cell: 323-286-3999
(I’m currently living in Japan. Calls will get through to me, but you may have to leave a message, since the time zone is pretty much the opposite of the U.S.)
- My first feature film, Waking Up in Idaho, is now in post-production.
- I have half a dozen feature scripts in progress, and a couple more in the research stage.
- My short films have won 27 awards (20 are listed on IMDb) and screened in 150 festivals since 2016.
- I train in gymnastics two to three times a week. I started in fall 2021, with no previous experience. It’s huge fun!
- I used to publish environmental science books in a small family business, along with my father and brother.
- I started doing parkour in the fall of 2021. Hard to say whether it or gymnastics is more fun, and there is crossover of skills between the two.
- I’ve been the Animation Curator for the New York City Independent Film Festival for the last six years, even though I don’t live in New York.
- I never had never acted—not even in a school play—until I was 45. I was invited to an audition just to watch, at the 13th Street Repertory Theatre in Manhattan, and when they ran through all their actors and no one fit, I ended up with the part.
- I had lead roles in three Off-Off-Broadway plays in my first year of acting.
- After I started acting, I took a couple of acting classes, but soon I was too busy acting and never took another.
- I won a Best Actor award (not IMDb-accredited) for the first short film I ever acted in.
- From 2003 to 2010 I acted in 150 student and indie films, including 75 for USC.
- I’ve written and directed 25 short films. I have not been to film school, nor taken writing classes.
- I lived in Tijuana, Mexico for three years, where I directed some short films in Spanish, and taught an acting class in Spanish.
- From 2014 until November 2019 I took care of my elderly mother in Michigan. During that time I occasionally flew to L.A. for a weekend to shoot short films (mainly the Antiwar Comedy Shorts).
- I enjoy languages. I’ve studied 10, in college or on my own. I can converse in half of those, but have forgotten others, like Swahili. My current focus is Japanese. (My grandchildren are half Japanese, and live in Japan.)
- I enjoy swimming, hiking, riding my bike, and doing qigong.
- In late 2020 I enjoyed learning some basic stunt work, such as bo staff fighting, high falls, and catching arrows in mid flight.
- I was born with a caul.
- I subscribe to no particular religion, but draw from many different spiritual sources, both ancient and modern.
