This Podcast Is... Uncalled For - Paul Shearman

Episode Date: July 24, 2026

Paul Shearman is a veteran actor and writer, joining us from China and talking about life experience.

Hello, Check the mic, we'll go live Stories told their eyes and dive Topics fresh with every spin You won't guess what's coming in Me can lose surprise Minds away, never lies Conversations bold and free

Tune in now, just wait and see Just press play we're on our way Voice a shot Hello everybody, welcome to the podcast and got another great guest with me today. Go ahead and introduce yourself, please. Yes, hi. My name is Paul Sherman.

I'm an international actor. I'm actually currently based in China, a long story, and putting together a solo show that I'm going to be taking on a world tour called The Last Audition. Our first stop is in Adelaide, Australia, then New York City, then to Edinburgh, possibly Montreal, where we're talking with them right now. So it might be going to Montreal as well. That sounds awesome. Yeah. So, so this is for

the fringe circuit, I'm guessing, from our... Yeah, I mean, right now, I've never done, I've never done the fringe, had had an interest in doing the Edinburgh French, which is the largest fringe. on the planet. So that was kind of a bucket list item. And to be honest with you, it scares the crap out of me. A lot of people, a lot of performers, they had over 4,000 shows last year in 2025. So a lot of competition for people putting on shows to get butts and seats. So I, but it just right now in my life, I'm kind of taking on. challenges, things that scare me, I'm embracing. So there we go.

Not only the largest, the original French Festival. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. I do have experience with French Festival. In my case, it was the Kansas City French Festival, which is my local fringe festival. We did 2020, 2020, 2021, all online because the whole pandemic thing. Right. right right right and then 24 we did a whole uh just for this podcast right uh did a whole uh program of live recordings in front of a live audience at k c fringe uh i wish i could tell you we uh drew big crowds but uh we didn't in fact there's one night we had no audience it's just the volunteers there and everything but uh but the

but the important thing is it's available for everyone to listen to now. Just look for any show that says Fringe show, give it a lesson. And yeah, and the important thing is I had a lot of fun doing it.

I've also been to volunteer at the KC Fringe Festival for many years too. Okay, okay. How big is the Kansas City Fringe? So let's say two-week affair.

So, yeah, two weekends and some shows during the week, always in late July. And it's at, theaters mostly concentrated around the urban core, but they'll go out to areas along the fringes of our urban core, like Westport's in the plaza, Brookside, the east side. Northeast area. If you know Kansas City at all, of course. I'm nodding my head and I'm going, I have no idea.

I have family history in Kansas City. My great-grandfather and great-grandmother emigrated from England and Ireland and they actually lived in Kansas City for a while and then moved off to Port. Portland, Oregon. So, yeah. So I've never been there, but my family has many years ago. So, yeah. And of course, I used to be a flight attendant. So I've been, I'm sure I had a layover there somewhere at some point in time. Yeah. So, so yeah, the airports, that's undergone radical

changes the last couple of years. They tore down all those old terminals, the old terminals with the Yeah. I'm describing KCI to any listeners who have never been. For a longest time, it had been three circular terminals that you just park in the middle of the circle and then walk to the gates and just hang out until your flight showed up. That's gone now. The last couple of years. It sounds nice. I mean, it sounds very, back in the time.

Yeah, to be able to park and just walk right in. It's heaven. But yeah, they, but yeah, that's gone now because of all the airplane restrictions. They got too expensive to have every single gate had to have its own metal detectors and all that after 9-11. And so it's like the last couple of years,

they opened the new terminal. It's a single terminal now with a single checkpoints for all the metal detectors and baggage screening and all that. And yeah, I haven't seen the whole terminal because I don't fly. I last flew anywhere in 2008. So it's either train or driving for me now. Is that due to a fear of flying for yourself? It's a fair of, it's not so much a fair of flying.

