Chewing the Fat with Jeff Fisher - Ep 192 | The American Dream - Steve Mokate & Todd Terry are Living Theirs...

Episode Date: September 7, 2019

It’s Saturday and Jeffy is bringing you a special podcast. Today Jeffy talked with Steve Mokate & Todd Terry two actors that are fantastic at what they do. Learn more about their projects as Jeffy talks movies & tv-shows.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to chewing the fat special American dream segment today. And I have two movie stars and television stars in studio in Dallas, Texas, here in the Mercury Studios, Irving, Texas. I have Steve Mokane and Todd Terry. Why are you laughing? We're laughing. I don't know. What should I say wrong? You lost this at movie stars.

Yeah, you did. Oh, I did? Okay, so the reason I had you both in is really you guys are living here in the Metroplex and you're, you know, you're living your American dream. I mean, you're acting in television and movies, things that people see all the time and they think to themselves, I can do that. I could do that. And you in particular, Steve, are, you know, you're a man that's done a load of different characters.

throughout your career now, but you still hold down a regular job. That's why I thought so funny a while ago when the actor got in trouble for working at Whole Foods, or he were at Trader Joe's, and I thought, so? I mean, he wants the everyday income, and then when he can work, he can work. Right. I mean, that's what you're doing, right? Right, and most actors have a second job. There's like 150,000 sag actors, Todd, something like that.

And the average income is under 20,000. People don't realize that. Not everybody is a Brad Pitt. Say I was going to ask to be in one of your shows, but now no. Yeah, the average actor doesn't make enough to get by just on their acting income. That's the sad truth about it. That's kind of sad. But that carrot is always dangling in front of you.

Right. So it's just around the corner. Every time you audition, that could be the thing that allows you to quit that second job. So I know, I know, Todd, you started. acting early on, right? I mean, this was, this has been really your life. I know that you have, you know, your, you're out hawking real estate on the side. You know, I don't know whether you're selling buildings or houses or, you know, whatever property you're selling. By the way. Give them your number.

Yeah, we'll tell you what the real estate service is. Yeah, I'm with Briggs Freeman, Sotheby's, in Dallas. Okay. Yeah. I've been doing that for about 22 years, but yeah, I started out of high school doing community theater. I moved over to Amsterdam with a theater company when I was in my early 20s. Wow. And then did regional theater and then started pursuing, you know, film and television probably about 30 years ago. And it is. It's like you're constantly job interviewing, you know? Right. And so that's what I tell most new actors, because everybody says, I want to do that. I can do that. You know, and the hardest part of it is not necessarily the job. It's getting the job. Getting the job. Yeah. And dealing with the rejection.

That gets a lot of people. So, but you, Steve, started a little bit later, right? I mean, you didn't stay as a, when you were a young man, you were just working. You didn't, were you thinking about being an actor? So when I was 19, I was in college up in Iowa, and I went and saw the movie Airplane, which you're familiar with, and I left a theater thinking, what a great way to make a living. So I thought about it, and I went to a school that was famous for theater, but I was a football player. And athletes and actors didn't mesh very well in my school for social reasons and scheduling reasons.

So I suppressed that urge until I was about 46. And then I started being a number of years to suppress an urge. So I became a background actor on prison break for two years. I played an FBI agent. Didn't have any lines. Just learned the industry. That was filmed here. Filmed right next door right here.

Yeah, we went in there and looked. I was like, this brings back memories. So for two years, I was the silent FBI. guy in the background and I kind of learned the industry but meanwhile I was taking a lot of classes with a woman named Nancy Chardier who's a big acting coach here in Dallas and then finally I did some improv work and an agent discovered me doing improv and so I signed with Linda McAllister talent here in Dallas and that was about 15 years ago so wow yeah late bloomer but it's still exciting for you right that's really exciting and thing is with acting there's no age limitations you know I can do this

you know, until I'm, you know, as long as I remember my lines. Right. Well, that's, now that's one of the... Which I'm already having trouble with. It is. That's one of the big things, though, right? You see so many shows that have the same reoccurring actors in them. When you watch so many of, like, I know you guys have a show now on Amazon Prime

vindication that just was released a couple weeks ago, right? Yeah. On Amazon Prime. So, don't worry, I'll forgive you if you haven't seen it yet, but get to it. but you see so many actors in those shows on HBO and Showtime and Netflix that are reoccurring actors that have worked together in all these other shows.

