Greetings! Isn't it funny how life changes as fast as it does. I remember when my son was born back in 1998. When I think about it I can remember every detail and that was over 15 years ago. The fact that the last 3 years my life has been a blur is an understatement. I have done so many different things during this time that my friends constantly remind me of all the things that I have accomplished. To me, they are just things I do that make me happy. As always, I am constantly pushing the limits, doing new things, advancing my film career knowing that I need to learn more. Its mind boggling to think about all the lessons and realizations I have gone through. The evidence is in the type of acting roles I get or how my scripts unfold when I am writing. Things are definitely advancing and life is on the brink of getting even more exciting.
So I have wonderful news. There was a group of Saskatchewan film makers that entered a film competition called the Cinecoup Accelerator. 90 film projects in total competed with Wolf Cop. It was written by Saskatchewan artist, Writer/Director Lowell Dean. He is a well known director here in Saskatchewan and I have had the pleasure of working with him on a couple of projects a year or so ago. To make a long story short, the group that ran the Wolf Cop project won the competition which meant that they now have a million dollar production budget and guaranteed screenings on 2600 Cineplex screens (don't quote me on this as it could be more...) across Canada. Well Wolf Cop won the completion and I am pleased to announce that I will be appearing in this movie. Its a small role but I have lines in the film. And the fact that I play a tough thug in this movie is also pretty cool too. Playing a bad guy role seems to be very typical for me. I've played a meth addict, a futuristic drug addict, and a killer in the movies I have acted in. I took a workshop with a very good acting coach back in Feb and he taught me that as an actor, I needed to sell my brand or in other words what I was really good at. My brand is bad guy. I play thug very well apparently according to the students at the Saskatchewan Police College. The various scenarios and the students expectation that when they are in my scenario that they have to bring their A game....otherwise the actor in me has fun. Maybe that's why I am playing a thug role in Wolf Cop. The many scenarios I have acted in have prepared me for this moment.
I am very excited about this chance for many reasons. Its my first chance of being in a big budget film with lines. And even though its a small role, it helps with the bigger pictures. And there is always a chance that my look or the way I act out my character may attract the attention of another director or producer. Its definitely another credit to add to my list of accomplishments. This is going to be a fun shoot!
Now to some people, the small role may not seem like much, but to me it is. I earned that spot. Its another learning experience and one more step closer to doing what I love. Its a good way to gauge if I am going in the right direction. I wouldn't want to make the mistake of pursuing something that perhaps I was shouldn't be doing. Landing this role showed me that the learning I did to prepare for auditions had sunk in. This is now the second feature movie that I have been cast in the last 2 years. A year ago it was Bread Thieves (www.breadthievesthemovie.com). The stuff I learned from doing that movie definitely helped me land the role for Wolf Cop. I am totally honored to have been chosen for this role. I really look forward to telling you about my experience on set. If you would like to find out more about Wolf Cop and the journey the production as taken to get to this point, please go to http://archive.cinecoup.com/wolfcop.html and see how the concept went through the competition. To follow the progress of production as the movie is being filmed go to the official site at http://wolfcop.com/ Filming starts tomorrow Oct 27th.
My other feature film Bread Thieves is scheduled to be out soon. Stay tuned for more information about that film as well.
Have a great week!
G.
Saturday 26 October 2013
Monday 14 October 2013
Health Crisis 2013: Bacteria...the scourge of humanity
Greetings everyone. I hope this posting finds you in great spirits as well as health.
Health. We take it for granted sometimes. I mean, if we see a speeding truck we instinctually take the initial action of jumping out of the way. I'm talking about how we take for granted we will not get sick until we get sick. We go throughout our day not even thinking about what is out there that could harm us. I can't say I blame humans for being this way. When we feel good we just go about our lives. Three weeks ago I had one of those health scares that knocked me on my butt and made me slow my life down to a halt.
It started out on a Saturday. I woke up, had breakfast, went and worked out. Just a normal Saturday. After working out I came home, ate lunch and decided to have an afternoon nap. When I woke up I felt achy, almost like I was being hit by the flu. I forced myself to eat later that night and that was when it hit me like a ton of bricks. I went to bed early and didn't get out of bed all day the next day. It wasn't until later that Sunday night that I showed my mom my leg. She's a nurse and when she looked at my leg, which was getting extremely red and puffy, she and immediately said I should go to the hospital. So I went.
