Jeff Ornstein 0:02

Hi everyone and welcome to Next Act with Jeff Orenstein. I am Jeff, and on this show we celebrate people on the cusp of greatness. Those building on past successes in some of the curious and inventive and sometimes unexpected ways they have achieved those, and stepping into moments that could define their legacy. We'll talk about current projects, lessons learned, and the extraordinary opportunities ahead. So the best is yet to come. Jim Grunshaw is a talented storyteller whose career spans acting, writing, directing, voiceover, filmmaking, and nearly 23 years of military service. From Army special operations to Hollywood sets, Jim brings a unique perspective on leadership, resilience, and the art of storytelling. Beyond entertainment, Jim's military background and recognition as a member of the U.S. Army Rangers Hall of Fame and Georgia Military Veterans Hall of Fame highlight a life dedicated to leadership, courage, and service. His unique journey bridges two demanding worlds, special operations, and creative performance. Jim, we are delighted to have you on today. How are you doing?

Jim Grimshaw 1:10

Well, I'm doing fine. I'm glad to be here. I appreciate the opportunity.

Jeff Ornstein 1:14

Oh, it's our pleasure. So you sort of epitomize what this podcast is all about, the next act. So you had this very impressive career in the military, and then after 23 years, you segued into the theatrical industry.

Jim Grimshaw 1:30

How did that happen? Well, first of all, as a teenager growing up, I was as an only child, and my parents gave me a 10-inch RCA television. It was the second television a family owned. I sit in my bedroom, and of course, I watched all the programs of the day: Maverick, Sugarfoot, Cheyenne, all that business. So I was always interested in acting. My mother put me in every skit and play and dance that you can imagine, and high school plays and best actor award in high school and all that kind of good stuff. So it was one of those burning desires that I had to be an actor. But when I graduated from high school, I didn't have the money to go to college. I was on the National Honor Society, but I took a business curriculum, so I couldn't pass the SATs and go to some magical college. My father was a very World War II Navy veteran. He was a pragmatic guy. Both my parents were products of the depression and so forth. And so he always wanted me to be in the military. And he said, son, if you're going to be in the military, you should be an officer. And I said, Oh, okay, that he wanted me to go to Naval Academy. But I didn't make that. So when I started working for a corporation right out of high school, I never got over that idea of saying, hey, I want to give up being an actor. But I never really thought I was going to have a chance to pursue it because I worked 29 months for 3M companies, to be fair about it. And when the Berlin Wall went up, they were going to start drafting 19-year-olds. So I decided it was time to go in. Didn't know what I want to be. So until I walked in at recruiting, and there's a long story behind that. I probably don't want to get into it, but I walked into the Army recruiting office and I saw this life-sized picture of this Army Buck Sergeant, 82nd Airborne Division guy leaping out of an airplane with parachutes opening and so forth.

Jeff Ornstein 3:26

I'm like, that's it.

