 love acting classes but when I find an acting class like this I get so giddy about acting classes I just love learning about acting classes and being like oh my god I want to take it so today I wanted to tell you about this one I have not taken this class yet but I am talking to Tony Gapastone today I'm Tony Gapastone I am an actor a screenwriter and a director making movies in Redwood City, California I've been in the Bay Area for 25 years and I founded Brave Maker and Amrit Hamstra which is one of the students of the Brave Maker Academy to learn more about it because I would love to take it one day and let me tell you the logistics before because before we get started what do actors really want from an acting class we want to get better at acting and we want to be able to book more work after the class and this class because you film a short film at the end of it you come out of it with a clip of you acting that you can post on your casting websites and be able to submit to some work so like that is a dream this class meets on Wednesday nights from 6 to 9 p.m. for six weeks and is $600 no matter what other acting techniques you take I think this one is a great class to take because you get to work with Tony and other professional directors depending on which class it is and it's really frustrating when you are taking acting classes and you're like well I think I'm good but I haven't really worked like I have I don't have any anything to film to show I also know how frustrating it is as an actor to just do classes and not really feel like you're being able to do anything with it because acting class is very different than filming it's so different to have a boom mic or I have somebody you know putting a love on you or dealing with only really getting one take and then moving on so I wanted to build something that would try to incorporate that and really give people an opportunity to be on set and then have some footage for real I just wanted to talk to you about the acting class specifically because I want to get a perspective from the actor as far as acting training did you have any acting training before taking the brave maker class so I had taken a few classes wasn't exactly what I was looking for I am a full-time physician here in the Bay Area I practice minimally invasive surgeries one of the aspects of medicine is once you're done with medical school which is essentially all book work and your you know your face is in a book for god knows how many hours a day but then you go through for me it was six years of training afterwards so after the book work you're learning on the job that is the best way to learn your craft under somebody's supervision I started the Brave Maker Academy with this mantra train actors by making films but it's a lot of work you're like this is why other people don't do it because that's right my work but I've had actress tell me that they feel like they've come alive doing this and they've also been recognizing you know the budget is like a positive investment for them because they said hey I did a school over here that charged me one person said $850 for a school their promise to give them footage now the footage was of them doing other scenes that are of known films in front of a gray backdrop which that is something but you can do that at home exactly exactly and that's not really going to show some you know casting director or another director or producer that you can take original content you're just kind of mimicking you know or taking another take on to some IP already so the class is set up to be a working actor partnered with a working director like it's really like a workshop we're on our feet every week doing stuff Tony did mention that that he's thinking about a lot of different things that might change so right now as you experienced so far week one through four are more workshop and then five and six are filming those shorts yep correct in our six week academy classes we do one focused on commercial just one night focused on commercial we often joke about like this is it's happy land from the time you do yourself tape to be on set to everybody wants it to be warm and friendly and it's all about you know do you have the right look and the right personality to hang out on a set for 12 hours but that's only one one part right then we have to go how do you develop characters and how do you deal with you know the drama and all the different things which a lot of actors we don't really get the chance to do that in the Bay Area when I first heard the guy in the first day of class he's like you know it's going to be a six week course you know obviously we're going to do some basics we're going to do some you know some groundwork but by week five and six we're going to be shooting some short films and I'll just like yeah okay buddy this is not going to happen like I don't know what you're talking about but that's what we did I and two other directors taught the first few sessions I brought a director up from Los Angeles named Christine weather up she's got a feature film on Peacock and she's a working actor herself so you can look her up and she and I we wrote original short films so that's the other thing that is making this an exclusive experience as we're writing specifically for the actors that sign up for the class he'll have maybe around by week three sometimes week two he'll have a script written and then we can start to workshop those you know lines and you know just trying to get into the character's mind if there is no script yet we'll do exercises so it's a lot of getting into the character's mind and him being a director he sits back he watches everything happen and then he says okay now try it like this Tony he caters to the person so he'll write a script and he'll say I'm writing it for you know actor a and I know actor a has only had you know two classes before if you are a beginner actor and had two people who had never taken an acting class and I was just really open with them to say hey you're not going to have a leading role in this short film you can't carry a film yet but I'm going to give you something at your level okay that you can handle and so one of the actors he had just a few words literally just a few words in one of our short films but I really gave him a lot to do with his body to react because I wanted him almost like a silent film to learn how to navigate the acting and expressing and reacting with his vehicle of his face and his body and his movement and you know we had to have some conversations like that's not always what people want to hear like I want to be the star well you're not ready for it everybody has gained from the class so obviously whatever somebody's their day one they're going to learn something completely different and the beauty of it is Tony caters to each individual person and their level of experience here's one thing we are trying to do is create a safe and brave environment for our actors like I I often say I always wear my brave maker hat you know my metaphorical brave maker hat which is of inclusivity and diversity and we want to be empathetic kind human beings all people and occasionally I'll I'll say I'm going to put on the entertainment or the Hollywood hat and say in some spaces you might hear this kind of feedback how do you deal with that how do you deal with bad direction how do you deal with jerks you know onset but I'm never going to tear anybody down I always want people to feel good but I'm also going to have to say that didn't work that was unbelievable you're not taking the direction I asked for an adjustment I didn't see that so I have to be able to give that you know in a real way because I'm trying to set us up for finding sustainability in the entertainment industry I'm a director I also happen to be an actor too but I'm trying to teach you how to work under the pressures and expectations of making the day you know ending on time getting the scene work