The Proof Is In...I Am Not A Jerk!

Spoiler Alert: I'm not exactly a warm and fuzzy person.

It's not that I don't like spending time with others. I just have little use for talking about myself for any length of time.

I like people to tell me what they need/what is on their mind so I will know what needs to be done. Let's get to the point and get moving ASAP.

Having said that, I recently discovered my personality is not as combative as some people believe.

In 2016, I was contacted by Mike Sager. Mike is a journalist who has written for Rolling Stone and Esquire, He is also an author whose articles inspired the feature films "Boogie Nights" and "Wonderland". He discovered my blog and contacted me about doing a feature story on Zach and his Dadager. It seemed like an interesting idea but we could never get our schedules to line up before the idea disappeared into the night.

Fast forward to this year as Mike and I touched base about the story idea. His editor wanted him to come to Los Angeles and interview out family. The story would touch on the journey that led us here as well as what a "Dadager" does for the career of his child/teen actor.

Mike and his film crew spent a weekend with us in September. The whirlwind weekend, filled with an intense interview process, included:

• Mike interviewing Dana and myself over dinner at Jerry's Deli. Dana and I discussed the decision making process behind moving to Los Angeles and what life is like having a teen actor.
• Interviews with Zach as he discussed his reasons for wanting to make acting his career, He also talked about the weird world of being a teenage stand-up comedian in the Los Angeles comedy scene.
• Mike and his crew went with us to The Ice House in Pasadena to film Zach's debut at the club.
• A few interviews, with the three of us together, discussing show business and how it impacts our lives on a daily basis.
• Even Doctor Murgatroyd AKA Doc The Dog got in on the action by insisting on sitting with us during one of the interviews.

The weekend with Mike is the most I've talked about myself/discussed the past in many years. I am not big on reminiscing about the past. I am more interested in the present as well as where I am heading in the future.

The weekend seemed to go well. Mike got a lot of good footage of Zach at The Ice House and some fun interviews at our home with all of us. The time spent looking back helped us focus on the future by examining the goals Zach is trying to achieve with his career/

I can feel your question about the interview...When can you read the feature article about Zach?

Mike put the article together and also made a short film piece containing footage from the comedy club and our interviews at home. He submitted them to his editor and discovered there was not enough drama or conflict in the piece.

In other words, I was not the cliche "evil stage parent" most people think of when it comes to parents of child/teen actors.

To his credit, Mike refused to do a rewrite that would have cast me in a bad light. He could have easily redone the piece to make his editor happy by making me a giant stage parent whose only concern is living off his kid.

The editor wanted a story featuring a stage parent like this guy: http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-lavar-ball-plaschke-20171121-story.html

So, what will happen to the story and the short film?

Mike and his team are shopping the story around and getting some advice from folks in the entertainment industry. I'm not sure what outlet will pick it up and run the story. I will definitely keep you posted in the future.

For now, the initial outcome of this project is proof that I am not as big of a jerk as many believe me to be.

Don't get me wrong...I am kind of a jerk. I'm just not a "stage parent using my kid to live out my show business dreams" jerk.

A feature story about this actor is coming in the near future.

Missed Interviews and Unexpected Opportunities

I've received a few emails out of the blue recently regarding my "dadager" duties with The Artist. These emails prove that you never know what will strike a chord with people.

I do a lot of social media for a living and try to tailor each post to the needs of the client. However, there are times I create a post simply because I find something amusing or because I want to share a joke with the fans of the client. While many of the posts I spend a good amount of time on do very well in terms of views and interactions, the posts I create on the spur of the moment sometimes gather more attention than the planned posts. I worked at a plastic surgery conference last weekend in downtown Los Angeles and I kept thinking of silly jokes while walking around the conference. I posted a few of them on my Instagram page and they caught the attention of the plastic surgery community around the world. 

When Zach and I moved to California in 2012, I started this blog as a way of documenting our adventures in Hollywood. I called myself a dadager because I thought it was a funny name to use in the title of the blog. Little did I know that the word would come to define me in the eyes of many people in the film and television industry. The fact that people refer to me by that title is not a bad thing. I'm just amazed by that fact since I started using the name simply as a joke. In fact, it is the name many people use when they are searching for me on the Internet.

The first email I received was around Memorial Day. A well-known author (the kind of author that it seemed like it should have been a prank email) contacted me through this blog wanting to know if he could interview me for a very mainstream magazine. His editor ran across my blog and became interested in my stories about learning my way around the entertainment industry in Los Angeles and what it's like being a father at auditions when the majority of stage parents are females. We set-up a weekend where he could see Zach do improv at Second City and interview our whole family. The weekend neared and the author had to cancel our interview because he was assigned another story. It was like auditioning, getting a callback and then going to test for producers. I was close to landing the part (being interviewed) but the part went to someone else (he was assigned another story).