Jim Grimshaw 3:27

I gotta do that. So that's what I did. That's how I started out. I was sort of a glorified clerk, and I saw a new office and I worked in an office and what have you. And my first experience in the Army, I was carrying a 19.5-pound Browning automatic rifle, BAR. I was a private. I made PFC, and this call from my platoon sergeant said first sergeant wants to see you. And in those days when the first sergeant wanted to see you, it meant you screwed up. Now I didn't know what he did wrong. I went down there and he goes like, Grim, I'm losing my company clerk. I see by your record that you can type 60 words a minute and that you work and that you work in an office. And I said, Well, first sergeant, I didn't join the army to sit behind a desk. And he said, Grim, if you stay in the army, log it up, you're gonna sit behind a desk. Trust me. So I made the decision to do the best decision probably I made in my life. And then a few months later it went by. We passed various inspections, everything was cleared away in the office, and my first sergeant said, You're either going to go to West Pike or you're gonna go to Officer Kennedy at school. I said, First sergeant, I can't do chemistry, I can't do advanced mathematics. I'm an artist. I painted pictures in high school, I acted in plays and so forth. And so I went to Officer Kennedy School at Fort Benning. Another great decision in my life. And then Ranger School. And before I went to Ranger School, I had five days off. And I went back to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, to see my first sergeant because he was like he was a great mentor. So I went in there and he hugged me. I got to tell a story. I put my toes in the door jam of his office and I stood there for a minute. He had his back, he was sitting down. And he had a favorite profanity, which I won't go into. He'd always start this thing off with. So I went like his profanity. I said, It's a sad day in this man's army when an officer walks into a room and an NCO doesn't stand up at attention. He ran his profanity past me real fast, jumped up and grabbed me, says, hugged me like a son. And he said, Where are you going to be assigned to? I said, Well, they're trying to make a leg out of me, meaning non-airborne soldier. He said, Well, we can't have that. The first sergeant called the chief of infantry branch. And he said, Sir, do you remember when you were down here as a deputy battle group commander before you went up there and made full colonel? You sent this guy Grimshaw to OCS. You approved it. And now you can't bring him back here to the 82nd. Boom. Orders that day changed back to the 82nd. By the time I reported in regular school, I had a set of mortars dated the same day. So went to the 82nd and it goes on. And eventually I went into special forces. Obviously, I can't tell every story that's going to be in a book and so forth. But that was the beginning of it. And part of it is that one of my trips during my vacation time before I went in the Army, I was driving back from Georgia for where my relatives are, and where I live now, and back to Pennsylvania where I was born and raised. And it was late at night in Bunker Fable, North Carolina. Went past one of his favorite restaurants I used to see. Under the street light, there's this guy standing at Savannah Clothes. It's late at night. He's hit drinking. I'm in my little sports car. I got to have some company because I'm going to drive all night. So I say to this guy, hop in, let's go. He says, I'm going to Maryland or wherever. I said, Great, because that's I'm going to Pennsylvania. And I asked him, I said, Who are you? What do you do? He says, Well, I'm in the army. I'm in this special type of unit, you know, and we jump out of airplanes and we blow up things and we repel out of helicopters. We do all this stuff. I'm like, whoa, dude, this is the kind of stuff that I want to do. And we wrote to each other over the course of about a year and a half. And I think that was the first time that the sea was planted that I wanted to be in Special Forces. The next time around was an OCS. I met my Ranger buddy John Harrelson. I have to mention his name because he's a big part of my life. He and I were OCS together, and he was an enlisted man in Special Forces and had served in Laos before he went to came to OCS. He and I went to Ranger School. Ranger buddies. I don't know if you know about Ranger Buddies. Ranger buddies, they get each other through Ranger School. They're inseparable. And in our case, John had the great field craft abilities, and I was really young, and I could do more pull-ups and push-ups, and I could run faster, and I could draw him through the finish line, but he could get me to the right navigational stake at night. We did all sorts of magical things together in ranger school, and we both graduated and got our coveted ranger tabs. And lo and behold, he goes back to special forces. I go back to the 82nd. So now we are Bachelor Lieutenants at Fort Bragg living in a house together. And so we are still good friends today. We have intertwined, and see Ranger buddies don't normally do normally you go to school and you're tight, and maybe you serve together here and there, but sort of separated over the years. In our case, we have been together all these years. And we live just about four hours away from each other right now. I have to mention his name because he and his wife are dearest friends. But these are the kind of relationships you do establish when you go into the service. So now, how do I get how do I get into filmmaking? Okay, real fast.

Jeff Ornstein 8:48

Yeah, so 23 years of military service, which is highly organized, I would imagine, is my impression. A lot of coordination. And after 23 years, your old theater bug bit you again?