and sometimes you know you really only have one take because of time we just had this experience too on our academy set there were four different scenes and each scene had two actors in it and the first two scenes were a great everybody got about a half hour 45 minutes to do you know all the different coverage and angles and then we had a camera glitch and then we had a sound issue and then you know we're losing light I look back at my very first experience in this environment and I think about I kept messing up on one line and I kept messing up and I kept messing up and everybody's like oh don't worry you know you'll get it just take your time you know but that clicked like as I was messing up sitting there in front of the camera I'm looking around and I'm like yo Amrit this is not just you this is not just your scene partner there are 20 other people right now you're wasting their time by continuously messing up this one line it's messing up the flow and it's messing up your flow as well that was the biggest lesson I learned on day one of shooting and I will not make that mistake again that's what I mean by learning by doing you don't realize it until you're in there in the environment in you know the lights on you the cameras on you all these eyes looking at you and you realize really what it takes to make a film in acting class you get as many takes usually as you want but on set that's not the reality and that's what you have to train for but I love it and if people want to be a part of it right now it's very organic it's like they have to contact me we're going to do auditions for the next session which is in fall of 2023 and I'm trying to figure out tiers because we have beginner actors and amateur and we have professional actors we're trying to figure out how to really do it successfully it's very small we're not doing more than 10 actors we're building this network so you're getting relationships with people I can't guarantee this but a lot of the actors that I'm kind of working with I'm mentally auditioning for other stuff 100 I would pay that just for the fact of like creating a relationship with you creating a relationship with the other director whoever director writes the short film like for me that's super valuable because we're going to work together again and again after you know it and I'm also thinking about my other friends who will always call and say can you cast help me cast this this demographic this person this whatever which we all created a whole another Instagram page called Brave Maker Crew because I was getting enough calls where I'm like I get really invested because I want to help especially the Bay Area film community I want to help people and I want to help actors but I can't like spend all my time doing this for free so I just created an Instagram page where I can go to this Instagram page Brave Maker Crew and see all the headshots and cast somebody from there we're going to show some of the short films we did for Brave Maker Academy at the film festival so we'll have a 45 minute little block but we'll talk about this process and what we're doing and then hopefully we'll be able to scale it and hopefully we'll be able to have a slew of directors who are teaching these on different nights because right now we only offer one night in one session basically at a time but eventually we'll be able to offer more as we grow it so speaking of the film festival tell me about the festival but also tell me about how an actor can benefit from the film festival and how do you like to be approached from actors because I know what not to do is to slide into the DM and be like hey can you cast me in something happens all the time happens all the time instead of like can I audition for you or let me follow you and wait for you to post a casting fifth year here in redwood city july 13th through the 16th there's four days we have like 40 40 ish plus filmmakers that are coming from all around the country and probably a good 20 bay area filmmakers which is cool so about half of them are probably bay area filmmakers get a pass yes come to all of the films we're doing so many workshops we have entertainment industry panels women in entertainment some of them are actually free so if you're going oh my gosh i don't have the budget to buy a pass for 150 or i don't have the budget to buy 20 dollars for a workshop look for the free ones we got a la filmmaker named kina fergusson who's doing an iphone filmmaking workshop for free at our library so there are things we're trying to make accessible for any level okay at cost if you're an actor or if you're a filmmaker yes come and hang out come and watch the films i'm a filmmaker so i want to have connections with actors i love it when people tell me what they like or ask me questions and with grace a good passion if you would have done something differently that's your choice sure share that constructive feedback and i just i tell my friends like just don't be thirsty don't drip in ooze with like please cast me can i get your phone number i'm always surprised with someone DMing me saying nothing wrong with saying are you casting anything in the future nothing wrong with that but then i go and i click to follow them and they're not even following me i'm like oh you're not following brave maker you're not even like dialed in or this is the first time i'm hearing from you and you're asking for something from me this is a long game this is relational and not to be manipulative or deceptive it's strategic like follow your your favorite filmmakers follow local makers in the bay area and start liking their work start commenting on their posts like we see that i see that and it just is what it is i'm more inclined to want to connect with you if i feel as if you have already been cheerleading and following and supporting along the way when you show up to the festival offer to help there's anything i can do filmmakers who are coming up from la you you can buy them coffee and get some time from them ask questions about them get to know them but also make sure you do your research you don't have to ask things that are readily available long story short actors just think about how you would want to be treated when you are you know at a place where you're going to be offering to to pay it forward and do those things i think maybe we need to get better at talking about best practices about our career but it is you know this is your career so take it seriously and there's so many great books out there how to do this and there's no right way to make it or to break in so you got to figure it out just don't you know burn bridges as you do yeah and there's so much information out there you put out so much we have all of our episodes that are on our audio podcast every single app ever out there almost 200 we're doing a live recording of our 200th at the film festival you can also watch them on the youtube page brave maker org and see the filmmakers you know everybody from Nicole Levy from the recruit on Netflix there's so many cool people and we're really trying to make these inroads from the bay to LA so if you want to join again this goes back to those relationships i'm always looking for cool team members who believe in this vision and want to help elevate it and you know although we start a lot as volunteers that's our our culture is a highly driven volunteer culture a lot of our volunteers end up getting gig work getting paid because that's what happens as we build these relationships and then paid opportunities come and i don't hold that up as like a carrot i don't i'm really hopefully honest and transparent about the fact this is how we do it it's not for everybody i'll see you at the film festival yes i'm excited i really appreciate this and we'll keep schmoozing and this is the great connections right who knows where this will lead and what we'll do in the future film festival absolutely july at 13 to 16 see everybody there