A powerful short film which presents the monologue of a single actor. Through his reminiscences the audience gets an insight into a dark, confused and embittered mind

Method Actor is a short film that reveals the perfect combination between a talented director and a powerful writer. Where the poetry works as strong with the words as it does with visuals, simply mesmerizing and beautiful, this dark short will be taking your breath, and words away.

Being constrained to creating Making-Of films and photography pieces at the time, director Justin Stokes wanted to create something bigger with a short film, using the theme of ‘Broken Dreams’, something that reflected his dreams of becoming a director from an early age, and never getting the right opportunities.

Justin approached writer Glenn Smith with the idea and a strong vision for the film, continuously using the word ‘misanthrope‘ to describe the main persona.

At the time I thought he was interested in exploring this facet of a person’s character but as time has gone on I’ve come to realize that he actually just has a very dark side to his personality!

– Writer, Glenn Smith

Glenn’s biggest challenge was getting into the mind set to write for this complex character. Being used to tight agency deadlines, Glenn was asked to take as long as he needed to write this by Justin, something that put even more pressure on him. Glenn tried isolating himself in a few different locations to write which didn’t quite work out.

But then, suddenly, on a narrowboat holiday with some of my best friends the words came to me. My friends always ask me what dark place I’d gone to to write this script and I haven’t the heart to tell them that it was while cruising down the Worcester Canal with them one bright afternoon in May.

But an incredibly rich visual experience and a profound articulate script would not work without the incredible performance by John Shrapnel, who inherits his character’s dark and mysterious persona to perfection. With such a rich acting background John was able to reach into his deepest ends to deliver this inspired performance. Shrapnel has acted in TV series such as New Tricks and Waking The Dead, and in films like Troy, Nothing Hill and Gladiator.

This is the second week in a row we feature a film with someone who has worked on the award-winning film ‘Gladiator’, director of short film Coward, David Roddham, was part of the special effects team.

Justin Stokes has since then become a commercial director through HLA, you can see his latest work along with writer Glenn Smith’s creative writing group here:

justin-stokes.com