It's the result of a bad flying experience. Oh, okay. Okay. So summer of that year, 2008, I was actually going to Minneapolis, Minnesota, for a weekend to attend. It's the National Conference for Meteor Reform. and on the way to and from I had to take connecting flights at O'Hare in Chicago. Yeah. On the way to both ways we got delayed in everything because there was some bad weather in Chicago that weekend.

But on the way two, I didn't get into Minneapolis until three in the morning. So it's severely limited what I could do. that day because i was so tired um but uh i did get to do a lot of cool stuff uh when i was conscious shall say yeah yeah on the way back um on the way back uh the delay caused me to uh change flights uh at msp so i think st paul yeah yeah me yes which is another nice airports i will go on that if that's out of the way. I get there I get changed to another flight so I can make

KCI flights at O'Hare. Unknowingly, when I did that, I got myself kicked off that KSI flight. So I got stuck in Chicago overnight. To their credit, they did put me up for the evening at a hotel nearby.

But getting back was it wasn't going to be a straight flight back to KCI it's either okay it's your choice we can find you back up to Milwaukee if Chicago's having bad problems you know Milwaukee's going to be having

problems too because they're very close to each other the only other option was San Antonio oh okay remember it out of the way oh yeah very much out of the way so far out of the way

that's the weather contrasts that day was just it was night and day going from damp and rainy in Chicago to hot in San Antonio

an airport in the middle of nowhere and oh yeah I got flagged by airport security

they checked on my bags and everything and that was not a pleasant experience and and talked to someone

family in Texas. Yeah. But more southeast Texas, like Houston, Beaumont. Mm-hmm. So, and oddly enough, I flew to Houston like three months earlier and picked up a car from my recently deceased grandmother's house and drove it all the way back to Kansas City. 13-hour drive. Yeah.

Wow. Wow. So that's that's me and flying and that also flying is just too expensive anymore. Yeah, I mean, of course, you know, going internationally, there's no other another way to do it. I have, you know, of course, as a flight attendant, a former flight attendant, I, you know, flying is is like breathing for me. I mean, I, nothing about it bothers me, you know, you, you, you, you. You kind of get on, go to the airport, get on the plane. You kind of expect something's going to happen, you know, especially nowadays with the security and everything.

I remember back in the day when I was, when I first started out as a flight attendant, and we would just, you know, go as a crew member, you'd show your badge and go, you know, scoot right past security. You'd just go right in. And then I think there was an incident where some crew member took a gun on board. and then they started scrutinizing the crew as well. But, yeah, nowadays, you know, there's all sorts of delays because of security. But once I, I mean, I'm the type of person I want to get there early. And once I'm on the other side, yeah, once I'm over there, I'm good.

I can, you know, the anxiety drips off. And I know that I'm in place for the flight. And, yeah, hopefully it goes on top. time and I'm all good to go. But yeah, it's traveling by train so much easier. Oh, yeah. The security, you just, you know. Yeah, especially Amtrak.

Yeah, you just show up, have your tickets, get on the train. Go to where you're going. Unless you're going to one of those destinations that doesn't have direct Amtrak. So they'll at the station, they'll have you get. off the train, you get on bus, and the bus is away. Yeah, here in China, right now they put a lot of infrastructure into high-speed rail. And it's just amazing. Yeah, it's amazing. I wish they could get over themselves in the U.S. and do high-speed trained. But I heard recently they had a big, like going between Houston,

speaking of Houston again, Houston and Dallas, Fort Worth. Yeah. I think that Southwest Airlines actually did a lawsuit against them for, you know, even thinking about doing this high-speed rail on that section, and even called it unconstitutional.

Is that a constitutional? I have no idea. I can do anything unconstitutional these days, I guess. But, you know, it's like, So it was, so yeah, so it's all, you know, because, you know, we have states. I mean, obviously here in China, there's a, you know, a big daddy at the top and he decides and things happen. You know, but, you know, thankfully we have the, you know, states' rights and all that stuff. But that division can, when it becomes a national interest, you know, like interest.

infrastructure projects like high speed rail, it would be nice to see somebody that could take the lead and just say, that's what we're doing. And the amount of, I mean, I think they did a study where air traffic greatly reduced because so many people are taking the train with high speed rail being available. And it's a huge benefit to the people. because the costs are less, the convenience is greater. And the skies are just not as crowded. So there's not as much concern with safety. You know, the airspace is overcrowded.

