Hi All,|
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april 13, 2008 09:14am
Hi All,
During the 2007 Christmas season, I was picked to be Santa in The Box -- a feature film written and directed by Richard Kelly and starring James Marsden, Cameron Diaz, and Frank Langella. The Box is based on the original story, Button, Button written by Richard Matheson and shown as an episode of the Twilight Zone in 1986.
In Kelly's version, a young suburban couple (Marsden and Diaz) receive a gift in the form of a plain wooden box. When they open the box, they instantly become wealthy. Langella is the mysterious stranger who later tells them that opening the box also causes, someone else in the world -- someone they don't know -- will die.
This project was my best experiance as an actor! First of all, I have always wanted to appear as Santa in a feature film and I also have been working dilligently to pursue opportunities to appear in major motion pictures. As some of you know, I was a background actor in 
Fever Pitch (statting Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Fallon) and in I Am Legend (starring Will Smith) but apparently edited out of both. In this film, I appear in scenes with Cameron Diaz and James Marsden and am in a great action scene, so I'm sure to be included (I'll be the guy in the red suit). Well, one of the two guys in athe red suit, at least -- I had a stunt double! That's too cool, too. To actually be in a project where I had a stunt double was exciting! Paul Marini is a stunt driver who put on a wigset and padding so that he could "double" for me in the scenes where I could have been hurt. Paul was a "hoot" to work with!
As I said, this was my greatest experiance as an actor, to date. And I want to sincerely thank Richard Kelly and everyone else involved in casting me for the role of Santa in this project. Maybe it was because it was the Christmas season and I was "Santa" on the set, but I was treated with such warmth and respect from everyone in the cast and crew. I will never forget the look on the faces of other actors who came up to me and stated, "When you walked into the room, I thought, 'That guy looks like Santa.' only to find out that you are Santa!" The director respected my "Santa" commitments and, on a day were the shoot had to be re-scheduled, arranged to shoot my scene first so that I could make my previously-scheduled nursing home and day-care appearences. And, perhaps, the greatest part of being in this project is that being a "featured" background actor got me the necessary waivers for me to join The Screen Actors' Guild!
Now if I can only get this listed on my IMDB film list.
Sal