In Search Of Excellence - Danielle Vasinova: How a Shy Farm Girl Became a Hollywood Star | E103

Episode Date: March 5, 2024

Welcome to another episode In Search of Excellence! My guest today is Danielle Vasinova. Danielle is an actor, model, producer, entrepreneur, avid equestrian, and drummer, she has been in more than 50 movies and TV shows and is best known for her colorful action-adventure rolls. And she has graced the cover of many magazines, including Vogue, and Harper's Bazaar. In this episode, Danielle shares her story of overcoming shyness through cheerleading, starting a modeling career, and landing her first movie role. Randy discovers how he unexpectedly landed a role in a movie alongside Sharon Stone despite having no acting experience and emphasizes the importance of taking advantage of every opportunity you get in life. Time stamps:01:23 Danielle’s backgroundHer grandmother was an actress and singer in PragueEscaped communism at 17Met her future husband at displaced persons’ camps in GermanyThey came to New York City togetherHer mom worked for American AirlinesDad tested airplane engines for Pratt and WhitneyFell in love and moved to Connecticut03:46 Childhood memoriesDad bought her a ponyFarm animals became her friendsPainfully shy as a kidCreating a character is a form of protectionReluctantly became a cheerleaderHelped her to break out of the shellA training accident 11:12 Modeling at 13Competition at the local mallThe scout came up to her and offered her to be a modelWent to New York and signed a contractCastings, auditions, rejections and bookings 18:23 Taking advantage of opportunitiesDanielle’s bucket listRandy’s advice on how to get to peopleRandy’s story about meeting a famous actressPeople do respond to bold movesMyocarditis on a date 29:16 Do you need education to be an actor?UConn collageWas a waitress the whole timeBecame a Patriots cheerleaderComing to Santa Barbara 32:31 Young and Restless castingCalled for casting through her momWent to LA and auditionedGot the part 35:05 Randy’s hilarious experience with the movie industryBecoming friends with Bruce McNallCasting for the role in the movieGetting the role of a police officerMeeting Sharon StoneShooting the scenesBecoming friends with a certain directorBeing offered a role in his show 50:53 Randy’s first podcast guestsMeeting Sam Zell and becoming friendsSharon Stone andCliff Kingsbury, a football coachMark Cuban responded to his emailThe greatest piece of advice Randy got from his mentorDoing things that no one else has done beforeSponsors:Sandee | Bliss: BeachesWant to Connect? Reach out to us online!Website | Instagram | LinkedIn

I was offered to be a Patriots cheerleader. I made it. I got on the squad. Three-hour practices, no pay for the practice. I'm not like a real football fan. I actually don't know much about football, but I know how to cheer. Called the woman up and she's like, okay come in on a Friday. And then she's like, okay, do you want the part? And I was like, yeah. Twist my arm. And she said, okay, go to wardrobe, be back here at 6 a.m. Monday to work. Just like that. Yeah, twist my arm. And she said, okay, go to wardrobe, be back here at 6 a.m. Monday to work. Just like that. Yeah, if they were all that easy, right?

Right. Welcome to In Search of Excellence, where we meet entrepreneurs, CEOs, entertainers, athletes, motivational speakers, and trailblazers of excellence with incredible stories from all walks of life. My name is Randall Kaplan. I'm a serial entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and the host of In Search of Excellence, which has started to motivate and inspire us to achieve excellence in all areas of our lives. My guest today is Danielle Vassanova.

Danielle is an actor, model, producer, entrepreneur, avid equestrian, and drummer. She's been in more than 50 movies and TV shows and is best known for her colorful action-adventure roles. And she's graced the cover of many magazines, including Vogue and Harper's Bazaar. Danielle, welcome to In Search of Excellence. Thank you for being here. Thank you for having me. I always start with our family, and I want to start with your grandmother. Going back to the very beginning, tell us about your grandmother, your mom, your dad, and how they influenced your life. So my grandmother, my whole family is in aviation.

And so my grandmother was actually the only artist in my family. I'm Czech and Native American, and she's my grandmother on my Czech side and she you know she was an actress and a singer and a dancer in Prague and the communism was really bad and so she escaped in the middle of the night with just a suitcase and so she was I don't even think she was 17 years old and And she got bounced around to a bunch of DP camps, like displaced persons camps. And she ended up at this one in Germany. And she met my grandfather there because they formed a trio.

And so people would throw like food or clothes or shoes, you know, up on the stage. And so he saw her and they ended up falling in love. They got a sponsor to come over to New York City. She was 17 at the time? Yeah, maybe not even. And so when they got the sponsor to come over to New York City, she went from acting, singing, dancing to scrubbing toilets

because she spoke no English. But she did it in the name of freedom. And so without that journey and her taking those steps, I wouldn't be doing what I'm doing. And what about your mom and dad? My mom and dad, my mom worked for American Airlines. My dad tested airplane engines for Pratt & Whitney. So completely different, you know. they met uh there was like a like this czech community in connecticut and my father was from six brothers of big family six brothers and sisters

and so uh from new york city they would go up to to this lake in connecticut and my mom actually ended up dating my uncle for a while. Mom dated your uncle? Huh. I'm not even sure if I should comment on that on this podcast. I don't know. I wasn't expecting that. Yeah, you didn't know what you were getting into.