That's why air traffic controllers are so much in the need just to keep us safe. And even that's not happening. Yeah, absolutely. And the funny thing is, you know, Dallas to Houston, that's, well, hey, you already got interstate connecting the two I-45. And that's number one. Number two, they're in the same states, you know.

So what's the thing? Yeah, yeah, you would think. Yeah. But, but yeah, they were trying, I think another time trying to do Dallas, Houston, Houston, San Antonio, San Antonio to Dallas, you know, to kind of do a triangle.

Yeah. Wow, that would be wonderful. I used to live in Houston and going to San Antonio all the time, and that is quite a trek. Yeah, I like Houston. That's a great city. It's huge, but. And it floods.

Yeah, yeah, flooding is a major, because you're right there in the Gulf of Mexico. And, yeah, I said Gulf of Mexico. Yeah, yeah. that's what it's called yeah yeah that's what it's called uh yeah i'm not doing this a gulf of america bullshit but but yeah rail uh that's certainly an issue it's certainly been a growing issue uh locally for me because uh we have the uh k c street car that opens back in 2014 we just had an extension open uh just a couple months ago it's been that that's One thing, I mean, you know, traveling the world as I do, I wish America was less reliant on the automobile.

We just feel like that's our freedom, you know. And I just, I think the freedom is, for me, is being able to, you know, to get from point A to point B without having to worry about how I don't have a car here. If I lived in New York City, it would be the same thing. But if I lived in Europe, most places in Europe, between the buses, the subways, the, you know, the, you know, the trolley cars, like you were saying, the street cars. I mean, there's so many variety of transportation, you know, the U-Bahn, the S-Bahn in Germany. You know, there's so much, so many ways for people to. to get around. And I think that the number one people that would benefit would be people that are, you know, lesser on the economic scale. Yes. And, you know, people, nowadays, you know,

it costs so much to live in the city, but it takes so long to commute. You know, they could, they could, you know, push out further in the city and still be able to commute more conveniently. Anyway, that is my tie-line. Yeah, that's a good tire. That's a good tie-rins. And then, yeah, the streetcar, they have another extension going open in a couple months, and it's free to ride. Oh, wow. Oh, my gosh.

Wow. It's paid for by a tax and district along the routes, and they just pay a little extra tax along there. But, yeah, I'd like to see that system grow metro-wide and everything. St. Louis. It is a boost to the businesses. The business is going to get more traffic. And so I think it pays that the taxes that are invested are recouped, you know, probably because of that. St. Louis has a good subway system, their metro link system I've ran it like.

Yeah. Well, now we need to work on the bike and walking paths. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, we got plenty. There's been plenty of work on that, too. There's a street not too far from my house. They just recently did a put on a road diet. So it's now. It used to be two lane in the two directions. Now it's that this portion of road is now one lane and it turns the outside lane into a bike lane. Oh, wow. Wow. Yeah. Oh, that is. That is progress. Yeah. So maturely, and there are other, and there are other streets around our metro area, especially in Midtown, Kansas City. They've turned to, they've gone to road diets. Yeah, oh, okay.

I'd never heard that term before. We're road diet. That's pretty cool. Yeah, it's a good term, I think. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Michael, I was listening to your 24K broadcasts. recently. Congratulations, by the way. Oh, thank you. Okay. Downloads. But the thing that I was, I was like, all sudden I hear this song,

about the 24K, I was like, how did he get a song? That's an AI. It was so specific. Oh, is AI? Yeah. Okay. I was like, I was like, Michael, is that you singing? I'm, yeah, I, I can't sing like that. So, okay, okay. Well, I mean, Bravo for, I mean, yeah, I mean, yeah, That was really cool. I like that. I think that's one of the good applications of AI. I'm hoping that you can just a type of sentence and all of a sudden the song will pop out.