Jim Grimshaw 9:00

So fast forward, I'm now serving in the first two years of the All-Volunteer Army in the Midwestern Regional Recruiting Command for the U.S. Army Recruiting Command at Fort Sheridan, Illinois, just above Chicago. Hated the assignment. I didn't believe in the all-volunteer army. I still believe in the draft, but frankly, for a lot of reasons. But I'm standing in the officers club one night by myself. We called the Rat Skeller Club. It was downstairs in the bottom of the main club, and it was all my way home. So I'm just there having a drink, and all of a sudden, this frenetic guy comes running in, and Ted Raymond is his name. And Ted looks like the stereotypical vaudeville comedian, smoked a big cigar, had a big hooked nose, was bald, and he's jah, ha ja. He's that kind of character, you know. He comes roaring into the club. There's just the two of us standing there. And he's all out of sorts. Give me a drink. I need a drink. I said, Ted, what's the problem? And he goes, I convinced the post-theater director to do this two-man play and hold auditions. And he says, he says, and I got one of the roles. He said, but nobody showed up for the auditions. He says, I've been working on this project for the he says, and I said, well, then Ted already had his actor's equity card from doing theater in Chicago. I knew about that. So I'm just standing there taking my drink very casually. And I get that funny, he goes, Say, have you ever done any acting? And I said, Well, Ted, I haven't told anybody yet. I said, but during the two years I worked for 3M Company, they still had the acting bug, and I did two years of community theater in Levittown, Pennsylvania. Boom. He says, You're going with me. And we went down to see the post theater director. We do this two-man play, and that's when the bug hit me. So I go on a few more assignments and back to Fort Bragg. I'm in Special Forces. I'm kind of bored with my job a little bit. I started doing Fort Bragg Playhouse, it was a big thing. We did plays like Mr. Roberts, for example. We did it for Josh Logan, who co co-wrote the play. Wow. Yeah, oh yeah. He came down here. We did a 10 o'clock in the morning performance. Lee Opp was the director at the playoffs at the time. Magnificent guy. He'd been at New Hope Playhouse in his career. So now he's running this big playhouse for Fort Wright. So we did things, oh, carousel, all sorts of all the good stuff. And we did Most Happy Fella. I don't know if you're familiar with that play or not. Well, I get this call that says, we'd like you to come in and do this audition for the singing role. And I said, Well, they said, Well, we heard you down at the Fayetteville little theater in downtown Fayetteville. You auditioned for a musical down there, but you had to turn it down. My duties interfered. So they said, Well, you can sing. I said, Well, yeah, I can sing happy birthday or something like that. And I said, So they hand me this most happy fella, it was written like an opera. And so the lead singers, Bill Beck was a guy from Metropolitan Opera. So I accept this challenge, and I have this major role. And I'm in this little three-bedroom house off Fort Bright Boulevard. And we go into this room and they hand me this musical score. And I don't read music that well. And we got a piano player out there. Vicky Carter was the musical director. And Bill Beck with this tremendous baritone voice. And then the two sopratos are in there and the ingenue and what have you. And then it comes my time to sing, and nothing comes out. Absolutely nothing. And I'm standing there and go, ah, you know. I was so stage fright because I was intimidated by these magnificent, well-trained voices. I mean, they all they had sang, sung, if you will, all their lives. Anyway, we do this thing. We do it two runs, two different runs, and we won like the Forces Command Theater Award for Musical Comedy that year. And I can remember the critique of the judges. I was okay the first time I did it, not too great. The second time we did it, obviously I learned a few first time I signed with an orchestra. I mean, that blows your mind. I don't care who you are, especially if you're not trained. And so, anyway, so now we do this whole thing, we win this award. I'm not winning anything as a singer, trust me. But the judges have they have one of these little judges sitting up there. He goes, I noticed when you slid up to the high D. And I'm thinking I tell the guy, I said, You're lucky I got to the high D. What are you talking about? So that was part of my singing career. But fast forward, I'm in Hawaii. First year I'm in special operations. Jump pay in Hawaii special operations. It doesn't get much better than that. And uh trust me, it doesn't. And I decide I'm gonna do this play at Honolulu Community Theater, which is a big physical theater, big physical planet, and it's wealthy people in this thing, and a guy, a former is a is an actor or director. So this is 1980. And I'm doing a show called uh Separate Tables and a leading role, and my then wife comes backstage and says, The casting ladies from this television