And then they broke up, and then she ended up with my father, and then she moved to Connecticut Connecticut and then I was born. Gotcha and so let's talk about when you were younger your dad bought you a pony when you were three years old. Yeah. And you and you loved riding so tell us what it was like to have that pony how it influenced your life how many times you fell off the pony and then what that experience was like. Yeah and they called me Lead Butt because I would just like take her down to the end of the kind of, you know, area where we would ride. And then I would just kind of had a crop and I would and then kick her

and she would go shooting off down the way. And I would just stick on there like glue. But of course, she was fresh and frisky a bunch of times and so she bucked me off you know from time to time and I would get the wind knocked out of me and just get back up and start again you know but when you're three are you actually getting on that horse alone as someone holding the horse with because I've got a three-year-old and I can't imagine I had her right I was three to six okay so like at first when I was, you know, learning, my dad would just take me around, but then I learned pretty quick. So. So you went on your own on the horse when you were six years old riding around? Probably, no, before that, before that. Yeah. And would you ride on your farm? Were you taking it? Sometimes we see horses on the street, on sunset, up in a park area. It definitely wasn't like sunset, no.

I grew up on a farm in Connecticut, and yeah, no, it was just like 100 acres, and so everything was fenced in, and it was beautiful. It was beautiful, but then, you know, she died when I was six years old, and then I started going to the Westbrook Hunt Club and so I started learning other different styles of riding. And so it taught me discipline because I'd have to go and feed my horse before school. And I would ride all the time and I started learning how to train horses and then breeding later. So it was a journey. So as a kid, equestrian was your passion, horses were your passion. What else were. So as a kid equestrian was your passion horses were your passion what else were you like as a kid say and we'll start with kind of six through twelve were you popular social

no god no I was like painfully shy so shy um I just my horse was my friend and my dogs and my goats and my sheep and those were my friends you know I was afraid to speak up in class like I never never never wanted to raise my hand yeah I don't know I was kind of a weirdo where were you afraid you didn't know the answer were you afraid people are gonna make fun of you you don't want people staring at you? I think all of the above. I think I just felt self-conscious. I felt awkward. I didn't feel like I had a voice. I don't know. Most actors I know actually talk about being shy when they were younger.

They were in their own shell, and I find it very interesting Why why do you think that is and what what makes them? want to speak in front of Hundreds of millions of people if a film is is incredible or go on live TV I mean their total dichotomy there. I think that there's a certain level of protection with Characters because I think if you layer that certain level of protection with characters. Because I think if you layer that over you, you don't feel like it's you. If that makes sense. Like this is, if I was to speak to an audience, I'd feel so vulnerable.

Today even? Today even, yeah. Like that is one of my worst fears of life i i just it's so weird to think about you're in front of a camera we'll talk about my movie experience in a little bit because i think i shared it with you but you know the first time i was in a room there were 40 cameras there's mics hanging everywhere there's people there where what was that for it was um well um let's save the story for another for later later in the podcast okay but it um it made me very nervous and self-conscious i had never been on a movie set before yet you do that every day or a lot so how how can you do that and still be nervous to speak in front of people i don't know i think it's creating characters that shield, that actors feel like

they're protected or they're shielded. I think that's the only way that we can kind of get around it. And it's like a safe expression. So at some point you got into cheerleading. You were, what I read was a reluctant, what does that mean? I read, I read reluctant cheerleader. Someone's dragging you to cheerleading trials. Basically. Yeah. This girl, this girl that I made friends with, like one of my two friends, she's like, she called me Danny. She's like, Danny, come on. We're going to cheerleading trials. And I'm like, hell no, I'm not going. She's like, come on, you're going!» Okay fine. We went and I auditioned and then we waited for the list.

They post a list on the outside wall and so we waited for the list to be posted and I got on it and she got on it. And then she got mad at me later on because I ended up making Captain within two years and yeah, that kind of helped to break me out of my shell a little bit because we had to you know learn routines and we had to go out there in front of everybody and and do it so it kind of broke the ice for me I think my daughters were cheerleaders in high school it was their true love and it was one of the best things they've ever done in their life that you're a team you're disciplined you're practicing every day yeah um and it is like flyers or they were they

they did everything i mean a local high school no one's really flying okay the lightest the lightest member of the team is is up on top as usual yeah yeah yeah and it's dangerous sport i mean a lot of people don't think so people one of the girls had a concussion the first week or freshman year. Couldn't cheer again, has had serious problems memory-wise. And you know, you take a bad fall, you're up there 10 feet in the air and someone doesn't catch you, right? It's kind of crazy. That's what happened to me. I was, we had two new, I was a flyer and we had two new bases and they go, okay, well, there was a screw up with the schedule. And so the basketball team had the whole core and we were kind of shafted off on the side. And, uh, so anyway, long story short.

So two new bases, you know, we're, we're on account of one, two down up. And then I had to go and do a pike basket toss. Yeah. And land. So they go one, two, down, up. And then their timing was off. And so instead of throwing me straight up, they threw me like backwards into a stack set of bleachers. Yeah.

And I just went and just got my back just. And then I fell down to the floor. And? Doctor, hospital? Yeah, had to get rushed to the hospital I didn't have anything broken but my back's like never been the same I don't know how I didn't have anything broken but I just felt like I couldn't even move and so yeah they checked me out I was I was okay but it still doesn't feel right, even to this day. My two young daughters, seven and three, I'm prejudicing them to become cheerleaders. Of course, in University of Michigan cheerleading outfits.

My wife went to USC, so we always compete which outfits that they're going to wear, but they love it and they give me a lot of shit for it, for lack of a better word. Oh, I've got mommies. I've got USC, go Trojans. Let's talk about how great shopping malls can be for us and how weird it is to have strangers come up to you at shopping malls. And talk to us about the cheerleading competition for Muscular Dystrophy Association and then what happened from that point on. Yeah, that's kind of how I got swept up into this wild ride, you know. Through cheerleading,

we got asked to do a competition at a local mall. So we, was it your cheerleading team? My squad, yeah. The whole squad goes there? Yeah, the whole squad. And so we went and we did this competition for the MDA. And this scout came up to me from Elite. And she's like, hey, I like your look. We'd like to set up something for you to come and test down in New York. And so I was like, okay, well, I got to talk to my mom. Because I don't know, I was probably like 13, 14 years old. I was just a puppy.