I'm not going to use it. I'm not playing on using it to replace human actors or anything. I just use it recreationally or for music. I brought it up because I thought it was you. I was going to applaud you for doing that. But, yeah, that's great. That's great. So, yeah, because you have another one for the opening of the show as well.

Yeah, yeah, that was also AI, yeah. And then most of my, most of the rest of the music I use will be other Creative Commons licenses. So I'll look at the free music sites, see what, see what I can see what we do. with a as a content creator you have to be really careful with you know with the music rights you know yes absolutely yeah so um so that's great that's great i think you're doing well with your your channel so oh thanks so much 24k downloads i think that that's uh it's actually closer 27k now that's how long ago that i did that so yeah okay okay okay so i was thinking that was it right at the end of the year but Yeah.

Yeah. But, and you're absolutely right about cars, too. Those are expensive to maintain and everything. Yeah. My, I mean, I mean, just, I mean, just, you know, think about a car, investing in a car and then car maintenance and getting, you know, fuel for the car. Yeah. And then a place to park.

And sometimes that's not, I mean, especially in urban, you know, that's not an easy. that's not an easy thing to do and can cost a great deal of money. You know, just all the different factors, the insurance, it just adds up. And when you can have life without the vehicle, I know that for many Americans, that's just very scary because it seems to take away your independence. But if you lived in a place that had the infrastructure and they, on the transit system yeah yeah yeah the streetcar is the one positive of our yeah of our transit in kansas city the um uh the buses uh in my part of town i'm in the suburbs uh forget it all right uh i know

they're trying they're trying but it's only really available at certain times and uh there's still uh you could possibly win be waiting an hour for a bus sometimes And good luck. Try and find one on weekends and double good luck to you if you're going across town. Wow. Wow. That's, yeah. No, I, in fact, I do without a car.

And when I do need a car, when I do need to go somewhere, just rent one, you know, and just go where you want to go, use it when, and then, you know, hand it back in. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Good on you. Yeah. Yeah.

So, yeah, I bring that up because I recently had a major repair done on my car. Like, over the summer, I had to have, I'm not looking to buy a new car right now. So I had to make sure this car's working. And part of that was to replace an engine. Well, then you take the, you know, it's like, okay, well, do I put more money into this one? And then, you know, but you never know if the fix is going to, you know, fix it for a long term or whether it's going to be a, you're going to be turning around and having to put money. more money into it right well fortunately this this new engine is uh working wonders yeah that's great

that's great yeah no my my kids are in in the u.s and they're you know deal with their cars and their car problems and maintenance and tires and yeah yeah tires is a big one too yeah so yeah so yeah fortunately i know places that's uh check those tires and can fix them for free so yeah Yeah, that's good. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Good, good, good, good. No, I was going to, and with the song, I was going to lead into, you should go to, you know, perform a fringe singing because, but, you know, but I'll save you from having to the pressure of doing that. But I was. I already have, yeah, I don't know plenty of singers and I've had singers on the podcast, too. so yeah yeah yeah i i i i can i'm an actor who can sing and dance um but i'm not a dancer i'm not a singer right and i don't don't pretend to be so yeah the closest i'll get the closest i will get to a singing person would be uh go and Karaoke bar so oh yeah okay okay yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah karaoke that's

japanese origin right yeah i studied i studied japanese in college so okay yeah i mean you you are quite the linguist i was i was watching some of your things with spanish and different things so yeah spanish and japanese primarily is why i studied in the school and uh spanish because it was Spanish because it was easy language in high school you know it's either Spanish or French initially and yeah Spanish was just easier

and it's much more useful in the States let's be honest much more much more useful in French and then Japanese I took up because I'm I was a martial artist when I was much younger karate primarily

and yeah same cara as in karaoke Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they encouraged me to learn Japanese, and so my dad, and I love the hell of Japanese culture. I would love to go to Japan at some point, but the whole flying thing is kind of an issue.