show called Magnum P. I are in the audience, and they said they would like to talk to you after the show. So I could hardly get through the second act. And they said, Would you like to be an expert on Magnum P.I. and then over the course of time we'll bring you in whenever you're right to read for an acting role. And of course, not knowing the business at all, I go like, I'm right for everything. I mean, what's your problem? Bring me tomorrow. I don't know about casting, I know about theater acting. Well, on the job for me, and a lot, obviously a lot of failures. But I don't know anything about television and film acting at all. And so in the course of a year, I went as an extra. I got to know people, I got to network with people, I got to know a second unit director. My very first extra role, we're doing a long shot of a guard by the fence, and they hand me an M16 and said, Your guard was M16. So I walk away from everybody and I take the M-16, I clear the weapon away from everybody, put the magazine back in, boom, we're ready to go. The director says, You know something about weapons. And I said, Well, yeah, I'm in the army. I didn't want to say, Yeah, I'm a special forces ranger and all that kind of stuff. But this guy's name is Bruce Shirley. Well, anyway, we got talking and I got them over the course of the year. Year comes up, finally, I get this acting, I get this acting audition with playing an Air Force major, and Bruce calls me up and he says, This is confidential, but Universal just approved. This is confidential. Universal just approved a two-hour special from Magnum P.I. He says, and it's all about these guys going back to Vietnam, and we need a military technical advisor. He says, and I thought of you. And he says, and you're coming down tomorrow to read for this other episode. So I went down there the next day and he says, make sure you wear all your uniform and all your stuff. And I said, Okay. So I went down there. In a 10-minute period of time, I read for this one episode as an Air Force major. Okay, boom. Stood right there. I interviewed to be the military tech advisor. The next four years, I was Magnum PI's military tech advisor. And I did the two-hour specials. I even got called back after I retired and came back to Hawaii and did the uh two-hour special and as an actor. But during that period of four years, depending on my duties, the wardrobe people would call me up and say, we need this and we need that. Can you help me out? And I do that. I run down the studio and give them ribbons. I used to walk down a hallway and where we were at SyncPAC headquarters. We were in the same building as the Fleet Marine Force, Pacific Headquarters, Senior Marine Corps headquarters in the Pacific. And I go out, I knew the headquarters commandant there, Lieutenant Colonel. I walked in there one day. I said, Lou, I need those ribbons on your chest. And off I go to the studio, Navy's Marine Corps ribbons. So I did things like that. And other times when I couldn't make it, I would say to one of the Navy SEALs in the office, Why don't you go down there and make a hundred bucks? Or my next door neighbor, who was one of my OCS classmates, he was the aviation guy for the Army. And I would say, Moose, you're doing helicopter stuff down there, stuff like that. I gotta tell you a story about the I'm the guy that made Tom Sellick a Navy SEAL. Okay. When he started out, if you look at the early the early programs, he wore the Navy surface warfare badge. Now, to the average viewer, they don't know what that is. But we're all standing around one day and I said, Well, you're doing all the stuff going back to Vietnam. You're on land, you're doing this, you're doing that. Well, we thought surface meant land. I said, no, surface means ocean. I said, what you're really saying is that Tom is a Navy SEAL. I said, now this would be great if you make him a Navy SEAL. I would have preferred we changed the whole thing to make an Army Special Forces guy, but that obviously wasn't going to happen. So Selic was like, that's a great idea. So they had to run it by Don Belisario, the owner, creator of the show. He was a former enlisted Marine in the Korean War, and he loved the idea. So boom, that thing you know, all the promos, all everything else, Sellick's the rest of the time he was on air, he was a Navy SEAL. But he was a picture recruiting poster for Navy SEALs. So I said to one of my Navy SEAL buddies in my office, I said, I made Sellick a Navy SEAL. And I said, Why don't you make him an honorary Navy SEAL and put him in your association and have a little ceremony? I said I can arrange the ceremony. So Mike Trukowski says, This is a great idea, so they do it. So Mike goes down there in his nice clean white uniform. We're doing helicopter shots this one day. And I got photographer arranged a whole nine yards. Mike comes down there in his whites, and he's got this nice frame thing to make hand of Selleck and we take photos. And I said to Mike very casually, I said, Where's your wife? You didn't bring your wife to meet Tom Sellick? I said, Mike, you're gonna be in big trouble.