And so we went and they ended up signing me and that was cool because my grandma she was in queens and flushing and then they were in midtown manhattan and so i'd go down there for work and then stay with my grandma and it kind of worked out and that's how i began doing a lot of print, editorial, commercial work from there. Let's go back. You're in the mall. Okay. The team is 12 or 16 people. Yeah.

And you're done with the cheer. And some dude is staring at you, basically. It's a girl. Oh, okay. Some girl. All right. Makes it a lot better. Less weird story.

So she's staring. Less creepy, right? Yeah, less creepy so she she sees you and does she say Danielle come here because it's a little weird when there's 12 or 16 people near you right she says yeah I think my I don't know weird right yeah it's super weird but I don't even I think she might have went up and found out who my coach was, and then my coach came up to me. She didn't kind of just go up to me with all the other girls there. I think she was a little more kind of cool, incognito.

But your mom wasn't there. You went home, you told your mom what happened, and did she think it was, whoa, hey, this is a little weird? Yeah, she thought it was weird. It was weird. But she's like, if you want to go, we can go. But, you know, we're going together. Right. I'm not sending you alone.

But did she probably want to do some research first to make sure that it was okay? Of course, 100%. Yeah. So you get on a plane or you drove to New York? Drove. Or took the train. I think we took the train. You took the train. Yeah.

Are you nervous at this point because someone's going to be looking? No, not at all. Like, I'm very, I was very just open, you know, kind of go with the flow. And did you have a goal at that point in terms of what you, what you wanted as a model? Did you even think of being a model before this woman said, Hey, nothing, no, never thought about, I didn't even know what I wanted to be. You know, I had no idea what I wanted to be at that point. I probably something with horses. And so just walk us through it because I think people just say, okay, well, we can fast forward. Yeah. Then you got a bunch of print jobs and your career took off, but you're 13 or 14 years old. You're walking into an agency. I've been in some

of the lobbies. I mean, they're beautiful.'re beautiful it's a little intimidating uh even for a man sitting there and just having a meeting it's intimidating whoa this is kind of crazy yeah it's kind of scary yeah it's scary so did you who are these people where am I what's happening to me right so so did you sit down on a in a chair and someone's looking at you kind of like? Yeah, I think I was just there with my mom and they had a bunch of fashion magazines laid out. And I think we were just, you know, hanging out. And then somebody brought me in to another room. And then there was like a bunch of people there in that room.

And then they just talked to me and they just asked if we'd be open to signing. Did you say how much? That's the question, right? My mom probably did. Big allowance at that point. Yeah, exactly. We grew up very poor, so I think she was like, this could maybe help with college a little bit. And so did you have a goal and did you at that point

to make a certain amount of money? And do you remember what your first job was? I think it was Macy's was my first job. But no, I had no goal. I didn't even know what I was doing. Yeah, I was just like, let's go have fun. I guess this could be a cool adventure. I don't know.

My mom might have had a goal because she might have been like, okay, we need X amount to put her through college. But I didn't. So I think a lot of people don't know the life of a model. My wife has been a model for a long time. And you go there and there's a bunch of people taking pictures of you. Here you're 13 or 14. It has to be scary, like you said,

but are you kind of posing in front of the camera? Because at 13 or 14, you have no idea what you're doing, right? I didn't even know how. I didn't even know how to pose or how to move or what to do, and so they kind of had to show me. So you get one job. You get the main stage job. Yep. and then things just started to roll from there yeah well a lot of jobs I wouldn't get you know I would have to sometimes they they direct

booked me sometimes I had to go to casting sometimes I would miss castings because of school it was a whole it was a mishmash of things right so for people don't know explain how the whole thing works you get a call from an agent and then you're on hold and then you got to go well it depends like if you get a call from your agent and they've already you know you've sent your comp card and sent all your materials and they're like okay we want her and you're booked that's one thing but if you have to go and audition then you you go, you audition, see if they like you. Maybe they'll put you on a veil,

which means kind of like a hold. Are you available? And then they'll call you and hopefully book you. I've been taken off of a veil, too. You're put on a veil, you're waiting, waiting, and then they're like, oh, no, they went in a different direction. Yeah, and then you're hosed because you don't get paid for it.

You could have taken another job. Thank you. Yeah, it's an unfair process. But a lot of times you're going for readings or shoots or whatever, and you've got to do something silly in front of someone for a commercial. But you get a ton of rejection, right? I mean, what's your win rate when you're doing that and then even at a young age how do you deal with the rejection I mean it's I my wife goes through this I don't know it's probably I'm still so screwed up I don't know I don't even know what the rate is

numerically I mean it's probably one in ten if you're lucky yeah right right I mean people see I mean you're just on a Vogue cover, which is incredible. Congratulations. Thank you. That was a bucket list, bucket list check. Bucket list check. What else is on the bucket list? Top five.

Top five. Oh, God. Top five for life? Anything. I want to... I'm going to Cannes this year, so that's going to be cool. Never been there before? Cannes Film Festival.