The second email came in early August and it was from a television production company in New York City looking for parents active in the careers of their children in Hollywood. I did a phone call to get more information and seemed to hit all the right notes. According to the production executive:

• I had great/funny/moving stories
• I was knowledgeable without being boring
• I was an easy interview
• I was the kind of person they wanted to cast for their project

I wasn't sold on the idea of being part of a TV project about Hollywood parents but I wasn't going to completely dismiss the idea. I did the phone call on a Wednesday and she asked me to leave the following Wednesday or Thursday open for a Skype interview. The executive needed to do her weekly production meeting before our Skype interview so she could get more details together for me. We set-up a time to Skype and then she dropped out of sight. I made a few calls and emails but got no answer. When I finally heard from her, I was told the project was on hold because they were having trouble finding other parents (besides me) who weren't jerks or looking to boost their own careers by being on a realty TV show. In acting terms, I did the audition and had the part in hand but troubles assembling the rest of the cast put the project on hold.

If those two emails count as strike one and strike two, is there a strike three in this story?

Yes.

The well-known author emailed me again in the middle of August to ask if I was still interested in doing the interview. His editor asked him why I hadn't been interviewed yet and wanted it done in September. We set-up another weekend for him to visit us and see Zach perform around town. His last email to me said he would be in touch soon to finalize the details for the September interview.

Welcome to October. Still no interview. Still no word from him. I'm not surprised but I am amazed at all of the trouble he has gone through only to miss the interview twice. I'm especially amazed since I didn't initiate the interview process either time. 

Both of these experiences have given me a better understanding of what Zach goes through at auditions. It's tough being told you're the perfect choice for a project and then never hearing back from the person who praised you. While being stood up for an interview isn't the same as not booking a part, it still helps me when I'm talking to Zach after he doesn't hear anything after reading for a role. 

It's the kind of insight that would be great to share on TV or in a print interview. All I need is someone to actually do an interview with me!!!!

This actor has been interviewed many times

I Always Get Interesting Feedback About My Blog

It's always a pleasant surprise when someone mentions this blog to me . I enjoy writing it but I never give who actually reads it much thought. I do hashtags when I post a link to a new entry. I also do search descriptions so search engines can easily find me. Having said that, I still don't often think about who reads the blog and where they are located. It surprises me where people are located that read it and who contacts me about the topics I discuss.

Taking a look at the current stats, the countries where people have viewed entries today include the United States, United Arab Emirates, France, Bulgaria, China, United Kingdom, Moldova, Macedonia, Portugal and Turkmenistan. 

The majority of those viewers found me through Google. Some of the other ways people found me include Instagram, Facebook and going directly to the blog itself. I won't bore you with too many details about the most viewed pages but most of them have to do with casting tips and acting advice.

I've had many people reach out to me after reading the blog. Some just want to say they enjoy reading it, others want advice and a few people are a bit crazy with their requests.

Here are my favorite crazy interactions I've had thanks to my Dadager blog:

• The person who emailed me asking if I could set-up a meeting for him to pitch his idea for a "Star Trek" reboot to Paramount. His version had Spock as a woman, McCoy as a little person and Kirk as a blind person. The idea behind the reboot was to "spotlight struggles faced by all people that are not white and male and perfectly made." 
• A random lady wanted to open an acting studio with me. She has no acting experience, lives in Iowa and wants me to run it because I "have the connections and also live here." She wanted to be partners but still live in Iowa. She would promote it on her FB page and tell all her friends about it.
• I often write about Zach's agent and manager. However, there was one gentleman who wanted to know if Zach was interested in leaving his current team and coming over to his management firm. Zach had no intention of joining him but I was curious what type of agent/manager tries to get clients through random emails. When I asked him about his company,I found out he had been in business three days. He was also his only client but was hoping I could let him "sponsor" my blog for free if Zach joined up with him. "The more mentions you give me, the more we can try and build relationships with casting directors." (No thank you.)
• There have been people that want to buy the rights to my life story. Unfortunately, most of these people want the movie/TV show to change for their vision which includes:

1. Replacing me with a female Dadager (I'm serious about that)
2. Me as a widower who tries not to mix casting business with pleasure 
3. Zach as a spunky child orphan hiding that fact from adults in Hollywood

• The guy who was convinced that I was stealing his life for my blog and threatened to bring legal action if I didn't stop using his stories for my blog. He lives in Senoia, Georgia so I'm not sure how I'm living his life.
• I heard from a woman who asked me to read her script and give her feedback. I politely declined by saying I didn't really have time to give her notes. She replied with "If you don't want to know my solution for how to avoid being enslaved when the animals rise up and overthrow mankind, it's your loss of freedom."
• The guy who wanted me to turn my blog into a book. He wasn't a publisher or an literary agent. He just thought it was a good idea and wanted me to give him a cut of the profits for suggesting it to me.

While I have received other emails, notes, videos and odd photos from readers of my blog, there are some that are better left in the "don't respond and the crazy people will go away" file. If I ever disappear for an extended length of time, check the email from my blog because the likely suspect is probably somewhere in my inbox.

I always welcome email from this actor.