LaMama. The cast of Somewhere Else included Heather Massie who starred
in Mina. I first heard of the Frederick Douglass Creative Arts Center six years ago as a guest at a combined
90th birthday party for the late Budd Schulberg (the Oscar-winning screenwriter of On the Waterfront) and benefit
for the Center of which Schulberg was an enthusiastic and energetic supporter. I was delighted to have this opportunity
to offer my services.
On Tuesday, February 16th, I
appeared in the final performance as the title character, Max Wolfe, in Steven Shapiro's "It's a Long Way Home, Mr. Wolfe", under the direction of Heidi Handelsman.
Presented as part of the Riant Theatre's annual Strawberry One-Act Play Festival at the American Theatre of Actors in Manhattan,
the play was funny, touching, gentle and
a bit profound. I enjoyed the work and the people I worked with, and given its selection for the semi-finals, our audiences
apparently did as well.
On Thursday, February 4, I appeared in readings
of two short works by graduate students in the NYU/Tisch School of the Arts Dramatic Writing Program. The bill was called
2010 Marathon of New Works and was presented in the Goldberg Theatre. Both works were by playwrights had I worked with
last term: Chase Marotz's "Headspace" and a scene from Derek Anderson's "Socrates".
From December 5 - 21, 2009, I appeared as Ron in
Alex Ladd's new short play "The Knot", directed by Arthur French and presented by HB Playwrights Foundation at the
HB Playhouse. Arthur is a legendary actor, director and teacher. Alex is terrific young writer with whom I worked
earlier last year in a reading from his published translation of short stories by the Brazilian writer Nelson Rodrigues.
The play was part of an 8 play evening of short pieces (there were two such 8 play evenings in repertory).
From Tuesday, August 4th through Sunday, August 23rd, I
appeared in The Metropolitan Playhouse's East Village Theatre Festival, a celebration of the life and lore of the East Village.
For this sixth season of The East Village Chronicles, four short plays presented in two series of four each, I appeared in
one play in each series. In Series "A", I played Abie, a deli owner and Holocaust survivor in Morna
M. Martell's "The East Fourth Street Years", directed by Laura Livingston. In Series "B", I played
Maxie in Robert Anthony's "Day Old Bread", directed by Jackob Hofmann. Maxie collects real day old bread from
East Village delis to feed to the birds of his memories. There was a lovely review from Martin Denton and Matt Roberson
of NYTheatre.com posted on Wednesday, 8/12. They said some awfully nice things about the East Village Theatre Festival
as a whole, about the quality of the acting overall, about both plays that I was in, about my scene partners and about my
work in them. The review is available at
AND... I continue auditioning judiciously, studying with both of my legendary teachers,
Terry Schreiber and Austin Pendleton, and the wonderful actors at the T. Schreiber and H.B. Studios; and, as Al Jolson put
it, "You ain't seen nuthin' yet"!