Never been? Nope. I would love to... Well, there's so many directors I'd love to work with, but I'd love to work with Tarantino. He's on the top of my list. Darren Aronofsky. Have you met them before? Tarantino once at the Golden Globes, and he asked,

what's your last name? And so I started to say, and then this woman kind of came in and totally just bulldozed, and I never saw him again. I would have told you and given you some coaching on that one. You know what I would have done? What? I would have sent him something to his office the very next day, something outrageous and said, it was so great meeting you. I'd love to have coffee with you. And I bet the response

rate would have been 99.99%. Really? You know he's in town. Yeah. Right? Yeah. You know he's going to the office if he's in town, right? He's got a production studio. He's got an office on some lot somewhere. And I think you gotta, I think you gotta hit it right on the spot. What if just some assistant gets it and throws it out? I'm not going to name names right now. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. I was in Hawaii and my wife knows the story. So I'm not, I'm not, I'm not telling anyone the story um I'm not releasing a secret about some other woman uh I was in Hawaii uh I don't know this was 15 actually 18 years ago roughly and with my first wife when there's an actress there with her husband who I think is attractive okay and so we happened to meet each other not not in a weird way but we

had talking from LA yeah you know I clearly knew what she did because she's very well known okay and you know we had a nice conversation I found her to be very humble I never really talked to a famous actress before and and it was always like there was a little like something that like a spark but it was you know it was nothing weird it just when you look at someone for a little longer it's it's a little longer yeah and then i i ran into her again um in brentwood and i was divorced at that point and um it was interesting actually no i ran into her at soho house okay okay and she's with a guy okay and i didn't know this is how much how much this was at least 10 or 12 years

oh later okay and i i went up to her and i said hey i don't know if you remember we we met at four seasons in kona and this was a long time ago and you were married to so-and-so and she said i vaguely remember that and still like now it was full i could show my spark yeah and then she showed a spark too but i didn't know who who the guy was okay so um they were together though they were clearly together but i didn't know if it was a friend i mean you know she's with a guy wasn't holding his hand wasn't all over and wasn't kissing him okay and so the next day um i messengered over a bunch of flowers and roses to the office i found out i looked up where her production studio was and i sent over that and i knew she liked a certain kind of chocolates i had googled it or something i had googled her to

find out what she liked oh my god so i sent all that over and i figure okay like you know she's going to respond and then i left a voicemail and And I said, you had her number. It's not that easy. It's not that hard. I mean, if you want to quit. Her office number? Yeah. Oh, not herself. No, no, no, not herself. That'd be creepy. That'd be creepy. Who is this creeper? There probably are ways to get that. I got it later. But, but, but, but so, so, so I sent this all over to her, and I didn't hear from her. I'm like, oh, shit. Like, what a loser. I shouldn't have done this.

It's embarrassing. She didn't get it. And it turned out what happened was she had left the next morning for a movie. And the assistant got it and didn't tell her for like a month later. And when she came back in town, she listened to the voicemails and she was horrified she didn't respond she was really really nice she said um i would love to go out with you but so you asked her out on a date well i said yeah on that call of course i did why why wouldn't i okay all right there's nothing there's nothing it's pretty ballsy i like it

yeah okay yeah i, why not? I see you. I see you. I see you. If you don't get up to bat, you know, you're not going to score. Amen. And so we, you know, she dated this guy for a long time and we ended up becoming friends. But again, it's someone high profile, someone I wanted to meet.

I mean, you do things like that, people do respond to it. Okay. I like it. I like that. People do respond to it. Okay. I like it. I like it. Have you ever done that and somebody's just been like, who is this? Like, no. Like, who's this weirdo? Well, I couldn't. I did something.

You know, there's nothing like positive reinforcement and learning from your wins. I mean, I think it's important to learn from your mistakes as well. Right. But when I was also single, and my wife thinks this is creepy, but it worked. It worked. There was a, you know, when you're single, you look on Facebook and you look at mutual friends. It's a community. Sometimes people set you up, but it's, you know, you want a wider meet me. Yeah. Wider net. And that's a good word. And I became friends with this news reporter who I thought was attractive and I'd watch her on the news. I said, that's great.

So I sent over a coffee basket with two mugs to the studio. She was a Channel 2 reporter. And I said, I'd love to drink this in person with you and have a coffee with you. And she responded in about 45 minutes after we got to the studio what so yeah she was on the caper well the the funny thing the funny thing about this and I don't want to talk about my dates for these crazy stories but two things happen the first thing that happened the first thing that happened is we went on a date and I nearly died, which is a true story. What?

Yeah, I got really sick. And we're going to talk about your illness as well and what happened to you. But I had something similar. I was very sick, couldn't get out of bed. I mean, I was suffering through that date. I had myocarditis and so, and it's often fatal. And so I went to the hospital, you're having a heart attack, you know, and I was afraid of dying. I mean, I was in the hospital for three days, intensive care, the youngest person in there by, you know, 35, 40 years. Wait, you're going on a date with this girl I want a date confused and got sick on the date I mean obviously I was coming down with it but I I took her home I don't even know how I drove home I was so sick and I didn't

get up for really four days oh my god I had to call 911 I felt you know no not at all and and the the the crazy thing about this whole thing, that was only one date, and we became friends, and she became good friends with my wife. Oh, my God. And to this day, you're still friends. Yes, and she apologized five years later after knowing what had happened for not saying, hey, are you okay? Can I bring you something? Yeah, I know. Where was she in this whole deal here? Well, I mean, I did tell her at some point,

hey, I'm in the hospital. I'm not doing very well at the moment. And so how are you now? Was there a cure for it? Yeah, it's really one and done. So you have myocarditis, and you can't get it again. And it's an infection that goes to your heart. No one knows what it's caused from. There is no known cause. It could have been a germ at Starbucks. Not hereditary, nothing like that. Nothing. It has nothing to do with that. It's just random. No. And it used to be very rare. And then COVID happened and it was less rare. And we're going

to talk about your COVID experience, crazy experience as well. I'm glad you're okay. Yeah, thank you. I'm glad I'm okay too. I'm glad I'm still here, but crazy experience. Crazy experience. So, all right. So we're going to get to your COVID crazy experience as well. But the moral of this story is that we should be sending these.