So I'm guessing that if you show up on time and know your lines, that's probably a big part of getting the gig. Yeah. I mean, we auditioned for a lot of different casting directors and once you've, when I say proven yourself, it's not necessarily you're the best person for the job, but you've gotten work

and they didn't fire you. You're reliable. That's always a positive thing. Show up, not drunk. Right. But you were saying, the funny thing about it is there used to be back a time when they shot Walker, Texas Ranger here. Yeah, yeah. And you could play multiple characters in a season. In the series. Yeah, you could be a bad guy. You could be an FBI agent. And they would allow that, but they don't do it anymore. So, but yeah, I

think most we get our work just hopefully based on reputation and continuing to show up. up and remember your lungs. I love the silent FBI guy in Prison Break. There's a cameraman that works here for us that he used to work for us and now he just subcontracts his time for us. But his big break was in prison break. He always joke around about it because he was a hand on a gurney a couple of times during

prison break. And that's his big star break. Yeah. If I see his hand, I might recognize it. That's why I always, that's why it's always, you watch a movie with people and you go and you see a guy walk by down the street. that's me. Well, my wife was Joan Cusack's pregnant belly and a show Arlington Road years ago, which is funny. She just showed up and she said, you're pregnant. We're going to shoot you.

When I was first starting out, there was a movie here about the Delta crash from the 80s, and David Hasselhoff was in it, and they needed a hand double, and I auditioned to be his hand double. Yeah, that was my, I thought that was going to be my big break. They came in, I put my hand down, they just took a picture of it. Yeah, I didn't get the part. Oh, no. So apparently David Hasselhoff's hand looks a lot different than mine. It's more female. Yeah. That's part of the deal.

So let's talk a little bit about working. We'll hit the new show that you're working on, and then we'll back up a little bit. But you're working on vindication. Now, all the episodes have been released on Amazon Prime. It's not a released weekly show. It's just you've done it all, and I can binge-worthy. Yeah, they dropped them all at once.

So it's 10 episodes. My favorite way. And the history behind it, it was a standalone short film. and the director had this idea, let's turn it into a series. And so from there, it took us about two years to film it, just because we'd write a script, and then we'd have a month or so before we could actually shoot it. So the process was two years, but yeah, it's all out now.

It's basically somewhat of a procedural crime drama, like a line order that there's an individual crime in each episode, but then there's also a family element to it. So you've got the best of both dramatic worlds happening at once. And sometimes they intertwine. I like it. I want to apologize for not having binged it yet. It's okay.

On behalf of my audience, I apologize because that's unlike me. Yeah, it's only been a couple weeks. Again, it's unlike me because I'm always looking for new shows. I love it. It's fantastic. So, also, we'll talk a little bit about some of the movies that you've been in recently, both of you. I know that, Steve, you've been in The Hunt, which I realized talking to your daughter,

who I'm friends with and know. And I thought, what? He's in the hunt. Why is this man not in my studio? And so here you are. And I appreciate you coming. So is it, since you've already been paid for the movie, is it less heartbreaking that it hasn't been released?

Or is it, do you want to get it out there? No, it's tremendously heartbreaking. Because it's probably the biggest opportunity I've ever had since I started doing this 15 years ago. It's a big Bloom House universal release. And I have a pretty nice role. and probably as big as anyone else in the movie. So when this whole thing happened two, three weeks ago,

Trump started talking about it and it's kind of... Then it was just domino effect, yeah. It was a domino effect. And the problem with that it is no one's seen the movie and most people haven't read the script. It's just when you see the trailer, a bunch of Republicans would get hunted down by some rich liberals. It doesn't sound right, but the truth is...