You would have to fly there for sure. But there, you know, I have heard, I've only been to Tokyo once, long, long time ago. But nowadays, you know, people that go to visit to, you know, Japan are just blown away by the

people, how friendly they are, and the food is amazing. It just, yeah, it's a great place, great place to visit. It is far away, but

there's there's so many islands to visit. Yeah, it's definitely definitely worth going. I'm very close. I can't put it on my list of things that I need to do

and I keep creating more work for myself so I'm too busy going. But I am hoping, I ran into somebody from Taiwan who may be interested in taking my show and and and and and and at least if not Taiwan and other places because she does and produce

she's a producer so there might be a kind of a trans asian kind of uh tour that we end up doing with the show um many many people are you know highly educated speaking uh english in the where Taiwan is um English is uh English is very comfortable language Philippines they speak English a lot of you know I mean we're just so lucky are so lucky and spoiled language wise

you know you know because most people understand English throughout the world but yeah but I'm I'm an advocate for travel so

maybe we'll have to work on you Michael and I'll get you on that airplane yeah But yeah, it's a, travel in the world is pretty exciting. Two things that I love, are the acting and traveling? So, you know, going into the world tour, yeah, twist my arm. I'm starting in Adelaide, spending a whole month there, going to New York City. Of course, I've, you know, lived in New York City before, but going back there, I'm just so

excited. Of course, for me, I'm excited about the food. I travel on my stomach. So going to, going back to New York, I'm dreaming of, you know, a bagel and cream cheese and, you know, slice of pizza. You know, we always have to, because I lived in Chicago for a while as well as well. Chicago pizza versus the deep dish, yeah, pizza. Yeah. Yeah. I'll take it all. I don't care. But, yeah, and then Montreal recently, they actually, I won a lottery. So I, to go into the Montreal fringe. So we're still figuring out the details. Actually, later on, today, I'm doing a Zoom call with now, because it's my morning here. Right. So later on this morning, I'll be doing a call with the people. and Montreal to find out more details,

find out whether that's something that I will be doing. But again, I've heard nothing but wonderful things about the city of Montreal. Very, very European, very, it's got both the, there's an old town Montreal and, you know, that's very, you know, it's French, you know, as well as English. And very kind of a European flair. I can't imagine what it's going to look like.

But I hope that I'll be able to go there and do that. Right. But yeah, yeah. Yeah, as a sports fan, I'm quite familiar with Montreal when they had the expos, you know, back in the day and the Canadians. Yeah, yeah. And I think one of my guests has actually, he did a cycle tour of the United States. I listened to that.

With Ritchie. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's from Kansas City as well, right? He's from Kansas City as well. We wrote a book, yeah, yeah. We wrote a book. We actually worked together.

That's how I know him. Used to be his boss, is that? He used to be my boss. He used to be your boss. Okay, okay. He used to be my boss. Gotcha. Yeah, but yeah, his travels to come to Montreal,

and he said that was. Yeah, I remember. He's the one. He said how amazing Montreal was. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. And with baseball now talking about, let's put two new teams in. Hopefully, hopefully Montreal gets the Expos back, but we'll see. Yeah. Yeah.

That was a cool. That's probably one of the coolest logos in all of baseball. It was the Montreal LAM. Okay, okay. I am not, I'm not a, I mean, I love playing baseball. I grew up playing baseball. and I love the sport. I grew up in Southern California.

So we, California Angels and Dodgers. Dodgers, yeah. Saw Hank Aaron, you know, hit, hit a Homer, you know. So, you know, so I love, I love going, going there, but I'm not much of a, turn it on TV and watch. Right, right, right. Yeah, sir.