Jeff Ornstein 20:29

Yo, a Magnum PI was a talk of the town when it was on TV. That was the leading show for sure.

Jim Grimshaw 20:35

Oh yeah. So anyway, we got home that night. I pick up the phone, I call his house, and his wife answered the phone. I said, I did my best Tom Thulley invitation with her. Hi, CC, this is Tom. I missed you down there today. I wish I'd met you. Jim Grimshaw, you're rotten SOB, you're worse than my sealed husband. But I had a lot of fun with that show and got a lot of encouragement to go on and become an actor. And that when I retired from the Army out of Hawaii, I went back to Fayetteville, kind of a lost ranger special forces thing, in a bad marriage, and all this kind of stuff. I ruled out, I got turned down by the CIA, I applied for a GS-11 job, and so I get a call to go back to Magna PI. I go back, I go out to Fort Shafter, I get on the phone, civilian personal office, and I call Japan. I had a job in Japan. I called the guy and I said, I'm going to turn down the job, the GS11 job. And he said, Why? And I said, Well, he says, You realize how many colonels and generals are called out here? By this time, I knew the Joint Chiefs of Staff exercise program front and back, all those almost five years I spent in Hawaii. I had a great time. And that's there's a whole lot of other stories there. But so I turned on a job because I said all my life I don't want to work for the government anymore. I have a burning desire to fulfill a teenage dream. And I want to be an actor. And I go, whoa. Then I didn't work again for like five months. Classic Murphy's Law. Yeah. And so it goes on. And so then you get into all these things about you asked me the questionnaire about transitioning and so forth. That transitioning going from the periods of unemployment. Of course, I was in a bad marriage at the time. So there's a lot of factors that go into this that maybe other people don't experience. But I had to go through that and I did a lot of things for free. Worked with a little theater a little bit, just said just to go for things, volunteer things. But and then the at that point in time, the wife, I did a thing called North and South. I was in the episode North and South run of episode three, North North and South Part One. I did I did a scene, a big scene with Patrick Swayze and Robert Guillaume and Kirsty Alley and all that kind of good stuff. And that's three days in Charleston with Kirsty Alley. Are you kidding me? And Robert Guillaume. You know, Robert Guillaume was Benson at the time. And so he had a terrific singing voice. People don't realize what a good singer Robert Guillaume was. But three days. Now I don't know who Patrick Sweezy is, okay? I'm an old guy. You found out. Here's a great story. My 14-year-old daughter came down to live with me, and I said, Well, what? You need to go to Savannah with me. I'll drop you off at my aunt's and uncle's house. I said, You stay with them for three days while I go to Charleston and film North and South. I want you to get to know your great aunts of uncle, my mother's sisters. She's 14 years old this time. She knows who Patrick Swayze is. I come back three days later, and I am hungover and I am tired. And she says, What's the matter, Dad? You look pretty bad. I said, Well, I was partying downtown Charleston last night with a young star of the show named Patrick Swayze. We were out dancing and we drink beer raising hell. She goes, Patrick Swayze, Patrick Swayze, you've left me here with these old people. And I could have been here with Patrick Swayze. Are you kidding me?

Jeff Ornstein 24:22

And she never let me forget that. So I gotta tell you, I'm very surprised. You mean you have a sounds like a really strong theater background. And what I was struck with when I was looking at some of your work, much of your work, there's a lot to look at. You have a really, really perfected communicating on film without speaking. I mean, you got a great look, look back, or uh wait you crinkle your lips and give a smirk or give a frown. You really communicate quite a lot without even having to have dialogue. And that's a a real skill on film. And yet your background is theater, which is always bigger than life. So, congratulations, really. Did that come naturally? Was that always how you were?