The thing is, I still don't understand it. I really don't because I watched the same trailer as everybody. else and I got a completely different aspect from it I thought well there I mean it appears to me and I know you're not going to you know you're not going to ruin the movie if it ever does get released which it seems

silly not to be but it appears even in the trailer that those people end up winning yeah I really don't want to say anything about the plot but I can tell you that it just appears that way Craig Zobel his point was to point to poke fun at Democrats and Republicans and his goal

was to entertain and unify and not separate and anger people. It makes fun of both sides. And, you know, I really don't want to go too far into the plot, but there's nothing to be upset about. Once you see the movie, when the movie does, if it does get released, I'm pretty sure it will. People will be like, what was all the love about? Yeah. It's a fun movie. Great actors, great plot.

Yeah. Hopefully it gets released. They need to hire you as the spokesperson now. Right? I mean, get out there. Let's go. Let's start pushing it. We're totally unselfish reasons I wanted to be released. And Todd, you're in a movie that was pretty recent and pretty hot on the irons. It was unplanned.

Unplanned, yeah. Amazing. I mean, I'm happy to have you here. It was great experience. Actually, funny, I got the job from a girl that was in Vindication in one of our episodes, and she played Ashley Bratcher, played Abby Johnson, the key figure in the movie. And so I actually got the job that way. but I played one of the abortion doctors, so I'm probably not looked on too friendly as far as, you know, my character,

but I really supported the overall, you know, message of the film. Yeah, well, I mean, you have to. I mean, you got to expose what needs to be exposed. Yeah. So. And you got to play an evil abortion. Yes, that's right. Those bastards.

And it's doing great, right? Yeah, I think it's still doing really well. So, yeah. So with vindication, before I, before we move on from that, Where are we at with Vindication now? You're done with season one. Have they rubber stamped the new season and you're all good to go and you've deep pocketed some three or four million and you're ready to go? Well, you heard it right here. You just made that prophecy. Honestly, I wish we could say, because people ask a lot of the people that have already seen it say one season two coming and we don't have an answer yet. I think a lot of it depends on viewership and the director and producers.

But we're hoping. That'd be great. It's a great show. There's not a lot of family friendly shows out there. No kidding. It's faith-based, but if you're not overly religious, you're not offended by the content. It's not right in your face with religion, but it's there. So whether you are religious or not, you would enjoy the show. Yeah, and you can set your kid. I mean, in my opinion, I can have my 13, 15-year-old with me and not be afraid of what's going to pop up on the screen. But it's not afraid to address harder issues like any Cobb drama would. Good. Yeah. My nine-year-old granddaughter watched it coming back from Oklahoma. We went up for the football game this weekend. I'm sorry.

She watched four episodes. She loved it. And I wasn't worried about what she was watching in the back seat. I'll tell you a story, Todd, about a good friend of mine that was born in a Big Spring, Texas. And he lives here in the Metroplex now. And he doesn't like to live this close to Oklahoma because he can still smell it. Oh, dude, I get hives. Yeah.

We went to the Big 12th Championship game. last year his wife and him and my son and I know that kills me so that was pretty fun yeah that kills me the big 12th my son my son goes to UT and so that makes it twice as honorous yeah my oldest son played for as long as we're making the rounds of children my oldest son played for the university of Missouri oh nice and they were defeated a couple of years there at the big 12 championship I was there I was at both games devastated devastated yes I was there devastating it was awesome no no it wasn't yeah we'd be We beat him in McCann Stadium, and we beat him in San Antonio.

You know, I remember. I don't know why I brought it up now because I do remember those. That's correct. That's correct. From South Lake, Texas, as a matter of fact. And Elvis Fisher, offensive line of number 72, left tackle. Oh, okay. Anyway, so I appreciate you guys coming.

So you guys are living your American dream now, right? Did you ever, like you, Todd, you started young and this is what you wanted to do. You know, I don't know that you wanted to sell. homes to supplement your income i mean like you said you're always waiting for that you know the the big break there's only so many yeah tom cruises out there in the world i get that but i mean you're pretty successful and i mean is this is are you are you living your american dream are you doing what you i mean i was always in it for the long haul i mean you when i was younger i you know of course you had the dreams of i want to be famous and rich and blah blah right you know i think any actor that's going to

have longevity, you've got to go, hey, I'm in it for the long haul. There's going to be peaks and valleys, and you just got to love it. But yeah, I got into real estate because it was a family business, but I never intended to make that. That wasn't my passion, although I love to do it. You know, the acting was always my passion. I will tell you to be careful snapping pictures. We did the story yesterday, chewing the fat about the realtor in Nashville that took a picture of him having sexual relations with some lady in one of the bedrooms of the houses he was trying to sell. And that Mer actually went up on the website as he was doing.

