PODCAST FROM AMERICA: EPISODE 5 WITH MARK GANTT

Welcome to the Christmas episode of PODCAST FROM AMERICA, with my special guest Mark Gantt, a talented actor/writer/producer/director, who I was lucky enough to speak to at the beginning of October. You can listen to the show via iTunes by clicking this link.

I’ve been following Mark’s career with interest since I met him on the set of Sony’s The Bannen Way, just over a year ago. He and his Bannen co-creator, Jesse Warren, were on day 18 of a 19-day shoot at the Lacy Street Studios in east LA, filming their ground-breaking high-production value web series, about a gangster who wants to go straight.

I blogged at the time that ‘Hollywood’s future was in Bannen’s hands‘, and after the series scored more than 14 million hits, and went on to be sold as a feature on DVD, I think they ably demonstrated that well-produced, original web shows can have clout. Their model is very new, but proves that there is another viable way that talented actors, producers and directors, who might otherwise not get the chance, can showcase their talents.

Mark’s now an authority on making shows on the web, and runs a kick-ass course on the subject – find out more at www.ganttworkshops.com.

He also has a host of projects coming up, including the episode of Suite 7 that he directed, starring Eddie McClintock and Jaime Murray, which is out now.

NOVEMBER 30, 2010
I've mentioned this in a couple different interviews but wanted to expand on it a bit in a new unit of time. I think it was mid 2005, I sat down with my mentor and teacher, Milton Katselas to discuss my decision to QUIT acting. I was very frustrated. I wasn't enjoying acting, the business mostly, but it affected my desire to improve my craft in class. So I was going to tell Milton that I wanted to quit acting and pursue directing. I sat across from him in his incredible house and pleaded my case, "I don't enjoy acting anymore. I love directing. I realize when I assist you Milton, I'm watching you as a director, seeing how you discover what the scene's about, work with the actors and tell a story. When I watch a movie, I'm thinking as a director, as a filmmaker, not as an actor studying their choices. I am a director!" I sat back in my chair, I felt good about what I just spewed.  Sitting next to me, was Art Cohan, the Senior Stage Manager of the Beverly Hills Playhouse, Milton's right hand and one of my best friends. I looked over to him for reassurance as Milton began writing on his notepad in broad strokes. He wrote the words ACTOR and DIRECTOR and drew a line between them.  He turned the pad to me and said, "You have to make a decision today, ACTOR or DIRECTOR... you can only do one... which?"

Several other actors also have signed on for 'Suite 7,' which is sponsored by the Better Sleep Council and will be distributed online by Lifetime via MyLifetime.com, Hulu and others.

NEW YORK -- Milo Ventimiglia (Heroes), Craig Bierko (Damages), Shannen Doherty (Charmed), Illeana Douglas (Entourage), Brian Austin Green (Desperate Housewives), Eddie McClintock (Warehouse 13) and Jaime Murray (Dexter) are among the Hollywood names that will star in Suite 7, a seven-episode branded web series to debut Dec. 17.

The show, to be distributed online by Lifetime via MyLifetime.com, Hulu and others, is sponsored by the Better Sleep Council, the consumer education arm of the International Sleep Products Assn., to heighten awareness of the important role proper sleep plays in health and well-being.

Suite 7 is the latest sign that entertainment industry talent is increasingly taking to branded entertainment. The show was developed in collaboration with marketing/PR agency CJP Communications, whose branded entertainment arm CJP Digital Media is producing.

Each week, the web series will see a new couple -- newlyweds, divorcing couples, best friends, business partners, co-workers or even total strangers -- check into Suite 7 and unpack personal baggage.

The series' seven writers include Bierko and Douglas, and its five directors include Doherty and Ventimiglia.

Also involved in writing or directing roles are Susan Miller (The L Word, Anyone But Me), Mark Gantt (The Bannen Way), Tony Janning & Sandeep Parikh (The Legend of Neil), Wilson Cleveland (The Temp Life) and Michael Kang (Easy to Assemble).

Three years or so ago, Mark Gantt found himself dissatisfied with the way his acting career was progressing. In fact, it was barely inching forward. His girlfriend had booked a film and a TV pilot, but Gantt was spinning his wheels, unable to get many auditions or meetings with casting directors. His one dependable creative outlet was his acting classes at the Beverly Hills Playhouse.

One day a woman in class complained that her career was, like Gantt’s, stalled, while her sister was booking work regularly. The teacher, Allen Barton, advised, “You’ve just got to build your own door and walk through it.”
Barton’s edict touched a nerve with Gantt, setting him on a course that would result in a starring role in an original web series and feature film, both entitled The Bannen Way. Gantt would play Neil Bannen, a suave chick-magnet of a thief who finds himself torn between the examples set by his chief-of-police father and his criminally inclined uncle.

Gantt says of the moment he decided to produce original content. “I’ve been on sets and I actually directed a couple of shorts and some music videos back in 2003 and 2004. So I knew how to create stuff.”

Gantt had begun working in the industry in 1991, starting as a production assistant, then a driver, and finally an assistant prop master. He had developed a pattern in which six months each year were devoted to prop-department work and six to his acting and other creative pursuits. Now he was ready to push forward fulltime with the latter.

I guess it's usually misquoted, people usually say, "If you build it, they will come." But in Field Of Dreams, Kevin Costner's character hears "If you build it, HE will come." I guess, in a way, it actually works the way it was said originally. I'm realizing that I am a BRAND, a BUSINESS. I'm no longer just an actor with a 'B' job. I think as artists, it's hard to think of us as a business and well, to even think with a business mind. I just overheard a make-up artist on set say she'd never worked in an office. She said that the joke with her fellow Emory classmates is they're not good at math. "That's why I date Jewish men so they can figure out the tip." But what I heard was, that she's an artist, she doesn't do the 'business thing' it's not her strength. I also saw a tweet from Felicia Day today, mentioning digging up W-9's and getting credit reports and that the business stuff takes longer than the creative at times. I'm rambling a bit, there's a lot of stuff rolling around in my head lately.

One of my teachers, Richard Lawson talks about the misconception of an actor and as a character. He'd take two tapes (before digitally recording critiques at The Beverly Hills Playhouse) and hold them up. He'd say, "This is you as the actor, this is you as the character. They look identical, but they are different. You have to learn to let that character go. You created it, put it out there and now it's done." I took that literally and said, well my 'acting career' is that over there, disconnected from me, Mark, the person.

Revealed: Season 5 Guest Stars and More!

Temp Life creator/producer and star Wilson Cleveland enlisted The Legend of Neil’s Tony Janning and Gabe Uhr to write the new season which finds Nick “Trouble” Chiapetta (Cleveland) resuming control of hiring temps at Celltons, now the number-two cellphone button-maker in the country. When Celltons’ icy CEO, Eve Randall (Douglas reprising her role), believes one of Nick’s temps is sabotaging the company from within, everybody is a suspect including Nick’s estranged stepbrother Eddie (Bierko), a socially-ungraceful cafeteria temp (Ventimiglia) and other temp hires played by new and returning guest stars Tony Janning, Sandeep Parikh (The Guild, The Legend of Neil), Taryn Southern (Rules of Engagement) Mark Gantt (The Bannen Way), Jessica Rose (lonelygirl15, Greek), Ben Blair and Anyone But Me's Rachel Hip-Flores.