Jim Grimshaw 25:10

Well, I'll tell you, I don't know how it came. I think it just again, it's working like watching guys like John Hilliman, uh, for example, who I thought was a great actor, and Tom. Tom is a better actor than most people give him credit for. And of course, the others that I've worked with along the way. And then some workshops along the way doing different things, but paying attention while you're on the set and how other actors do things. Robert DeVaul. I was Robert DeVaul's stand-in and photo double and stunt double for the movie Days of Thunder. And then I got an acting role in Days of Thunder. I worked on that show for five months, and I was very happy because I made a lot of money on that show. And watching Randy Quaid, there's another guy too. He told you about making faces and reacting and doing this and doing that. A lot of great stories about working on Days of Thunder. But Duvall, I started out just being a regular stand-in, okay. And then it was like I was making like $500 a week as a stand-in. All right. So then all of a sudden, Director Tony Scott was saying, and they said, Well, if you dress like Duvall and you go into hair makeup like Duvall, that's another $100 a day. I was like, well, that's pretty cool. And so the next thing you know, Tony Scott saying, Jimmy, I want you, I want wardrobe. I'll get give Jimmy the jacket and the Denver hat that he's wearing. And so the next thing, I'm doing all these setups, and I'm dressed like Duvall. So now I'm making all this extra money, which is great, because I needed it, and then watching Duvall. So after a while, it got to be where Tony Scott would say, Jimmy, do Duvall. And I go up there and I would do I would do all these little body movements and these things that Duvall did. And it would, Scott would just roll over in laughter. So I did the stunt, and it was like standing behind a wall in Darlington Speedway while these nice the sag stunt guys from LA get paid great money, but they did a great stunt driving into the fit to the fit wall of the crash. And of course, the stunt guys in LA, when they fell out of the way, they had mattresses to fall on. I did not have one and or anything. I just fell onto bare ground. And so I did the stunt for DeVa. I walked up to the casting guy, Craig Fincannon, local guy. I knew up from Wilmington, with the buddies casting at a lot of shows. And I said, Craig, I said, stunt guys, they got paid a lot of money for that stunt. I said, You think maybe I can give a little bump in pay here? And he goes, I'll get back with you. So two or three days went by, whatever. He came up to me and he put his arm around me. He says, Here's the deal. He says, if I give you a bump of pay, it comes out of my pocket. Okay. He says, but here's the good news. Here's the good news. We had a management meeting and they fired the actor who's on the show and who's going to become the hardiest car, pitch through chief. And they're trying to figure out who to hire as an actor going into this final phase in the movie. And he says, and I said, Well, the guy you want to hire has been standing in front of your camera for the last five months. That's the guy you want to hire. And Tony Scott, you're right. Just put sunglasses on and all this kind of stuff. So now I'm an actor. Okay. And I'm eating steak and lobster at Daytona Speedway on a Saturday afternoon. Well, do I have to be a stand-in anymore? No, take it easy, eat your steak and lobster. And so I'm sitting there enjoying myself, and all of a sudden, golf cart come flying around. Tony Scott wants you up front. Hop in the golf court. So off we go. I get up there. Tony says, Jimmy, he says, I've been looking at you through this camera for five months. He said, I gotta have you standing there when I set up the shot for Duvall. I said, Well, do I still get paid as a stand-in and all that kind of stuff? He goes, I can pay you whatever you want like that. And he told the guy who was replacing me as a stand-in, he says, We'll keep you on too, like that. I mean, and a great group of guys. And so now I am a stand-in and I'm doing this thing every day, dressed as DeVall, and I am actually on an actor's contract as well. And we're already filming one little portion of one scene this week, and next week another little portion. It went off for four weeks, and I'm going. I hope this movie never ends.

Jeff Ornstein 29:47

Jim, the producers are going to kill me. We are at 35 minutes and counting, and they got to pare this down to 20 minutes, and they're going to have to figure out which stories they're going to share because they're all fantastic. So I got to wrap this up, but I want to give you a closing question. Clearly, you had this the acting passion was always part of who you are, it was always part of your makeup. And then you went on to a really illustrative career in the military, and then you brought a lot of those managerial and coordinating skills in back into your work in the theater. So, and I saw so much of your work in front of the camera before I interviewed you, and it was very impressive. I loved watching you. I just thought you really embodied the characters beautifully. So, is there a story that you want to tell either in front of the camera or behind the camera that's still sort of percolating in the back of your brain?

Jim Grimshaw 30:43

Well, that's a that that's a good one because uh if you want to be an actor, okay. First of all, here's what I recommend to people real quick. Start off young, do what you gotta do. I would say get the schooling, but maybe get some practical schooling too, because the world is well, actors are a dime a dozen, let's face it. You know that as well as I do. If I can tell you a story, I'll tell you another Days of Thunder story. And it's about, I would say, uh what would be improvisation, understanding what the mission is and what you got to do to get there, to get the job, and that's this. My buddy and I, Les Pendleton, whom I met on King Con Lives, he was in the contract of making neon signs for movie sets. And by this time, his business had sort of gone out the window. Wilmington got very political. So we're doing neon signs in Newburn, North Carolina on a December day. It's very cold. We couldn't do it. And so we go back to his house and we're like freezing our butts off. I get a phone call from my agent who says, Tony Scott didn't hire you on your initial audition as an actor. He fixed somebody younger for the role. He says, But he wants you to be DeVall Stand. He likes you because you and DeVaul have the same stomach. That's what he said.

unknown 32:09

Okay.