I am grateful for the health care system we have in Canada. The downside to it is the long waits in hospital emergency rooms. This particular night was very busy for this particular ER. I was there for 3 1/2 hours, feeling totally ill with a sore lower right leg. To me it looked like an allergic reaction. That being said that I must note that I don't have any allergies. So I was very nervous to say the least. After that 3 hour wait I then decided to just go home and see a doctor the next day.
The next day, I saw the doctor. This MD looked at my leg, said it was an infection called "cellulitis," and she immediately put my on some powerful antibiotics. I went home, took my medicine like a good boy until I realized the next day that this so called bacteria was now tracking up my leg. I then went to a different hospital hoping the wait was less. My leg was a real mess. Red, swollen, and excruciatingly painful. Every time I went from laying down to sitting/standing up made my leg feel like a million spikes were being driven down through my leg towards my foot. No word of a lie, it was the most severe pain I have ever felt in my entire life.
The doctor I saw in the hospital ER (I was seen almost immediately) immediately changed my meds and ordered an ultrasound to make sure I didn't have any clots. My leg was very swollen. As you can see this was turning into quite the nightmare. I had my ultrasound, no clots but they immediately put me on an IV antibiotic that I had to go back and get administered once a day for 6 days.
This was the most sick I have ever been in my life. I really did feel like dying. It was so debilitating. It turned my life upside down and slowed it to a halt. But then, like everything else that ever happens to me, I started thinking to myself at how grateful I was to have all the things I have going for me. I have a job at a company that allows me to take the time to heal myself. I also have a phenomenal group of friends that worried about me and are cheering me on to recovery. I'm being told by the doctors that it will take me up to 3 months to fully recover from what it took this bacteria 3 days to damage. So now I have to endure leg wraps every three days for 2 weeks and then special pressure stockings for 2 months after that. I never once thought that I would have been effected in this way by anything. Its all because I was feeling good. I worked out 4 days a week, I didn't smoke, I ate well, I didn't have any major stresses to bog me down. To go from that to having to prioritize creditors because now I have an illness and have more expenses...you get the picture.
This brings me to the second part of my post. The more I talked about my illness, which I had to explain it to people because I was cancelling out on acting engagements and having time all this time off from work, the more I found out that more people I knew have had this illness. It was more common than a cold in some instances. But why don't people talk about it? I mean, here I was in the midst of a health crisis where, from the research I did, could turn into meningitis, flesh eating disease, coma inducing infections. I could have even lost my leg! It was like 6 degrees of separation through illness. I was shocked that I never heard of any of my friends actually getting this awful sickness until I talked about it. I was expecting shocked looks when I was actually seeing heads nod with understanding.
I am grateful that the survival rate of this illness is high. It knocks us down, expects us to neglect what is happening while making us seriously sick. One thing I can personally say is that it didn't break my spirit. When I was in the midst of feeling ill, I kept on thinking about everything that made me feel good. My son, my family, my friends, my job, my acting, my writing....and the list goes on. Thinking about having all these positives in my life made me put a sense of urgency into making sure I was getting the care I needed. I have lots to live for and I have had a lot of people tell me they were worried. How can I not get better with that kind of support?
I'm on the mend now. 2 weeks of special compression leg wraps and then 2 months of the "special stocking" It would be hoped that I should be back to normal after all that. This whole situation has left me with a sense of being thankful I have had the ability to do all the things I do. It made me appreciate that I have been feeling good enough to do all these things as well it humbled me to know it can be taken away at a moments notice.
That's the underlining moral of this story. Never take for granted all that is positive that you have surrounded yourself with. Support the people that support you and embrace the things that you cherish. Life is very fragile.
Have a great week everyone and Happy Thanksgiving to all my fellow Canadians!
G.
Health. We take it for granted sometimes. I mean, if we see a speeding truck we instinctually take the initial action of jumping out of the way. I'm talking about how we take for granted we will not get sick until we get sick. We go throughout our day not even thinking about what is out there that could harm us. I can't say I blame humans for being this way. When we feel good we just go about our lives. Three weeks ago I had one of those health scares that knocked me on my butt and made me slow my life down to a halt.
