Chicago

009 David Dastmalchian on That One Audition with Alyshia Ochse

David Dastmalchian
David Dastmalchian 1920 960 Alyshia Ochse

No Agent, No problem

Award winning actor, writer, producer, and filmmaker David Dastmalchian is known for bringing complex characters to life on screen in film and television, and penning raw, harrowing tales of flawed individuals from all walks of life. David has become one of the most in-demand talents in the entertainment industry today.

This year David will be heading to the DC Universe starring as the iconic Polka-Dot Man opposite Margot Robbie, Joel Kinnaman, John Cena, and Idris Elba in James Gunn’s “The Suicide Squad” (Warner Bros Pictures). The film follows super villains Harley Quinn, Bloodsport, Peacemaker, Polka-Dot Man, and a collection of nutty cons at Belle Reve prison who join the super-secret, super-shady Task Force X as they are dropped off at the remote, enemy-infused island of Corto Maltese. “The Suicide Squad” will debut in theaters on August 6, 2021. Next, David will star in Legendary Studio/Warner Bros’ upcoming blockbuster adaptation of Frank Herbert’s bestselling sci-fi novel “Dune,” playing Piter De Vries opposite Timothée Chalamet, Oscar Isaac, Rebecca Ferguson, Dave Bautista, and Josh Brolin. Directed by Denis Villeneuve, this visually stunning, sci-fi masterpiece is slated for release on October 1, 2021.

Originally from Kansas, David was discovered by Christopher Nolan nearly a decade ago, making his silver screen debut in the iconic, award winning feature “The Dark Knight,” which launched his career from the stage, to film and television. Since then, David has been hand-picked for dynamic roles by critically acclaimed directors including: David Lynch, Denis Villeneuve, James Gunn, two-time Cannes winner Michel Franco, Sam Taylor Johnson, and Susanne Bier (to name a few). Previous film credits include: Sam Taylor-Johnson’s directed film adaptation of “A Million Little Pieces,” Academy Award nominated feature “Prisoners,” (Warner Bros.) Disney/Marvel’s “Ant-Man” and “Ant-Man and the Wasp,” “Birdbox” opposite Sandra Bullock for Netflix, “The Domestics” for MGM, “Blade Runner 2049” for Warner Bros. opposite Ryan Gosling and Robin Wright, indie horror-thriller “The Belko Experiment” opposite Michael Rooker and John C. McGinley, and “Relaxer,” written and directed by Joel Potrykus.

While working in film and television keeps David busy, he recently collaborated with Dark Horse Comics to turn his childhood passion of creating a comic book series into a reality, with the launch of “Count Crowley: Reluctant Midnight Monster Hunter.” Written by David and illustrated by Lukas Ketner, the comic follows Jerri Bartman, a once rising TV journalist who has returned to her small Midwest hometown TV station. Demoted to hosting the nightly Creature Feature, Jerri’s professional humiliation is eclipsed by the discovery that her new job comes with a secret, supernatural duty. Her missing predecessor, Count Crowley, was one of the last “appointed” hunters of monsters. Monsters are real, and they’re hell-bent on controlling the news and information consumed by humans. All issues of “Count Crowley” are available online and at comic stores nationwide.

Resources

LINKS:
QUOTES:

“I love when actors and directors have those special relationships.”

“You have to get to know yourself and care about yourself so deeply and in such an authentic way that it’s enough. The journey is enough. The process is enough. The work is enough.”

VIDEOS:

Credits:

  • WRITER: Erin McCluskey
  • SOUND DESIGN: Zachary Jameson
  • WEBSITE & GRAPHICS: Chase Jennings
  • ASSISTANT: Elle Powell
  • SOCIAL OUTREACH: Bebe Katsenes
Anthony Meindl on That One Audition with Alyshia Ochse

WW: Anthony Meindl
WW: Anthony Meindl 1500 750 Alyshia Ochse

Stop Waiting: Allow Yourself A World Beyond Acting

Anthony Meindl is an LA-based multi-hyphenate talent. He is a director, screenwriter, teacher, actor, coach, entrepreneur, author, and inspirational speaker. He is also the founder of AMAW studios worldwide, with studios in LA, London, NY, Vancouver, Toronto, Sydney and Atlanta.