We should be... Not creepy gift baskets. We should be taking advantage of opportunities that present themselves in real time. So you meet Quentin Tarantino, right? And you're now pissed off because some random person comes and cuts you off. And you're with your dream director. Yes. Right?

And I just would have pounced on it because memory, he asked for your name. Yes. Right? So that's huge. Yeah. Huge. Yeah. And then I would have just hit it the next day.

All right. Live and learn. All right. Live and learn. Live and learn. But hey, you're young and have your whole life in front of you and there's still opportunities to meet them. Exactly. And you know the right people. So let me ask this, by the way, I find this so interesting. You're an actress. You're

a great actress. You've been in a ton of stuff. Why not use your relationships and say, I want to meet Quentin? I don't know. It hasn't, I've not been able to meet Quentin? I don't know. I have not been able to connect the dots. I don't know anybody that knows him. Have you tried? I mean, I've asked my management and whatnot, but nothing has come of it. You've asked them to say, hey, does anyone... Do you know someone who knows Quentin?

I don't think so. What have you asked? Okay, so I know Lawrence Bender. Okay. Who used to work at a band apart with Quentin. Yeah. But they are not. Right.

So that's not, I can't. It's not appropriate. But I don't know. I don't really run around and ask people, hey, do you know Quentin? Do you know Quentin? I feel like kind of silly. It's funny because I want people on my podcast. Right.

I reach out to you. Yeah. I reach out to Mark Cuban. I reach out to the CEO of Goldman Sachs. And they all said yes. Right? They're hard to get. I think I need a pair of Yerko on this.

They're hard to get. I mean, but why not? You got to go after your dreams. Quentin's gonna have a new movie, he's gonna have a premiere, you gotta be there. Okay, well I am a Jedi in training, so I'm learning from the master. Okay, so we'll move forward now. So you're modeling for a while. Let's talk about college for a minute. So take us to UConn and the whole, I'm doing it, I'm not doing it I need it

I don't need it and as part of the question is do you need an education to be an actress or an actor no you don't 100% you know sometimes you don't even need an education to be you know some of the most successful entrepreneurs business people in the world have not even gone to college so it depends right I went to UConn we we that was kind of the best that was the best fit at the time financially for us and uh yeah so I just I was a waitress the whole time and then if I could do jobs I would do them but being in Connecticut going to New York it wasn't always the easiest right to get out of class and to go and do these jobs yeah so I was offered to be a Patriots cheerleader I made it I got on the squad right and then tell us about that you're

you're rushing through it because I think this is also very interesting. I mean, why? $100 a game? Yeah, we get $100 a game. All day practices, I mean. Three-hour practices, no pay for the practice. Right. So what's the math on that? $2 an hour?

You're in the hole, basically. $2 an hour? I'm paying them. Right. Yeah. So why go out for that job? What is it? You make money off, like, promo stuff. You make job? What is it? You make money.

You make money off like promo stuff. You make money off of calendars. You make money off of appearances, things like that. It's kind of like a, I don't know, like a cool factor, I guess. Okay. So was it resume building or just hey? Resume building. Yeah.

Make connections. I don't know. Football fan down on the field? Yeah. No, I'm not like a real football fan. I actually don't know much about football, but I know how to cheer. So you get the job, but you don't do it. Got the job, but my friends from the restaurant were going out to California.

Right, so tell us about Santa Barbara. Yeah. The difference between Santa Barbara and Yeah. The difference between Santa Barbara and LA. I didn't think there was one, but when I got here, that's when I found out there's a big difference. Big difference. Yeah. So my friends were going out to California and I had always wanted to go to LA because, I don't know, something clicked in me and I was like, I think I'm going to make a go for film and television. So yeah. and I was like, okay, I think I'm gonna make a go for film and television So yeah, so I was like screw it I'm not doing the Patriots I'm I'm coming with you guys and so we all just piled into one car with all our luggage

like a thousand bucks in my pocket and we just drove across country And then you got to Santa Barbara. Did they have an apartment? You slept on a blow-up mattress. Yeah. Well, one guy bailed out by the time we got to Vegas. He had already lost all his money. He tapped out.

So it was me and the other guy, and we went to Santa Barbara because that's where he had people, but I had nobody. And I didn't understand that Santa Barbara was quite far from L.A., even though it's not really that far distance-wise when you're stuck in traffic. It's like a whole other world. And my mom, working for American Airlines, she said there was these two good-looking people that came up, and she was at the ticket counter this one day,

and they were going out to L.A., and she goes, Oh, my daughter, my daughter just left for L.A. And so the woman said, Oh, wow, what for? And so my mom told her and she's like all right well here give her my card I'm I cast young and the restless and so my mom called me and she's like oh my god you'll never guess what happened and I said what anyway long story short she's like call this woman and so I called her and I was in Santa Barbara and she's like call me when you get

to LA so I was like screw this like I'm out of here next day drove to LA called the one person that I knew from working in restaurants that was living in Van Nuys and she's like yeah I have a loft and a blow-up mattress you can crash on so I left Santa Barbara went to LA called the woman up and she's like okay come in on a Friday and I went in talked to her for like two hours and then she gave me a set of sides to read I read them what does that mean for people who oh sides is like a like a piece out of a script that they want you to audition with so it's essentially just like a couple pages or it could be a page or it could be eight pages whatever they choose for you to audition with." So it's essentially just like a couple pages or it could be a page or it could be eight pages, whatever they choose for you to read for that character, for that part.

