This is a shorter version of his reel. I think I prefer it. However, Arron belives the longer one (with a slight modification) will be of more use to him. He never listens to me that willful young man, and yet it seems to do him no harm.
Arron Shiver was the darling of his Calarts class, and a huge talent. I know this first hand as I cast him in my film String Theory which he carried on his back. It came as a shock to some ( or at least to me) that less that a year after graduating he and his wife decided to move from LA back to Taos New Mexico where he is from. They had their reasons. His wife was pregnant and they had the support network in Taos they felt they needed .
Naturally…
I over stepped my bounds as a friend and a colleague when I told Arron in no uncertain terms that he was making a mistake. A BIG MISTAKE!
You need to be in LA where the action is. I demanded.
What are you going to do in Taos?
Are you going to pay your student loans by doing community theater? I sneered.
People raise kids in LA all the time.
Please, don’t through it all away, I begged dramatically .
Arron did not listen to me, he never does, and moved back home. The result of not listening to ones slightly older and much wiser friends, is posted below. It is in the form of stats I got from IMDB
# Sex & Lies in Sin City (2008 (TV) (filming) …. Evan James
# Sex & Lies in Sin City (2009) (post-production) …. Bernard
# Spoken Word (2009) (post-production) …. Paramedic
# ,Brothers (2008 (post-production) …. A.J.
# Not Forgotten (2008 (post-production) …. Deputy Pratt
# Love N’ Dancing (2008 (post-production) …. Wedding DJ
# Swing Vote (2008 (completed) …. Greenleaf’s Aide
# Hamlet 2 (2008 …. Virgil
# Sunshine Cleaning (2008 …. Detective
# Love Lies Bleeding (2008 (V) …. Room Service Waiter
# “Comanche Moon” (2008 TV mini-series …. Stove Jones
# In the Valley of Elah (2007) …. Cop
# 3:10 to Yuma (2007) …. Bill Moons
# Naked Fear (2007) …. Dwight Terry
# Save Me (2007) …. Jude
# “The Lost Room” (2006) TV mini-series …. Counter Clerk
# Beerfest (2006) …. Strike Out Kid
# Believe in Me (2006) …. Johnny Price
# Three Wise Guys (2005) (TV) …. Wayne
# North Country (2005) (as Aaron Shiver) …. Young Male Doctor
# “Wildfire” …. Lenny Kellman (1 episode, 2005)
– Pilot (2005) TV episode …. Lenny Kellman
# “Into the West” (2005) TV mini-series …. Maj. Edward W. Wynkoop
# String Theory (2004) …. Johnny
# Elvis Has Left the Building (2004) …. Gas Station Guy
# The Missing (2003/I) …. Rancher
# 21 Grams (2003) …. Young Doctor
# Screen Door Jesus (2003) …. George Herbert Jr.
I would be willing to bet my next paycheck that Arron has worked more than any actor from his graduating class. He makes his a living as an actor (no mean accomplishment) and raises his son (with his wife, Anais) in Taos New Mexico. It’s true he got lucky in that New Mexico has seen an unprecedented amount of production in the last few years. It is not however a matter of luck that the very busy NM casting agent, Jo Edna Boldin has taken a shine to him. His success is a result of his talent that stands out no matter where he lives. So I was wrong. Sue me. Arron’s latest reel is below. I edited two versions, one six minutes and one three. I will post the shorter one tomorrow.
The first part of this story was posted some time ago, so here’s a link if you have not read it.
Waleed was in and getting in is hard. Everybody knows that, but what is important to this story is how Waleed behaved once on the other side. It can be summed up in the word “presence” . Waleed was in rehearsal as an understudy. Which meant that he had the hard task of rehearsing without rehearsing. Doing by watching. Taking notes. An understudy wants to perform but if they get to perform they will basically go on un or under rehearsed. While they ( most likely) have no ill will toward the actor they are understudying , how can they not help but to whish them a broken ankle or an aneurism. They are there, paid, and most of the time called upon to do nothing. The tendency I have observed is to disengage. To become separate from the project, and to become resentful because they have signed up for second class status. However, I remember how engaged Waleed was, and his lack of resentment, when he was not running lines with Omar, he was helping me with some Arabic translation, and every time I turned around he was there with a smile or a word of encouragement, yet he was not in the way. No easy trick.
Then it came to pass….
That we were having problems with the part of Saleem, Mahmoud’s uncle. In three productions we had not managed to get that part right. The actor we had hired to play Saleem was fine, yet somehow the very pivotal scene in which he played always seemed wrong. In a late blurry meeting over drinks Garry looked at me and said
“What if he weren’t the uncle but his older brother instead”.
We called in Waleed to read the scene with Omar and without changing a word it made more sense. A lot more sense. (in the sprit of full disclosure there are people who believe this was the wrong choice, and that the play was damaged by this move. They maybe right)
This was great for Waleed, who got out of being an understudy and got to sink his teeth into a meaty role, and not so great for the actor we had hired to play Saleem. However, that actor bowed out with grace and is also someone (should I ever get the chance) I would hire.
So there it is. Brass and Presence.