So I would say, be careful of what you're snapping. Just, you know, just a hit from me. Yeah, I know. It's yeah. Todd, no, no, no. No, no. Oh my gosh. I'm not saying you would.

Oh, my gosh. This is becoming a whole different kind of interview. Okay, so, Steve, you started, you said you had, you know, that little inkling in the back of, in the back of your mind early on that, hey, that'd be a cool way to make a living. But then, you know, that went away. and you moved on and then at 46, you said, you know what, I'm going to do this. This is what I wanted to do.

This is my American dream. I've already, you know, I've got a family. I've got kids. I've got work, but I want to be an actor. I want to create, you know, some sort of art. Are you happy? I mean, this is exactly what you wanted. Is it what you thought about?

Are you disappointed that you started so late? Yes, yes, and no. When I was going to do it in my 20s, there's a lot more competition. And I was, you know, I looked like every other actor at that age, basically. So there's a lot more competition back then, and I just wasn't mentally prepared for it back then.

Once you go through life and you hit a lot of adversity and a lot of hardships, you're more prepared for the rejection. You kicked in the gut a few times. Because I don't know what your success ratio is taught on auditioning, but if you're 10%, you're considered a stud in the industry. And I'm not 10%. Really?

But 10% is considered pretty solid. So you're going to fail. Even the good ones fail a lot more than not. So the rejection was the thing you have to deal with the most. I've come out of auditions thinking I had it in the bag. Like it was the greatest thing I ever did in my life. And you never hear from them again. But it could be because you were too tall, too short.

You look like their ex-wife, you know. Yeah. Yeah, you remind the casting agent of someone that. Fingers are too fat. It can be anything. And it's not the best actor a lot of times who gets the role. We've seen those films. That's what I tell myself when I don't book something.

And that gets you through, right? Steve was like, I'm just too handsome. You know, they had to go. Doggone good looking. We've all heard the story about the old actor years ago. I wish I could remember his name now. But he was in all these westerns and he had the bad teeth and he was, you know, the scrugging-looking guy.

He started making all this money. so he got his teeth fixed, never worked again. Yeah. That's so interesting. You know, so I mean that's, that's, you know, that might be an old Hollywood Wives tale, too. It's probably true. But it sounds good.

Yeah. That actor Jack Elam from the 60 years, who got the crazy eyes, he booked everything. Right. Right. So, I mean, it is, a lot of times, it's just luck of the draw.

So you say 10%, okay? So you get picked 10% of the time you're considered a stud. Now that's 10% of, do you agree with that? You agree with that. You agree with that, you know, I've never,

I actually knew a guy that used to Cal his percentages on booking jobs based on his auditions. I've never done it. It's a bad idea. It's a bad idea to do it. I'm afraid I'd depress myself. Yeah. However, mine is 9.2 right now.

Yeah. If I don't book this next one, I'm going to be below the average. But how, okay, so 10% of how many auditions, though? I mean, you say, you know, 10% of all your audition. Well, if you do 100 auditions, you book 10, you're considered pretty successful. Are you doing 100 auditions?

And what amount of time? It comes in waves. Like, I've had probably 12 auditions in the last six weeks, but then I'll go like a month with nothing because we live in Texas. Yeah. You know, if we're in LA, it'd be different. Yeah, I mean, it's not uncommon in Texas. If you have an agent in Atlanta as well, and so I'll put myself on tape for auditions

that happen there. Okay. So that's not uncommon to have three a week that you have to tape yourself, but in-person auditions locally, that's more once to three times a month. Most auditions are on tape nowadays. It's changed a lot. So how many times in your career, and this is for both of you now, have you auditioned say three times in a week and you have to say no? You have ready to turn one down because you wanted to do something else or you thought you got one that you ended up not getting butt.