And then she gave me an adjustment which means they want you to change something or they just want to see if you can take direction. And so I did the adjustment and then she's like, Film Courage, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film Director, Film did the adjustment and then she's like okay do you want the part and I was like uh yeah twist my arm and she said okay go to go to wardrobe be back here at 6 a.m monday to work just like that

yeah if they were all that easy right right so but let's go back because you've been in this town long enough now I know that a lot of people, not only in that business, are completely full of shit. Right. So they give you a card, call me. They never call you back. Yeah. Were you thinking, oh, yeah, she's going to call me right back. Well, I was ignorance is bliss, as they say.

Right. I was very pure. I had not been jaded yet at that point. Right. So I was like, yeah, great. I'm going to call it right up. Like it's good. And maybe that energy just kind of came through.

Film Courage And you had never read for a movie before? Nothing. Film Courage Had you ever seen a script before? Nope. Well, a commercial script but that's different. Not like this. Not like a proper television script. television script yeah so we talk about bucket lists and i want to be in a movie that was in a major motion picture and i'm friends with this

guy named bruce mcnaul he used to own the los angeles kings okay he owned a studio uh he made his fortune in the coin and stamp business bought the los angeles kings wow. He was Mr. Los Angeles. I mean, he had a studio. David Begelman ran the studio. They produced the biggest movies of their day, like War Games and some of these other movies. So Bruce was kind of a man around town. Okay. Pre-net jets. He owned seven jets, two helicopters. Then he went to prison for fraud. Oh, he bought the Los Angeles Kings and brought Wayne Gretzky to Los Angeles. So the city of Los Angeles, the Kings were never good. And then suddenly they're good because Wayne is here and everyone loves Bruce. He goes to prison. I'm friends with some of his old players. And the interesting thing is when people go to prison,

a lot of people just say, Hey, you know, I'm done. I, you know, it's like, why? But you find out who your friends are when things bad go your way. Bruce kept all of his friends. I mean, Wayne Gretzky would go visit him in prison. His former players would. In fact, it got so bad that they moved him to Milan, Michigan, to a max security facility because he had too many people like Magic and Wayne going up to visit him in prison.

Wow. And so, and my friend said, oh, you got to meet Bruce when he comes out of prison. And I'm a huge fan, hockey fan. I grew up at Detroit Red Wings and I love the game. So I meet Bruce when he comes out of prison we become friends and um my wife and I are going to dinner at Tuscana in Brentwood with he and his then girlfriend who he got married to she was a paralegal on his case okay and I go to the bathroom and he he tells me oh I said what are you up to said, I'm doing a movie with Sharon Stone and Justin Timberlake.

And I said, why aren't I in that movie? So I went to the bathroom and I come back and he said, you have a casting call on Monday. Stop. And I said, I looked at it and I said, well, that's ridiculous. I'm just going to say that to people. Why aren't I in that movie? Well, that's, I mean, it's sort of like what you just said. And so I looked at Laura, my wife at the time, and she said, yeah, you know, he did call the casting agent.

You go in. And so I go in. I'd never read or whatever. I'm some building, and there's all these young kids around with scripts on the cover, CIA, William Morris at the time. There was a William Morris and they're all pacing nervously around the room. And I've done well for myself at the time. And I don't really leave my office during the day unless I have to. I mean, my team all knows if people could come to my office, that's better for me. And it's said, okay, I'm going'm gonna go and they're late and I'm thinking gosh you know gotta get back to the office this is crazy I mean I kind of want to walk

out the door and I'm about to complain that there were three people before so I'm getting kind of pissed off and they leave and they're finished the casting agent comes out we sit down small cramped office there's shit everywhere and from Detroit yeah oh good you know you know Bruce yeah Nick Cassafetes walks in he'd just come off the notebook and that was the director oh my god Alpha Dog was the movie oh which is one of the yeah yeah it's one of the worst yeah it's one of the worst movies you've ever seen in your life. But I did get a residual check last month. So wait, so you read for the part. What character did you read for?

Nick comes in. Okay. And he said, oh, you're a friend of Bruce? Yeah. You like the Wings and Kings? Yeah. He said, you want to be in the movie? Yeah, you're in the movie.

I said, just like that? Just like that. He didn't even read you? There was nothing. You had no audition? I didn't know what the movie was about. I had no idea. Why did they even make you show up with the casting?

They wanted you to meet Nick probably. I don't know. I thought it was cool. I didn't see the notebook, but everyone loved the movie. And this was supposed to be a big deal. It was his next movie. So the movie was about a middle, a young drug dealer from a well-to-do family from the Valley whose brother had been kidnapped by a rabble gang and was murdered, ultimately. Jesse James Hollywood was his name.

It was a story, a famous one here. And so they said, you'll be the cop who interviews the mom of the son who's gone missing. Okay. He said, just go up to the set and drive to the lot here. And they said, so I go in and I drive to the lot. You know, I'm a fish out of water. And there's a shuttle. They're shooting a neighborhood in Reseda.

Yeah. And it's just a shitload of people around. Yeah. And I go in. How much did he give you your, like, you got the script? I had nothing at the time. So you didn't memorize any dialogue? Memorize it?

I didn't even see a script. You didn't have anything? Okay. It's crazy. It's what happens. So I'm playing a police officer. All improv. I'm playing a police officer.