Below is Sarah Jane Drummey’s reel. Sarah Jane recently moved to LA from London. For the most part she has worked in Irish and British theater, often appearing at the National Theater in London as well as the Abbey Theater in Dublin. She came to LA because she wanted to do more film and TV, and in the spirit of full disclosure, to live with… me. (yep she’s my wife to be). Within a couple months of landing on our fair shores she scored a guest starring role on ER. Although she has great representation now, at the time she was represented by no one but herself. Talk about brass.
This fall US audiences will be able to catch Sarah Jane on stage as Pegeen Mike in the US tour of the Druid Theater’s production of The Playboy of the Western World, directed by Garry Hynes. (Stay tuned for tour dates).
Her reel contains clips from ER, a film called Rory O’Shea Was Here, with James Mc Avoy and a clip from an Irish film titled Bloom. Although she had quite a few other clips to choose from she decided not to include them. She wanted a simple reel that shows her off, in three distinct types of roles. And I totally agree with her. Often more of the same is simply that, more of the same.
Something about talking about the “things you are going to do” seems to diminish those very things. Talking about future plans, steals energy from those very plans
The same holds true for things you have already done. Real accomplishment can have its luster worn away by constant recounting.
However, knowing that you are going to do something, and not talking about it has a power that is hard to describe. It puts you one up like a poker player with pocket kings.
Also
Not touting your past accomplishments has that same power. Even better, pocket aces, and most likely to be tuned over by someone else, when they get curious enough.
I have noticed something about people lately. I have noticed that I am a attracted to people who appear to be in harmony with their own perception of themselves, just as I am repulsed by people who appear to be indisharmony. I can only assume that my experience is not unique.
Disharmony ( of this particular sort) is easier to describe so I will start there. A person in a state of disharmony sees themselves differently from the job they are doing on that day. The perception of disharmony is ( an this is the important bit) heightened by a attempts on their part, to bring you around to their way of seeing themselves.
For example: not long ago I was working on a commercial ( as an Art PA) and I met a woman who had been hired as a shopper. I had not known her one minute before she told me that generally she is not a shopper but an art director and that she only took the gig because she needed the money. I heard her repeat this three other times through out the day. And each time I wondered how we were supposed to receive this information. Should we treat her as an art director because that is what she is ( although as it happens on that day she was not)? Should we feel sorry for her that she has fallen on hard times?
The truth was as an art PA I understood her circumstance very well. I did not want to be working in the capacity that I was in either. I wanted to tell her, “I hear ya sister, I too have commanded more respect than I am getting today. I too see myself differently than I appear on this day. Others have seen me differently too. However, I kept my mouth shut. I do most of the time, although it is hard and some days are better than others. I kept my moth shut because saying you Are something ( like a writer or an actor) does not make it so. Wanting to be something does not make it so. Having been something at one time, or even many times in the past does not make it so. What you are on any given day is what you are!
No, I take it back… a day is too long. What you are in any given moment is what you are. If you are a grip by day but you are writing a screenplay at night, than at night at least you are a writer, no less a writer then George Bernard Shaw, or Ethan Cohen . It is after all the same animal involved in the very same noble act.
I think the way to move away from disharmony is to have a secret life, and a life that you live right next to it, one in which you make money however you can. However, mixing the two…
More on that tomorrow.
In my country I am a doctor…
Really, I’m an actor….
I’ve written six features, I am just doing this until my agent gets off her ass and makes a deal…
I am a designer, I am just helping out here but really…
Visit any film set, out of one hundred people on the set, four of those people are referred to by the reverent yet infantilizing word talent, there is the Director, the producers, and the other ninety are crew. OF those ninety somewhere around forty are who they are not. They are grips who are really actors. PA’s with screen plays, Electricians who are really directors, ect, ect, ect… As a matter of act I have to go to work myself ( art department). My next couple of posts will be a discussion of the disconnect between how we see ourselves and the reality of our days. I could use some help if anyone would like to chime in.
I do have a movie recommendation. Son of Rambow What a great film. If you grew up in the eighties, if you had a rich fantasy life as a child… i know, I describe quite a few movies, right? yeah. But somehow this one managed a trick that in my mind separates art from the rest, it managed to avoid both easy sentimentality and easier still, cynicism, so as to deliver authenticity. It’s that simple, right? Move over ET, it’s The Son of Rambow’s turn at the wheel.
This is a video I made last summer as a visual aid to the producer who had optioned the screen rights to my play Sixteen Wounded. I put it together to help her pitch the project. I don’t think she ever used it although I don’t know that. Her option has expired. The video is built entirely of stills, some grabbed from the net and some from the different productions of the play. The audio comes from LA Theater works recording for the radio. I am proud of this little video as I believe it goes some way in capturing the spirit of the play in a short time. The voices you hear are those of Omar Metwally, Annabelle Gurwitch and Martin Rayner. The music is from a compilation called Dessert Grooves.
So, this is the shortest of the three but still long by some standards.
Casting and talent agents are people famously short on time and we never want to give them an excuse to skip to the next reel however, Dylan has done quite a bit of work and so it is important to show the breadth of his experience. In this cut I just used the very center of the clips, nothing but the meatiest bits. I re-cut a couple of the scenes to favor Dylan a little, and I still used the one comedy clip as a juxtaposition to all the Alpha male roles he’s played. I don’t think Dylan needs both a three and a five minute reel, and I suppose that he will decide which is more useful to him. The question is does he need a one minute reel? Something that does not necessarily show off his acting ability just his different looks?
