Actor?! ...NOT!
For many years, I’ve played improv music for various events including dance and yoga classes…something that I really love doing. There’s nothing like creating music with friends, spontaneously. Some of the best musical moments have been in these situations and for a time, I had a group called SoulKaTu, which also included fellow percussionists Rich Ferguson, Butch Norton, Kalani and Michael Barsimanto. One of the regular yoga classes we performed at was for yoga instructor/actor/musician - and Sage, James Morrison. Always a great experience.
In late 2010, my touring career slowed down a bit and I was always looking for something else creative to do, to stay busy and make some dough. At this time, I was also on a hiatus from my work in the music instrument industry. One of our guest percussionists at a class one day was TV director Richard Rosser and we got to talking. He mentioned to me that they were looking for some background actors for a new show he was directing on CBS called “The Defenders”, starring Jim Belushi and Jerry O’Connell. I said I’d never done it before, but he thought I’d be good for it, so I thought, why not!
What a trip this was. It lasted for about 6 months and I found it really interesting, as well as, at times - extremely boring. I’ve always been a big fan of TV and Film, so to be on the inside was fascinating. I loved going to the set every day and seeing the backstage activity and how it was all put together. When I say boring, here’s what I mean - being a background actor or extra as it commonly referred, can have A LOT of down time. While I didn’t have any speaking parts, they did in fact use me a lot on camera. I had a look they liked…I had long hair, I was in a suit and kind of became their ‘hippie’ lawyer type. So, I did get some air time, as you’ll see from the two attached screen shots!
One game I liked to play was to try and guess which take they would end up finally using, from the many takes they’d go for. You’d be surprised how many takes goes into one TV scene, or how many times the actors would mess up their lines, forget lines, etc. Guessing the final take I noticed had something to do with something else I knew a lot about - rhythm. The timing of their delivery…how natural the lines were spoken, etc…I noticed all played a part. I often guessed right, which was really kinda fun.
While I never got asked to do a speaking part, I kinda did get the bug that one day, I’d possibly do this again…but the down-time was pretty hefty. They housed the background players in a room, while you wait until your next call and it was the kind of thing that you couldn’t bring your computer, etc to do other work, due to security issues, so we either read books or talked amongst each other. It was interesting to meet some of these other actors who actually made a career on playing the background thing. The $$ wasn’t great but if the day went on past 8 hours, you’d tend to make a nice taste. Which was often the case - long days are typical in television.
One missed opportunity was getting to meet and talk with Jim Belushi, which I wished I had cause he & I had a shared experience years ago. I was touring with Glenn Frey and Joe Walsh and Jim was doing the Blues Brothers thing and at one show, they opened for us at Mandalay Bay’s outdoor stage in Vegas. Really great night…wish I could’ve share that with him. He was the ’star’ though, so not much interaction with us ‘little’ people! Jerry however was quite friendly and would share a meal with us, from time to time. Nice cat.
So there it is…my very short acting career! We never know where we’ll end up, if we’re open to trying out new things. All-in-all, it was a really cool experience and I’m so glad I did it.
Who knows, maybe one day I’ll take an improv acting class. It would be, at the very least, interesting to see the parallels to performing improv music!