Anthony is known for revolutionizing a more modern understanding of acting training. He has guest lectured at the Gaiety School/The National Theatre School of Ireland, the prestigious Moscow Art Theater, the Actors Centre London, and is the guest acting teacher at David Lynch’s Masters of Filmmaking Program. He has taught internationally in Sofia, Bulgaria, Rome, Capetown, South Africa, Melbourne, and Paris.

As a filmmaker, Anthony has received a number of awards and acclaim. His latest feature film, WHERE WE GO FROM HERE premiered at Outfest in Los Angeles, won the Jury Award at NYC’s East Village Queer Film Festival, and is available to view on HULU.

As an inspirational speaker he’s shared the stage with such luminaries as Jim Carey, Jack Cornfield and Tom Shadyac. He is also the author of three books: At Left Brain Turn Right, Book The F*cking Job and Alphabet Soup for Grown-ups. His latest book, You Knew When You Were Two, is soon to be published.

You can check out Anthony’s podcast In The Moment on iTunes.

Resources

LINKS:
QUOTES:

“Acting is just ONE vehicle of expression of who we are.”

“You don’t need more confidence to act, you just need more courage.”

VIDEOS:

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Credits:

RE-RELEASE: Merle Dandridge
RE-RELEASE: Merle Dandridge 1500 750 Alyshia Ochse

GREENLEAF Made Oprah Find the Star

Merle was born in Okinawa, Japan to a mother of Korean and Japanese descent and an African-American father serving in the U.S Force. Growing up in Nebraska,but not into football, Merle didn’t know where she fit. A friend encouraged Merle to choose drama as a study because she was told it was “easy”. Little did Merle know that the drama department would be the community she had been longing for and that expression would give her the platform to explore social conditions and and the emotions that must be exposed to understand and accept each other. Merle graduated college and had a wild inclination that New York was where she needed to be to fulfill her purpose. With $107 in her pock, a packed Uhaul and an ailing kitten, she drove to New York and landed in the sea of many hopeful artist. Merle was still figuring out what was cool and learning everything on the fly. At the time a non-equity actor, she heard that everyone in town was going to audition for “Jesus Christ Superstar”, so she decided to learn a song and stand in line at 4am to hopefully be given the opportunity to audition. At 1pm the casting director not only called her in to the room, but gave her the space and the light to shine. Even though most things came to Merle very easily, she was still doing what she considers “on the job” training and chasing after an idea or feeling of what it is to be an actress. After a job replaced her, a blessing in disguise, Merle accredits her acting coach Warner Loughlin for giving her the strength and confidence to approach every role with ease and unwavering sense of responsibility to the intention and message of the role. After working three jobs to support her theater career, Merle Dandridge landed herself in the company of Oprah and now holds the honor of portraying Grace on OWN’s hit show, GREENLEAF. This woman’s 25 year journey is nothing short of resilient, spiritual, and guided.

Merle Dandridge currently can be seen critically acclaimed show “Greenleaf” on OWN network and will be on Broadway for the rest of 2017 in the play “Once on this Island”.

Tune in

Listen On iTunes

Resources

LINKS:
QUOTES:

“You’re never walled in for no reason, you are walled in to deflect you to where you are suppose to go.” CLICK TO TWEET

RE-RELEASE: Paul Adelstein
RE-RELEASE: Paul Adelstein 1500 750 Alyshia Ochse

Bloom Where You’re Planted, Keep Moving Forward

Today we chat with Paul Adelstein, from Private Practice, Prison Break, Scandal, and Girlfriend’s Guide to Divorce, as he lays out his 30 year career for us, sharing some of the most inspirational, motivational, and insightful stories, and how he’s managed to turn countless challenges into opportunities to win.