Jim Grimshaw 32:10

And he says, but they need you in Charlotte tonight, and it's 20 degrees, and it's starting to snow. And my buddies, he needed me to stay in a business to help him out every day. And I looked over at him, I said, Les. He goes, he and I are in the movie business together. And he goes, Jimmy, you gotta go. You have to do it. You must go. This is an opportunity you can't miss. So I said, okay. So I went to my storage room. I was I had moved out of my apartment, I was living with Les while we were doing these signs. And I have my dog with me, Sugar Bear. And so Sugar Bear and I, we hop in a car in a van. And I said, Man, I gotta do that. I go, I'll get my cold weather clothing out. Off we go to Charlotte. It's snowy. It's snowing. I didn't have a heater core element in a car because I was too cheap to buy one. I mean, who needs it in North Carolina in the wintertime along the coast? So, anyway, catching up with me, I'm driving to Charlotte. The windshield is icing up. I try to rub off the ice. I said, I gotta get there. I got a disappointment with Craig Fukanna to be DeVall Standard. Okay. I mean, this is the mission. You're going for the job. You don't know what the opportunities are. So I reach down, I find a can of spray. Okay. I reach out there, I get a nice little hole in the ice on the windshield. I keep on driving for another hour. I am in this 1985 Ford van, which has got him on his last legs. And I got my dog with me. I pull into Hilton Hotel parking lot. I make the dog comfortable. And I go in there and I meet Craig. And I said, Okay, I'm here. And he says, Okay, says, we're going to interview you with Bobby. And I said, Okay, fine. So we're there, and all of a sudden the elevator opens and Bobby DeVall walks out with his girlfriend. And Craig says, Bobby, this is Jimmy. He's going to be your standing. Hey man, how are you? Nice to meet you. Blah, blah, blah. He says, Robert DeVald says, We're late for dinner. We got to go. And off we go. And I said, Jeez, Craig, I says, is that the interview? He goes, That was the interview. Get on the elevator. We go on the elevator, we go to Penthouse. Okay. And so nah, open the penthouse, go in, who do I meet? I meet Larry Simpson, Jerry Bruckheimer, I got me Tom Cruise, Randy Quaid, and Nicole Kidman. Hey, this is a new addition to the team, blah, blah, blah. And I said, go down the elevator, Craig says, hang on, I'll get to your room. And so it was like I took a step backwards by being a stand-in. Okay, I call it a sidestep. And I didn't get a role in the showing days of thunder. But sometimes you got to do things that that may not seem like you're going forward. And you have to take a step back or look at it and say, okay, fine. I'll do this until I can do something better. It was very fortunate for me. And like I said, I told you the other story. And the next thing, the next thing you're in Daytona, I mean you're making all this money. The next thing you're an actor. And after days of days of thunder, I never really had to go and work another type of job again. I mean, I have my military pay, of course, but retirement pay. But it was always to me, it was always about the mission. Yeah, you go to an audition in Atlanta. Most of them are last minute. To be an actor in the South, okay, in my time, you had to have a headshot, you had to have hopefully a resume, and you also had to have a car. And you had to have the ability. Okay. If you didn't have a car, most Atlanta-based actors were living outside of Atlanta. Anyway, so there's a million stories to tell about going to Atlanta and so forth.

Jeff Ornstein 36:00

Now I loved hearing all of them, and I really enjoyed watching you perform, I have to say, in the clips I saw. I thought, I really thought you really had a commanding presence in the roles. And again, you didn't even have to open up your mouth. And I think that's a pretty impressive tweet. You gave him a wealth of stuff to share. You were a terrific guest. Thank you so much for sharing those stories. And I think a lot of people are going to be inspired by this guy is in the military, special ops. He's talking about Navy SEALs. And next thing you know, he's on a Magnum PI and he's talking to Robert Duval. I can do it. And that's what the podcast's about giving people, every man, the idea that somebody else can do it, I can do it too. And you did it. You did a great job. So thanks so much for coming on. Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it. It's my pleasure. Thanks for tuning in to Next Act with Jeff Orenstein. Follow, subscribe, and stay connected to your favorite socials at www.next actpodcast.com. Keep chasing your next act. The best is yet to come.