My, I have a 10-year-old nephew who's playing baseball now. and he's one of the, he's one of the bare kids on his team. So I hope he, I hope he does make it to the majors and everything, but it'll be able to him. Yeah. Well, it's, you know, doing the whole minor, you know,

up to the majors. I mean, that's, it's a hard, hard road, but, um, that's what you love, then,

go for it, man. That is. Yeah. And yeah, growing up and watching players myself, well, the first game ever went to, I was eight years old is at his Royal Stadium. They were playing the A's. So we had George Brett on. We had George Brett on our side. And then the other side, we had Mark McGuire and Jose Canseco.

Yeah. Okay. Names, yeah. Yeah. It's all good. Yeah, some good old times and everything. Yeah, I'm really excited about the future of the Royals, and hopefully they wind up downtown here very soon.

Because Kaufman's name is not downtown. It's like on the edge of town. Okay, okay, okay. Well, the one thing, I mean, the sports, I mean, I think that's why cities like, like, you know, sports, whether it's, you know, even soccer or baseball or football or whatever. Because it brings so much money to the community. I mean, more money to the owners and, you know, that's what a thing, which is unfortunate.

But, you know, but there is some money that goes into the community. But the other thing is I'm used to live in a little town called Stanton, Virginia, which is where the American Shakespeare Fest center, American Shakespeare Center is from. So the only world, the Blackfriars replica of the theater. And so they built that, performed there all the time. Their motto is, we do it with the lights on because that's the way they did in Shakespeare's Day.

And it's amazing. But that actually happened because of Ashland, Oregon. Ashland, Oregon started a Shakespeare festival, which helped propel that small community. And there's so much tourism there, just as there is now with Stanton, Virginia, people are coming from all over to come to the city. So if you're in city infrastructure building somewhere in the world,

and I would advocate having a professional sports or a Shakespeare or other kind of play theater there as an actor. I'm real excited about the second more than the former. Yeah, yeah. But yeah. Have them both. Yeah, we have both. There you go.

But it's a great way. And then, you know, then you're going to have your bike lanes and transportation, your street cars that are free. I mean, there's so much we can do to, to, improve the lives of the people that live in the cities. Absolutely, absolutely. We're coming close to time to wrap it up. So anything you want to plug before I wrap it up?

Well, I mean, I'm assuming that most people on this channel are not going to be in Adelaide, maybe in New York City, maybe. Maybe. And then Edinburgh or Montreal, if you're there, please come see my show. So the last audition is about a Shakespearean actor who comes to do his last audition for King Lear, but he's dealing with early stages of dementia. And his daughter's trying to get him into an assisted living. This is kind of a way for me to shine a light on to the caregivers, because the caregivers are the unseen heroes in this whole.

mess. My name, I don't know if it's going to be on the recording, but yeah, he'll appear on the graphic, but yeah. So Paul Shearman, it's S-H-E-R-M-A-N. So Paulsherman.com is my actual website, and then there's a tab for the last audition. And that'll be all the shows about the show, ticket links, and all that information is there, as well as my, Instagram and Facebook and all that stuff. All right.

But yeah. Hey, Michael, I so enjoyed chatting with you today. Yeah, same here, yeah. You made me want to come and visit Kansas City. Absolutely. I'd have to come and say, here, Michael, I've got an airline ticket. Let's go. Going to Japan.

Let's go. No, Iikemas. All right. All right. Yeah, good deal. Yeah. Well, thanks for being. on the podcast. I really enjoyed this.

All right. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you, man. And for everyone else, listen, thank you. And we'll talk again soon. This podcast is Uncalled For. It is hosted, produced, and edited by myself, Mike Cherniewski. Our opening music is the, this podcast is Uncall for Theme, which is great at suno.com.

S-U-N-O- dot com. That is AI in music mode. And our outro music is Ujjian City by Kevin MacLeod at Incomptech.com, and it is licensed under Creative Commons by attribution 4.0 license. Please support the podcast and purchase our exclusive uncalled for merchandise, t-shirts, sweatshirts,

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