Beginning in Chicago, he began his career as a member of John Cusack’s commedia-style theatre company. We talk about how the rigor of this group prepared him for anything, and as he shares with us here, there was a lot to be prepared for. From the jobs he’s lost, to the ones that have come to define his career, he’s unappologetically honest about what it takes to persevere and stay focused, even when everything seems to be falling apart. From a pre-audition pep-talk from John Travolta, to a meeting with Shonda Rhimes that lead to a direct offer, his journey proves that things always work themselves out, and often lead to beautiful, seemingly fortuitous, full-circle moments that make an artistic life worth the uncertainty and risk.

Regardless of where you are on your journey, whether you’re at a peak, or feel stuck in a valley, today’s conversation is for you. Full of encouragement and optimism, this bird’s-eye-view of a career is a reminder that things are always working out for good. Your good and for the good of great storytelling.

Tune in

Listen On iTunes

Resources

LINKS:
QUOTES:

“It’s all storytelling. Whether you’re acting or writing or directing. It’s all service of the story.”

“Bloom where you’re planted, keep moving forward.”

 

078: Paul Adelstein
078: Paul Adelstein 1500 750 Alyshia Ochse

Today we chat with Paul Adelstein, from Private Practice, Prison Break, Scandal, and Girlfriend’s Guide to Divorce, as he lays out his 30 year career for us, sharing some of the most inspirational, motivational, and insightful stories, and how he’s managed to turn countless challenges into opportunities to win.

Beginning in Chicago, he began his career as a member of John Cusack’s commedia-style theatre company. We talk about how the rigor of this group prepared him for anything, and as he shares with us here, there was a lot to be prepared for. From the jobs he’s lost, to the ones that have come to define his career, he’s unappologetically honest about what it takes to persevere and stay focused, even when everything seems to be falling apart. From a pre-audition pep-talk from John Travolta, to a meeting with Shonda Rhimes that lead to a direct offer, his journey proves that things always work themselves out, and often lead to beautiful, seemingly fortuitous, full-circle moments that make an artistic life worth the uncertainty and risk.

Regardless of where you are on your journey, whether you’re at a peak, or feel stuck in a valley, today’s conversation is for you. Full of encouragement and optimism, this bird’s-eye-view of a career is a reminder that things are always working out for good. Your good and for the good of great storytelling.

Tune in

Listen On iTunes

 

Resources

LINKS:
QUOTES:

“It’s all storytelling. Whether you’re acting or writing or directing. It’s all service of the story.”

“Bloom where you’re planted, keep moving forward.”

 

074: Katie O’Brien & Katy Colloton
074: Katie O’Brien & Katy Colloton 1500 750 Alyshia Ochse

Today we’re chatting with TWO extraordinary women who took the advice we’ve all heard, “Create your own content,” to the extreme and landed themselves with Series Regular, Writing, and Producing roles on their own comedy show on TV Land. These ladies began performing together in sketch groups in Chicago, where they created their own short-form webseries that ultimately lead them to Los Angeles, where they sold their show TEACHERS to TV Land. 50 episodes later, and they’re here to share what they’ve learned about acting, producing, auditioning, and being a boss!

Katie O’Brien hails from Omaha, Nebraska, but is now an actress and comedienne living and working in Los Angeles. Katie has appeared in Nora Ephron’s, Love, Lost and What I Wore, Key and Peele, and is currently one of the creators, writers, executive producers and stars in TV Land’s hit, underground comedy, Teachers. Katie has also appeared on the Today Show, Comedy Central’s @ Midnight and Kocktails with Khloe.

Katy Colloton is one of the creators, executive producers, writers and actors on the TV Land show Teachers.  This year she has developed TV for NBC Universal and a feature with Bluegrass Films and Scott Stuber.  Katy received her B.A. in theater and psychology from Vanderbilt University.  Before moving to LA, Katy performed comedy in Chicago at Second City, iO, and The Annoyance Theater.

 

Tune in

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Resources

LINKS:
QUOTES:

“There was so much we learned. It taught me to trust my instincts…I don’t really believe people buy a show, I think they buy your voice…Trust your instincts. They’re buying what you love.”

