Post by badcop187 on Mar 24, 2006 17:15:02 GMT -5
Posted on Fri, Mar. 24, 2006
‘Shield’ lets Kansan learn to love L.A.By AARON BARNHARTThe Kansas City Star“The Shield” has been very good to former KU student David Rees Snell, who plays strike team member Ronnie Gardocki. In fact, just this week he landed an audition for an upcoming TV pilot because of those two words on his resume.
“ ‘The Shield’ is very, very well thought of by people in Los Angeles,” he said by phone this week. “Even people who have not seen ‘The Shield’ think it’s great.”
Snell’s long road to TV started in the 1980s in Lawrence, where he was a roommate of Jay Karnes’. Both eventually moved to L.A. Karnes found some success and directed one of Snell’s plays, but Snell found little but frustration.
“I came to Hollywood right out of college and found I could not get anyone to see me,” Snell recalled. “You’d do a play and literally no one would come see it.
“Finally I decided the whole city was a pyramid scheme. The actors were at the bottom of the pyramid and their paltry dollars (paid to agents, etc.) ran the whole industry.”
Snell gave up and moved back to Wichita, where a tip from Karnes got him into industrial films for Payless Cashways, Western Auto and others. Most of that work was in Kansas City, and after putting tons of miles on his car commuting, he just moved here in 1992.
The next six years were spent doing a lot of everything: corporate movies, stage acting, even a bit part as a reporter in “Truman,” the HBO movie filmed here.
“I made a rookie mistake in that,” he said with another laugh. “My big scene, we all crowded around the house to gain a concession quote. I was supposed to make my way through this throng of reporters. But they won’t let me through.
“Now, the savvy TV actor just gives up. But the theater actor makes it happen. So — I just shouted my line. I wasn’t even on camera. In fact I wasn’t even on microphone. And that was the scene they used.”
When “Truman” was screened here, Snell said, “I took a date I didn’t know especially well. I didn’t tell her I was in the movie, and it’s a good thing because I wasn’t.”
By the time he was ready to give L.A. a try again, an ally from the mystery-audience-theater days came through. Shawn Ryan, who had staged a Snell play and was a roommate of Karnes’, had gotten a contract from FX to write a police drama. Ryan hired Karnes for “The Shield” cast, and gave Snell a call about the pilot.
“Shawn said, ‘We’d like you to be in the pilot, but we didn’t get you enough money to have a speaking part.’ I thought, ‘I dunno. I’m the fourth guy on the strike team. What will be left for me?’ But if I hadn’t (said yes), I wouldn’t have a house now.”
This is the fifth season of “The Shield,” but the first in which Snell’s name appears in the opening credits. Better late than never, but Snell knows that time is winding down for the show. Ryan is also running “The Unit,” which has posted decent numbers for CBS. He has indicated publicly that he is unsure whether to continue “The Shield” for a sixth season.
Meantime, there’s Season 5 1/2 to look forward to. Those 10 episodes begin filming next month and could be on FX as early as this fall. This summer Snell has a part on a Hallmark Channel movie, “Desolation Canyon,” in which he gets to ride horses with Stacy Keach and Patrick Duffy.
On the home front, he and wife Melanie have an 18-month-old child. He hasn’t lost sight of the city that gave him work when no one in L.A. would even give him the time.
“I was channel flipping the other night and I caught a glimpse of the drugstore on Westport and Main, was it the Sav-On? The Osco, that’s right. It was a shot looking north, and I said, hey, that’s Kansas City! So I watched the show. It was an episode of ‘Cops.’ ”
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I’m at (816) 234-4790 . Or visit TVBarn.com .
‘Shield’ lets Kansan learn to love L.A.By AARON BARNHARTThe Kansas City Star“The Shield” has been very good to former KU student David Rees Snell, who plays strike team member Ronnie Gardocki. In fact, just this week he landed an audition for an upcoming TV pilot because of those two words on his resume.
“ ‘The Shield’ is very, very well thought of by people in Los Angeles,” he said by phone this week. “Even people who have not seen ‘The Shield’ think it’s great.”
Snell’s long road to TV started in the 1980s in Lawrence, where he was a roommate of Jay Karnes’. Both eventually moved to L.A. Karnes found some success and directed one of Snell’s plays, but Snell found little but frustration.
“I came to Hollywood right out of college and found I could not get anyone to see me,” Snell recalled. “You’d do a play and literally no one would come see it.
“Finally I decided the whole city was a pyramid scheme. The actors were at the bottom of the pyramid and their paltry dollars (paid to agents, etc.) ran the whole industry.”
Snell gave up and moved back to Wichita, where a tip from Karnes got him into industrial films for Payless Cashways, Western Auto and others. Most of that work was in Kansas City, and after putting tons of miles on his car commuting, he just moved here in 1992.
The next six years were spent doing a lot of everything: corporate movies, stage acting, even a bit part as a reporter in “Truman,” the HBO movie filmed here.
“I made a rookie mistake in that,” he said with another laugh. “My big scene, we all crowded around the house to gain a concession quote. I was supposed to make my way through this throng of reporters. But they won’t let me through.
“Now, the savvy TV actor just gives up. But the theater actor makes it happen. So — I just shouted my line. I wasn’t even on camera. In fact I wasn’t even on microphone. And that was the scene they used.”
When “Truman” was screened here, Snell said, “I took a date I didn’t know especially well. I didn’t tell her I was in the movie, and it’s a good thing because I wasn’t.”
By the time he was ready to give L.A. a try again, an ally from the mystery-audience-theater days came through. Shawn Ryan, who had staged a Snell play and was a roommate of Karnes’, had gotten a contract from FX to write a police drama. Ryan hired Karnes for “The Shield” cast, and gave Snell a call about the pilot.
“Shawn said, ‘We’d like you to be in the pilot, but we didn’t get you enough money to have a speaking part.’ I thought, ‘I dunno. I’m the fourth guy on the strike team. What will be left for me?’ But if I hadn’t (said yes), I wouldn’t have a house now.”
This is the fifth season of “The Shield,” but the first in which Snell’s name appears in the opening credits. Better late than never, but Snell knows that time is winding down for the show. Ryan is also running “The Unit,” which has posted decent numbers for CBS. He has indicated publicly that he is unsure whether to continue “The Shield” for a sixth season.
Meantime, there’s Season 5 1/2 to look forward to. Those 10 episodes begin filming next month and could be on FX as early as this fall. This summer Snell has a part on a Hallmark Channel movie, “Desolation Canyon,” in which he gets to ride horses with Stacy Keach and Patrick Duffy.
On the home front, he and wife Melanie have an 18-month-old child. He hasn’t lost sight of the city that gave him work when no one in L.A. would even give him the time.
“I was channel flipping the other night and I caught a glimpse of the drugstore on Westport and Main, was it the Sav-On? The Osco, that’s right. It was a shot looking north, and I said, hey, that’s Kansas City! So I watched the show. It was an episode of ‘Cops.’ ”
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I’m at (816) 234-4790 . Or visit TVBarn.com .