You said, no, I'm not going to do this one. They said yes, but no. Yeah, it's a bad problem. I mean, it's a good problem. No, I understand. Yeah. But I mean, have you missed out on the role that would have been the, million dollar roll.

You like not to think about it. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I've had to turn stuff down in Atlanta and it's only, it's not because I didn't want to do it. It's because one, I couldn't cut my hair and they had to have cropped hair or it conflicted with another job. So sometimes you just go, which job do I think is better for me at the time?

But yeah, it does happen. Sometimes you don't know. Like I was on the movie Logan Wolverine. I was on hold for that for three weeks. I'm not allowed to audition or do anything for those three weeks. they kind of own you, even though you're not getting paid, and you don't officially have the job. But they put you on hold.

But they own you for three weeks. And so I had to turn down a lot of auditions in a three weeks. And who knows what have happened? You know, maybe I would have gotten the jobs, maybe not, but you know, I'll never know. And then I did not get the role on Wolverine to give to somebody else. So do you have any idea when you go on hold? That's fascinating that they own you like that,

because you, I mean, you agree to. Yeah. If you say no, then they just throw you in the trash. You're willing to risk it. Right. Yeah, that was a big time. You're not going to say no, you know, screw you. Yeah, either yes or no right now. Right. Yeah. So how long can they do that? You're on hold for three weeks. Is there a limit on that? No. So in the commercial world, it's called right of first refusal, which they may put 10, 20 actors on that. And that means we're considering you. When you're officially on hold, there's usually a smaller number of actors they're considering. You may be the only. You may be the only. You may be the only. You may be the only. You. only one. It could be a week, it could be two weeks. Typically, I haven't seen it longer in a couple of weeks. And the cruel thing about that is when you don't, when they decide to go another direction, they don't tell you. You just never hear again. Yeah. Oh. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. That seems

unfair. You never hear no. You hear yes, but you never hear no. You just never hear from them again. Yeah, you don't get feedback. Yeah. And then the movie comes out and there's your role. Right. Well, I guess I didn't get that one. Can I start looking for another job now? Yeah, that's the way it goes. So, yeah. I mean, if they put you on hold, it does seem, and I realize life isn't fair,

but it does seem a little unfair that they're not going to say, okay, you're off hold now. I had to get my agent to dig into it and find out for me. Yeah, normally you have to push your agent to find that out. Wow. That's the thing. They never tell you no, so they just leave you hanging. That's pretty amazing.

Okay, so we're talking to Steve Mokate and, Todd Terry. Actors extraordinaire. Happy to have him here in the American dream segment of Chewing the Fass. I appreciate you guys coming in. So, vindication is what you're working on now. It's wrapped and it's up on Amazon.

So what's next? Steve, what do you got next? I don't have anything officially coming up, but I'm auditioning all the time. I've auditioned for three or four movies in the last week. And you just cross your fingers and hope something happens. I don't know. Do you have something coming up right now?

Yeah, I've got a, it's, we've shot one episode of the series. It's called Washington's Armour, and it's shot here. There's a place called Copernum Studios. I don't know if you've heard of The Chosen. It's that biblical series that they crowdfunded. Long story short, they're shooting it there, and it's about the life of George Washington. And so I don't know if it'll be a history channel type thing, but we've shot one episode, and they're supposed to be, I believe six total.

Wow, nice. But it's fine. You get to wear a powdered wig. I saw the picture of you. It was awesome. Yeah, the costuming is amazing. And the sets are really, really nice. Do you find yourself, and it's funny that you talked about, you know, The Chosen and this group is putting together the Washington series, and I'm sure that it's, you know, strong based around the faith of George Washington.

Right, David Barton. It was based on a David Barton book. Yeah, I mean. Yeah. I mean, I love David. He's dumb. Yeah. He's dumb. The smartest, is he?

The smartest guys in the country. But do you find yourself now because of unplanned? If that was the first movement, I don't know if vindication was in on that too, but do you find yourself now that the faith-based production companies and the faith-based people putting together those films are saying, we've got people that, you know, we've got people that are behind what we believe, so we want to work with them, or is it just? That's a great question, because I've been trying to figure out who were those people that are casting those faith-based projects, because I don't know them personally. I mean, I got unplanned, like I said, through Ashley Bratcher.