Okay. And they gave me and, you know, went to wardrobe. Who are you? What? You're playing? Okay, whatever. They gave me and, you know, went to wardrobe. Who are you? What? You're playing? Okay, whatever. They gave me a uniform and a rubber gun. And they said, whatever you do, don't take the gun out of the holster. Okay. So, and Nick had said, come find me on the, on the shoot. Come find me. So, you know, the neighborhood's all blocked off with police cars

and, you know, that deal. And so I look around and I see Nick and Nick's around there's 15 people following him right he's in the neighborhood he's barking to people whatever so I go up to him and I said um hey Nick and he's kind of pissed like I'm he's talking to people and I said who are you and I said oh Randy Kaplan Bruce's friend he said oh oh oh okay so he said um you have a pen and paper I said I don't have anything so he just he he says to nobody pen and paper someone gives him a clipboard a pen and paper he calls the policeman over here uh over and he says um okay policeman what would you say if someone's son had gone missing you're taking a missing person report so he gives me the clipboard and pen he said write this down so I write down

all the questions and then he says okay so I've got I've got my lines now okay okay he said go on the house and wait there we're going to shoot the scene there so I go there and all these people are sitting there you know they're talking, they're milling about, they're sitting on the couch. I'm on a love seat. There's a couch next to me and I'm just sitting there and I don't know what's going on. I mean, there's cameras everywhere. I'm nervous. I have no idea what's about to happen. I'm there for maybe 45 minutes just talking to the women next to me. She has a name tag. I forget what her name was.

And each of the people have a name tag. So I finally went over to the guy who looked like he knew what he was doing and looked at his chart and said, hey, I don't have a name tag. He said, well, he said, yeah, yeah, yeah. You're in the movie. And I said, oh, OK. And I walked back. And I sat down in the love seat. And I still had no idea what he meant meant I had no idea who these people were and so at some point he said first team and then Sharon Stone walks in

and Sharon sits next to me and I said oh shit and your first scene ever with Sharon Stone ever and she's and by the way all I could think about is basic instinct, how much I loved her as a kid. I dreamed about meeting her and maybe some other things too. But, you know, she's sitting next to me. And all I could think about at that moment was, what would my boys back in Detroit think right now? They would not believe where I am right now. And so Sharon just looked straight ahead. She didn't say hello.

She didn't do anything at all. And I'm even more nervous now. She's kind of in the zone. I finally said, excuse me, Sharon, Randy Kaplan, nice to meet you. And then just stared straight ahead. She was in character yeah right so all of a sudden uh nick comes in everyone's settles down and he yells action randy go like who me i mean so i've got the clipboard and i said, name, date of birth, social.

Cut, cut, cut, cut, cut. I said, what's the problem? I said, wait for her to answer. I said, oh, okay. The next scene was she started making these weird faces, like twitching. And then tears were kind of coming down her eyes. And I had to wait for it again. I wasn't sure what, what was happening. And then it was a, a cut, cut, cut as well. I'm like, Oh my God, two cuts. Everyone has to reset because of me.

This is what I do now. I'm about to get kicked off the set. And so he finally said, and by the way, there's 40 people there. I mean, you, you know, it's very embarrassing. I'm about to get kicked off the set. And so he finally said, and by the way, there's 40 people there. I mean, you know, it's very embarrassing. And I'm sure everybody's thinking like, what's happening here? Like, who the fuck is this guy? Because he's clearly shouldn't be here. And so I settled down. So I did one.

And then the next thing she said was, find my son. And I was like, holy fuck. What, what am I doing? It's like someone just like, I got blown out of an airplane. It was, I was, it was unbelievable. It was unbelievable. And so I, I, I ended up hanging in there. Um, and then Nick, this was all improv right you had nothing to say you're like I I never read the script the first time I I knew anything about the movie really was when I saw the movie oh my god it was crazy what did you say after that it was named at a birth social but then Nick said to me like he comes and he coached like like you said again this all new to me.

He comes, whispers in my ear, and I'm wondering, gosh, you know, he's going to yell at me. He said, do you have the capacity to piss people off? And I look at him, what? I said, can you piss people off? He said, yeah. I said, I'm pretty good at that, actually actually when I want to be. And they said, I want you to piss off Sharon Stone. I want you to forget it's her. I want you to go after her. I want you just to be an asshole cop. And that's when I kind of settled in, not because I like

being an asshole, but because it was fun. Like he was actually coaching me And then I got into it. Then we take a break, right? And there's a kitchen there. And all the people, like they all got up. The second team is all in the kitchen. There's snacks or whatever. And one of the women said to me, this woman said to me, how long have you been acting before? And I said, this is my first time. She said, oh, you know, you have an agent. And I said, no. And she said, how are you here? You know, you have 14 lines. You know, I'd written down 14

questions. And I said, oh, my friend is a producer. And that's when it hit me that her face you know she said I moved here from Omaha Nebraska to pursue my dream and I'm an extra on this movie I'm getting paid 250 dollars for the day and this is my dream and you don't know how lucky you are to be here and have these lines and that's when it hit me very lucky I was very lucky yeah and that doesn't happen a lot and then they'd have to taft hartley you too they did union they did so tell people what that means like if you're if you're that was your first job and so you're non-union right right and i don't know there there was probably sag and after at the time of that movie now they're merged um but yeah so it's basically like,

they're basically saying there's nobody else for the job but you to do this. And so you're automatically in the union. But if you were to go the route of being a background actor, you have to get three vouchers in order to get eligible. Yeah. It's a whole process. And that can take years.