It started out on a Saturday. I woke up, had breakfast, went and worked out. Just a normal Saturday. After working out I came home, ate lunch and decided to have an afternoon nap. When I woke up I felt achy, almost like I was being hit by the flu. I forced myself to eat later that night and that was when it hit me like a ton of bricks. I went to bed early and didn't get out of bed all day the next day. It wasn't until later that Sunday night that I showed my mom my leg. She's a nurse and when she looked at my leg, which was getting extremely red and puffy, she and immediately said I should go to the hospital. So I went.
I am grateful for the health care system we have in Canada. The downside to it is the long waits in hospital emergency rooms. This particular night was very busy for this particular ER. I was there for 3 1/2 hours, feeling totally ill with a sore lower right leg. To me it looked like an allergic reaction. That being said that I must note that I don't have any allergies. So I was very nervous to say the least. After that 3 hour wait I then decided to just go home and see a doctor the next day.
The next day, I saw the doctor. This MD looked at my leg, said it was an infection called "cellulitis," and she immediately put my on some powerful antibiotics. I went home, took my medicine like a good boy until I realized the next day that this so called bacteria was now tracking up my leg. I then went to a different hospital hoping the wait was less. My leg was a real mess. Red, swollen, and excruciatingly painful. Every time I went from laying down to sitting/standing up made my leg feel like a million spikes were being driven down through my leg towards my foot. No word of a lie, it was the most severe pain I have ever felt in my entire life.
The doctor I saw in the hospital ER (I was seen almost immediately) immediately changed my meds and ordered an ultrasound to make sure I didn't have any clots. My leg was very swollen. As you can see this was turning into quite the nightmare. I had my ultrasound, no clots but they immediately put me on an IV antibiotic that I had to go back and get administered once a day for 6 days.
This was the most sick I have ever been in my life. I really did feel like dying. It was so debilitating. It turned my life upside down and slowed it to a halt. But then, like everything else that ever happens to me, I started thinking to myself at how grateful I was to have all the things I have going for me. I have a job at a company that allows me to take the time to heal myself. I also have a phenomenal group of friends that worried about me and are cheering me on to recovery. I'm being told by the doctors that it will take me up to 3 months to fully recover from what it took this bacteria 3 days to damage. So now I have to endure leg wraps every three days for 2 weeks and then special pressure stockings for 2 months after that. I never once thought that I would have been effected in this way by anything. Its all because I was feeling good. I worked out 4 days a week, I didn't smoke, I ate well, I didn't have any major stresses to bog me down. To go from that to having to prioritize creditors because now I have an illness and have more expenses...you get the picture.
This brings me to the second part of my post. The more I talked about my illness, which I had to explain it to people because I was cancelling out on acting engagements and having time all this time off from work, the more I found out that more people I knew have had this illness. It was more common than a cold in some instances. But why don't people talk about it? I mean, here I was in the midst of a health crisis where, from the research I did, could turn into meningitis, flesh eating disease, coma inducing infections. I could have even lost my leg! It was like 6 degrees of separation through illness. I was shocked that I never heard of any of my friends actually getting this awful sickness until I talked about it. I was expecting shocked looks when I was actually seeing heads nod with understanding.
I am grateful that the survival rate of this illness is high. It knocks us down, expects us to neglect what is happening while making us seriously sick. One thing I can personally say is that it didn't break my spirit. When I was in the midst of feeling ill, I kept on thinking about everything that made me feel good. My son, my family, my friends, my job, my acting, my writing....and the list goes on. Thinking about having all these positives in my life made me put a sense of urgency into making sure I was getting the care I needed. I have lots to live for and I have had a lot of people tell me they were worried. How can I not get better with that kind of support?
I'm on the mend now. 2 weeks of special compression leg wraps and then 2 months of the "special stocking" It would be hoped that I should be back to normal after all that. This whole situation has left me with a sense of being thankful I have had the ability to do all the things I do. It made me appreciate that I have been feeling good enough to do all these things as well it humbled me to know it can be taken away at a moments notice.
That's the underlining moral of this story. Never take for granted all that is positive that you have surrounded yourself with. Support the people that support you and embrace the things that you cherish. Life is very fragile.
Have a great week everyone and Happy Thanksgiving to all my fellow Canadians!
G.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)