“So much of this experience for me was that everybody knows more than I do. Because I’ve never done this before. But then I realized, no, nobody knows what they’re doing. Everybody is faking it till they make it.”

“The only thing you have to offer, that’s different than everyone else, is You. I formed a million sketch groups to get attention and be seen. Do a webseries to get noticed, yes. But create something that you want to create, who cares if everyone says no one’s going to watch that.”

VIDEOS:

Amy Landecker on That One Audition with Alyshia Ochse

072: Amy Landecker
072: Amy Landecker 1500 750 Alyshia Ochse

Today we have a really special conversation with an actress who has defied what we’re often told is possible in a Hollywood career. She started on stage with the Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago, but didn’t make it to Los Angeles till she was nearly 40. She is an example of what can happen when an artist decides to be the exception, embrace fear, and relinquish over-thinking.

We also get to chat about failure, how it is a vital part of success as an actor, and how she’s been able to take professional and personal challenges, and turn them into opportunities to tell stories with some of Hollywood’s most innovative artists.

She’s developed an incredible body of work that includes working with the Cohen Brothers, booking 9 (count them!) 9 guest stars in one year, and most notably her role on Amazon’s Transparent.

Amy Landecker started her career as a theatre actor in Chicago IL, where she worked with the Steppenwolf and Goodman theaters. A transfer production from Chicago brought her to NYC and the Public Theatre. While in New York, she worked at the Barrow St Theater and Second Stage. She eventually made her way to Los Angeles, where she was tapped to play “Mrs. Samsky” in the Coen brothers’ Oscar-nominated A Serious Man (2009). After a long series of guest star and recurring roles in shows like Mad Men, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Louie, and The Paul Reiser Show, she landed her current starring role as “Sarah Pfefferman” in the Emmy and Golden Globe award-winning series, Transparent (2014). Amy has also written pilots for FX and Amazon and is a top VO talent in animation and commercials.

 

Tune in

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Resources

LINKS:
QUOTES:

“Regardless of what you look like, you have to have confidence.” – Amy Landecker

“You can’t look at the stats, you have to believe you can be an exception.” – Amy Landecker

“We’re ageless in our artistry if we allow ourselves to be.” – Alyshia Ochse

VIDEOS:

Amy Scott on That One Audition with Alyshia Ochse

BONUS: Amy Scott
BONUS: Amy Scott 1500 750 Alyshia Ochse

“It’s a hell of a drug, storytelling…” Amy Scott takes us on her journey of storytelling through cutting and directing the messages that the world must explore! Her tenacity and fearlessness in pursuing the films she wanted made, her ingenuity and painstaking detail, her drive and talent, and the fact that she taught herself how to expertly fine tune her narrative and lovingly portray her subjects while editing and directing is beyond inspiring. This conversation explores the subject of her Sundance nominated film “Hal, her life in Los Angeles, motherhood, 70’s cinema, invaluable how to’s, getting those creative chills, crowdfunding, and why she wouldn’t be in any other career.

Amy Scott is a Los Angeles based filmmaker and editor originally from Lawton, Oklahoma. Throughout her twelve year career she’s created films, shorts and music videos. After receiving her BFA in Film Studies from University of Oklahoma she spent a decade in Chicago, Illinois working as a documentary filmmaker, editor and as media producer for the University of Chicago, the head digital archivist at the Chicago History Museum under Studs Terkel. Scott also taught as an instructor of documentary film at Chicago Filmmakers. Scott is best known for her work as editor on projects such as The History of Caves, Me, The Beast & The Angel, and Fully Loaded. Her Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury Prize nominated feature-length directorial debut Once I Was: The Hal Ashby Story follows the life and career of filmmaker Hal Ashby.

 

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Resources

LINKS:
QUOTES:

“I just needed to know that there was something outside of the four walls or the city limits that I lived in, and I needed to know that there was a giant world out there of culture that I could go and explore.”

“Most of all I loved interviewing people, and so that kind of stuck with me and I think that’s the route I took with journalism and then crossed over into documentary films.”

“In documentary it is a complete snake on its tail.”