Right. And you just, got it. It costs the money. It costs the money it it costs the money like the money it costs the money so it's paperwork but i mean if it's paperwork it's money but if they say that it's a go then you're in right so you got lucky very i i got lucky i mean i i hit the bucket list my um the movie was kind of weird how the movie was cut. So my lines. Did you need to cut? So yes and no. Okay. So at one point on a screen, and I've never seen a movie do this before,

but it was kind of three different parts with lines in the middle. So one scene, one scene. Yeah, like a triple screen. Okay. You can see me like that. I mean, I record it. I screenshot it. Like I hit pause, pause. And I do have screenshots, which I've enhanced with new photography programs

that make it look very clear that I'm actually in the movie and there's Sharon, which is cool. So you wouldn't know it's me unless I saw you at that and I said, okay, stop the movie here. But something else crazy happened from that as well, which we had a little toddler at the time, and there was a director in preschool class that we'd become very friendly with. And he had directed a lot of TV shows, and he had just done a movie with someone who got paid 20 million dollars who wouldn't come out of his trailer by the way these stories I hear about like the Hollywood stuff is just so crazy yeah and so he comes over to our house and he's engaged to someone who he met on

a movie set who had done makeup and they had a kid and the kid was friends and that's how we become friends and he's we're sitting in my living room. And we have a nice home. And he knows that I've done okay professionally. And he starts to tell me. I mean, he thinks the story about my movie, he said, is just the craziest thing. And he loved it. He said, this shit never happens.

And he said, I'm writing a script i'm pitching this thing and i i'd like you to be one of the guys in the in this in this uh show and i looked at him and i i said uh i'm very flat he said you know i i like your look and he was very complimentary and he said i i think you'd be great for this role in the show. And I've never seen a woman yell at a man like that ever in my life because his fiance had been begging him to get a role in any of his shows or movies. And she, she, I thought her voice was going to split. I thought her larynx would, was going to break. And thought her larynx was going to break. And she said, this guy doesn't even need it.

He doesn't want it. But I'm thinking, you know, it's kind of cool. Yeah. Never pitched. I mean, it never got picked up. I mean, the conversation never went any further. But crazy stuff happens when you're not expecting it, right? Or you know the right people. Or you know the right people.

So let's talk about that for a second. Yeah, first movie with Sharon Stone. You did it right. You did good. And she's been on my show. She was my second guest. No way. Who was your first?

Sam Zell, who is a real estate entrepreneur, icon, philanthropist, and yeah, amazing mentor. Do you know most of these people or how do you find everyone? At this point, so Sam Zell had been a mentor to me for a long time. He was a Ford 400 guy and someone had written a piece about me when my tech company went public. And then I'm from Detroit and Sam's name is all over the University of Michigan. He had donated hundreds of millions of dollars. And I had just joined the board there. And the reporter who wrote this profile, which I didn't want to cooperate with.

And he said, I'm going to write it with you or without you. So you cooperate to influence the outcome of the story. It came out. And it was very complimentary. And he asked me that day, do you want to meet Sam Zell? And I'm thinking, there's no way this reporter knows Sam. right and so he hangs up called me back he said Sam would like to meet you Sam had this amazing house out in Malibu and he comes every weekend based in Chicago and he became a mentor and a good friend of mine so that was my first guest and Sam is an icon in the business

world yeah I mean everybody knows him. He's an amazing person. We're friends. I'd never really said, Hey, you know, we do something for me. I mean,

we didn't have that kind of relationship. So I was very nervous when I called, I told him what I want to do. I said, I'm going to do this podcast. And I was very nervous. He just said, yeah,

I would love to do it. So then I had Sam and I knew, I mean, for the credibility purposes, that would be great for the business right sense and then Sharon's good friend Price Arana High Price um is best friends with Sharon and so I'd become friends with Price and I I told her what I want to do and uh Sharon ultimately you know I had to get through her team. And her team had canceled a whole bunch of times. Sharon didn't know about it any way.

And she was very pissed when she found out. That happens sometimes. Yeah. Yeah. And I went to dinner with Sharon and Price. And Sharon and I become very good friends. She's amazing. And then my third guest was Cliff Kingsbury, who's a football coach. And so at that point, I just used relationships that I had and asked people, people that I knew or knew of, most I knew.

And then I built some momentum because I had some very high quality guests. But a lot of them, I just were cold emails. Mark Cuban was an email. That's crazy. Yeah. And he wrote back in four minutes. Mark responds to all of his emails, uh, by the way, not that I want to cause 2000 emails coming into his inbox today, but, um, Mark had been in the technology business and had a competing company with mine so I did mention that so I've been I've been lucky referrals have been great you know you tell people about your show and I was at dinner last night with somebody for for a birthday party and they said hey what about so-and-so I'm friends with them would you want them on your show I said I'd love them on my show yeah I have no

idea that yeah it. So you build. What was the greatest piece of advice your mentor, your first guest gave to you? It's okay to stand alone and be different. You know, he had, he was a contrarian. And his, what I thought was the best line from, and he made a career. He said,

I didn't understand it when everybody was going this way, I was the only one going this way. I like the voice. And I mean, that's how he talked. He passed away last year, but he had a very gravelly voice. Did you always feel like that? Like, did you feel like you didn't fit in? It wasn't that I fit in. I mean, I've made a career out of doing things that no one else has done before. And sometimes you do things and people will criticize you and say, oh, you know, no one's done that before. They

mean it as a criticism. And I take that as a compliment. Yeah. So the coaching I do, I say, you know, who does that? And people say, no one. And I say, that's exactly why you should. Boom. Right. Stand out. Quentin Tarantino. Who does that? Nobody, which is exactly why you should and which you will the next time. Okay. Deal. Thanks for listening to part one of my amazing conversation with Danielle Vassanova, an actor, producer, entrepreneur, avid equestrian, and model who's graced the cover of many magazines, including Vogue and Harper's Bazaar. Be sure to tune in next week for part two of my awesome conversation with Danielle. you