Orlando Gonzalez, as Tony

I first met Orlando when he answered a Craigslist post I had put out in December of 2007 for actors to appear in the initial trailer for Smalltimore (then "Charm City"). If you watch the old trailer, you can see him in a "morning after" scene with me. He did well, especially when Director Sean would make us improv some stuff to loosen us up. When I posted the trailer on YouTube, his reaction was that he needed to lose 40 pounds (this is why you should never let actors see the dailies). I didn't necessarily agree, but when he showed up for the real auditions in April, he had done just that, and had also worked on some other issues about the character that we had discussed.

One of the many lessons I learned during the auditions: you can find a lot of male actors over 50, but very few females. And you will have a plethora of actresses under 40 to choose from, and quite a few men, too, but at least in this area, VERY few muscular guys who can act. If you write a character like that and you are casting in this area, your choices will pretty much be Orlando Gonzalez, maybe one or two other guys, or you will have to go with a union actor and pay union wages (and even then you will have to search far and wide). I am not saying that to take anything away from Orlando, I am just letting you in on one of the surprises that came my way in pre-production.

In between December 2007 and the following April, I saw Orlando on the set of another movie he was in, "Good People". He was playing a thug who got to beat up Johnny Alonso. In a movie he did the previous summer, "Safehouse," he also was a thug who fought with Johnny Alonso (though in that fight, Johnny "breaks" Orlando's arm - Orlando got his revenge in "Good People").The "Good People" set was at the 1919 bar in Fells Point. In between scenes, I was talking to Orlando. He seemed a little frustrated. He really likes the business and did not want to be type-cast.

At the April audition he was the best one I saw for the role of Tony, and by far the only one who fit the very specific physical description I had in mind for the character. There were still some things bugging me, though, when I watched the tapes later. I did take into account that he was really stressed that day. In addition to the hour+ drive from Germantown in weekday rush hour, he had had to put his dog down just a day or two before the audition. I could see the sadness in his face on those tapes, and having gone through that myself on too many occasions, I had to feel for him.

But bottom line, I had to make a choice: it was either going to be Orlando, or I was going to have to rewrite certain things about the character, which I really didn't want to do.

I didn't know Orlando that well at that point, but I knew him well enough to know that he was going to stress until he heard from me, though I had told everyone that I might not get back to them for 2 weeks while I reviewed the tapes. I knew what I had to say to him, so I didn't see the point in torturing him, especially on top of the grief of losing his pet. Within a few days of the first round of auditions, I wrote Orlando an honest letter, similar to the one I had sent to Cheryl. I told him if he promised to get an acting coach in the meantime, I would like him to come to the callbacks in June.

He replied that he had already been considering someone in the area as his coach, and got on it right away. When he came in for that long day in June, he was pumped, he was off book, and the difference in his skills and self-confidence was easily apparent. And so, of course, he got the job.

Orlando and I don't always see eye to eye, but he is a trooper and he earned my respect. I remember the day of rehearsals where he had his make-out scene with Cheryl. Cheryl said, to brace Orlando and me, that she didn't "know how to not make-out," in other words, to fake it. She had to really kiss. Orlando was totally okay with that. I believe it was his first such scene, but he did great. I think I was more nervous about it than they were. It was very odd to direct people to start kissing, and then make comments like, "Okay, can we do that again with less suction? That was a little noisy. Action!!"

Orlando was always off book, and his chemistry with Cheryl and with Joyce Scott, who played his boss, was exactly how I had hoped it would be. I have some good Joyce & Orlando stories, but I'll save them for when I am talking about Joyce.

Orlando had to meet a lot of challenges in this role, including comedy, which I also learned the hard way is WAY harder than drama, to direct as well as act. But he had one challenge that none of the other actors did - nudity.

Michelle once tried to talk me into putting some boobs in the film, but I nixed that. It's a romantic comedy - who goes to see these but straight women and gay men? They don't need to see boobs. Throw a bit of man-butt in there for the ladies!

I REALLY have to hand it to Orlando for doing this. He was nervous and self-conscious, starved himself for a few days beforehand, but he did it and he owned it. He knew a lot of the guys on the crew from the other films he had worked on, and they razzed the hell out of him.

That day we filmed all day in my friend Greg's house. We did that bedroom scene first, upstairs. First we did these great jib shots of Cheryl in her bra in the bed, part of which you can see in the trailer. Everything was going smoothly, and Cheryl was walking around her bra in between takes, which hopefully made Orlando a little more comfortable. He seemed okay. I walked into the room where he was running lines and asked if he was ready for his "close-up". He said yep, turned around and dropped his drawers to prove his point. Okay, then, systems go!

I treated the day like any other day because I didn't want to make a big deal of it. After Cheryl's singles, we were ready for Orlando's butt scene. Actors on their marks, crew in place, camera rolling, I turn around to yell for quiet, as there are a lot of crew downstairs (I thought), and there in the bedroom doorway is EVERY SINGLE FEMALE INTERN ON THE SET. I felt like if at this point I said to clear the set (which in retrospect, I probably should have) it would make a bigger deal of it in addition to delaying filming. "Action!"

I think we did the scene 3 or 4 times, which Michelle made fun of me for, but I always do extra shots for safety (and the few times I have not I have totally screwed myself for editing purposes). Orlando did it all with a sense of humor, and I think the scene turned out to be very comic.

Though it was an ensemble cast with several large speaking roles, Orlando was basically the male lead. I think he surprised a lot of people on the set who had only seen him work in small, stereo-typical roles before that. He took it all very seriously, never complained, always delivered. So if you are trying to find a beefcake leading man for a romance, or the buff action-figure type guy for a shoot-em-up, I can tell you you have at least one very good choice in the Baltimore-Washington area. Orlando Gonzalez is determined to go places. Get him while you can afford him.