“You think you know the story, but then you get in, and you start watching every frame of footage that you shot and inevitably a different story will emerge and that’s when you can really dig in and kind of really craft what it is that you’re trying to say with your film.”

“Cut to what you want to see when you want to see it. And that’s it. It can be that simple.”

“We were wrapping up the film, and then I had this dream that I’d smoked a joint with Hal and he was telling me, he’s like, “There’s more archival, kid. You gotta go find it. You’re not done yet.”

“There’s nothing more fascinating to me than other people’s stories, and I think as humans we look to each other for support and knowledge.”

“It’s a hell of a drug, storytelling.”

VIDEOS:

Chris Sullivan on That One Audition with Alyshia Ochse

018: Chris Sullivan
018: Chris Sullivan 1920 960 Alyshia Ochse

THIS IS US made America sit up in their seats and pay attention to the man behind the immediate heart throb of Toby, Chris Sullivan.  He first gained attention for his portrayal of Tom Cleary on the Cinemax drama THE KNICK.   He played Benny Hammond in STRANGER THINGS and Taserface in GUARDIAN OF GALAXY VOL. 2.  It may appear that Chris had an easy ride to the dense career track he is on, but he has been putting in the work for over 17 years.  Graduation from Loyal Marymont University left him transformed from a Tennis pro turned actor and climbing the ladder to seek representation.   A self-proclaimed perfectionist and dedicated artist with no backup plan, listen in to see how he landed his agent several years after graduation, how he made $5000 stretch for almost a year living in Los Angeles, how Broadway prepared him for a role of a lifetime on the Cinemax show THE KNICK and how every part since The KNICK can all be traced back to that character.

Chris is currently starring on the hit NBC show THIS IS US and is the lead singer of the band SULLY AND THE BENEVOLENT FOLK.

Tune into our Interview on iTunes HERE

 

 

Resources

LINKS:
QUOTES:

“Have faith in something, develop faith in something greater than yourself.  That is the thing that will carry you through all the hard times.”

“Rehearsal for high school play is the same as Broadway rehearsal, doesn’t matter, creativity is the same.” CLICK TO TWEET

“An artistic endeavor, job of any art (good, bad or other) is to elicit some desire of exploration in the audience.” CLICK TO TWEET

VIDEOS:

009: Gillian Vigman
009: Gillian Vigman 1500 1000 Alyshia Ochse

Gillian Vigman deems herself a late bloomer to the acting game, but she has always been an entertainer. She hailed from Second City in Chicago, but didn’t give Los Angeles a try till she was 30 years old. A comedic genius with a self-depricating heart of gold, this woman knows how to make the uncomfortable job of auditioning into a humorous experience for everyone involved. Life has come full circle for Gillian from being taught by Tina Fey and Amy Poehler back in Chicago to now sharing the screen with them. Gillian held down multiple jobs for years to support her craft and find her “special something” that made her stand out from the crowd. Comedy. Life with Gillian is a constant chuckle, even as she journeys down the tragic moments of her career, she does so with such wit and amusement. You don’t want to miss a moment of what might come out of this woman’s mouth. Her story defies the Hollywood idealism of age and success. Her amusing approach to auditions has left an impactful imprint on my heart and to the Hollywood casting gods. Gillian has worked in over 70 television and film projects and countless commercial campaigns. She is most recognizable as “Jack’s wife” in many Jack in the Box commercials and Bradley Cooper’s wife in all the Hangover movies, but also for notable for her membership in the recurring cast of comedians on the sketch series MADtv. Gillian appeared in the critcially acclaimed show Son’s & Daughters, Californication, New Girl, Suburgatory, Parks and Recreation, Dr. Ken, Life in Pieces, and Scrubs.

Gillian currently can be seen in THE HOUSE with Amy Poehler and Will Ferrel, in HBO’s show DIVORCE and new CW show LIFE SENTENCE.

Tune into our interview right HERE

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ALYSHIA OCHSE

Los Angeles-based actress, bestselling author, host of That One Audition podcast, entrepreneur, & mother.

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