I've done other faith-based projects and films in the past, but they were from people I knew that were just producing them. But I think over time, I believe there are a couple of casts. directors out there that are doing the stuff like the Kendrick brothers overcomer was the thing that's out right now. I just talked to one of them as a matter of fact. And the guy that's in there, Cammy Arnett, who is a fabulous actor and really was just brilliant in that movie.

You know, he's a strong Christian and just a great person, several people in that movie. So you guys are right now just out of work actors, really. I don't even know why I'm talking to you. Yeah, thanks for stopping. I appreciate you coming by. Living the American Dream of the game. Waiting.

Like I said, I've had a bunch of auditions tomorrow or today. When I check my messages, I may have booked something. Probably not, but there's a chance. So you are, Todd, you are a real estate agent. So, I mean, that's kind of a, you're on your, I mean, you said it was a family company, so you're not really locked down to a hard schedule. Steve, you are running a business where you're selling goods. How difficult is it to manage holding down another job and still trying to do the work?

It always depends on who you work for. I work for a 220-year-old Japanese company called Sanjay. We make soy sauce and organic sauces, Japanese sauces, and they know I do this because I didn't want the owner of my company in bed some night and there I am on the TV. He's like, what's my sales guy doing in this movie? So I told them up front that I'm an actor on the side. but I use, so when I filmed the hunt in Louisiana, I had to take three weeks off from my real job, my day job. Right.

And so I used three weeks of vacation. And so they make you take vacation time for that? I don't know if they would have made me, but I did just to be on the up and up, you know, in case he's listening right now. You're fired. Yeah. And I appreciate him letting me do that. But they're very, I work on my house. I cover the whole country selling the Sanjay sauce.

Right. So I'm very flexible. I can make my own schedule. It's the perfect. job for being an actor as well. So LA is my territory. So I auditioned in L.A. Albuquerque, where I'd better call Saul and some other things I was in. So I would go out there and do my real job for a week and then I would film the next week on Better Call Saul or Nightship. The two shows I was in out there. And it's a win-win for everybody. That's great. All right. So

gentlemen, I know I've yapped you off and I could talk for another hour and a half, but I'll let you go. I appreciate you guys coming in. And I look forward to seeing the hunt. you're going to break the news and when it's going to be released and when we can see it right here today? Yeah, I wish. I had that much input. So the answer is no.

I know their distributors in Europe are pushing to get it. So it could be that it gets released over there first. But hopefully. It seems strange in today's world when if it gets to release in Europe, I'm guessing we'd be able to see it here.

Yeah. I wonder if there's a way. I don't know if there's some sort system we have made. It'll be released here hopefully. I think Al Gore created it. Yes, he did. 100% correct.

He did. Yeah. When he was working in the Senate. But watch vindication. Vindication on Amazon Prime. I'll leave it to that. Gentlemen, Todd Terry, Steve, okay, thank you very much. I appreciate you guys coming.

Quick reminder to subscribe to chewing the fat with yours truly, Jeff Fisher. Remember to subscribe and tell your friends, tell your neighbors, and make sure that you you know, once you subscribe. And if you subscribe, you know, if you're an Apple iTunes user, you can rate and review it so other people find the podcast.

And I know you have a busy life. So it's easier for you to just 20 stars, best podcast ever. And you're done. We're all good. So subscribe to chewing the fat and then rate and review it, 20 stars, best podcast ever. Really nice to talk to Steve Mokate and Todd Terry. And I know in the interview, I had not. seen the show. And I just want to let you know that I went home after I talked to him earlier

this week and I started watching his show on Amazon. So I broke my heart not to have already had all their shows under my belt. So when you get an opportunity, vindication is up on Amazon if you have an opportunity to watch it. And Todd Terry is great as the lead detective in that show. And hopefully keep your fingers crossed for The Hunt to be released so that we can see Steve Mokate and his good work in The Hunt. Thanks for listening to Chewing the Fat, The American Dream segment on Saturdays. I appreciate it. Have a good weekend.