Latest / Next Act with Jeff Ornstein / Bert Rotundo – Actor, Producer & Voice Artist, The Traveling Lantern Company

Transcript

Bert Rotundo – Actor, Producer & Voice Artist, The Traveling Lantern Company · Next Act with Jeff Ornstein

• 0:01
  Jeff Ornstein: Hi everyone and welcome to Next Act with Jeff Orenstein.
• 0:05
  Jeff Ornstein: I am Jeff, and on this show we celebrate people on the cusp of greatness.
• 0:09
  Jeff Ornstein: Those building on past successes in some of the curious and inventive and sometimes unexpected ways they have achieved those and stepping into moments that could define their legacy.
• 0:21
  Jeff Ornstein: We'll talk about current projects, lessons learned, and the extraordinary opportunities ahead.
• 0:26
  Jeff Ornstein: So the best is yet to come.
• 0:28
  Jeff Ornstein: He was known for his acclaimed stage work in Frankie and Johnny and The Claire de Loon, producing indie films like It's God, and executive producing viral web content such as Generation Awesome and The Bartender Hates You.
• 0:50
  Jeff Ornstein: That sounds familiar.
• 0:51
  Jeff Ornstein: A true creative polymath, where it combines acting, writing, producing, and fine arts to tell compelling stories and inspire emerging artists.
• 1:00
  Jeff Ornstein: Welcome.
• 1:01
  Jeff Ornstein: Thank you.
• 1:02
  Bert Rotundo: I couldn't have said that better myself.
• 1:03
  Bert Rotundo: That was beautiful, Jeff.
• 1:04
  Bert Rotundo: I'm gonna steal that.
• 1:05
  Jeff Ornstein: I take no credit.
• 1:06
  Jeff Ornstein: The producers put that together for me.
• 1:08
  Jeff Ornstein: So I get a little heads up about my guests a little bit beforehand.
• 1:10
  Jeff Ornstein: I had to look up what a polymath was.
• 1:13
  Jeff Ornstein: So congratulations on being a polymath.
• 1:15
  Jeff Ornstein: It's very impressive.
• 1:16
  Jeff Ornstein: So you have morphed a bit in your career.
• 1:19
  Jeff Ornstein: And we were speaking a little bit before the show about where you did it and now what you're up to.
• 1:24
  Jeff Ornstein: But let's start sort of at the beginning, because you you grew up in a home, right, that celebrated movies and and and theater.
• 1:32
  Jeff Ornstein: So was that sort of the beginning of the Bert story and theater?
• 1:37
  Bert Rotundo: Yeah, big time.
• 1:37
  Bert Rotundo: My dad, uh, and later I found out that his father, my grandfather, patriarch of the family, both wanted to be actors.
• 1:44
  Bert Rotundo: I didn't find out about my grandfather wanting to be an actor until I graduated high school.
• 1:48
  Bert Rotundo: He pulled me on the side and he's like, Come here, I want to show you something.
• 1:50
  Bert Rotundo: He pulls out his little autograph book and he says, What does it say here under career?
• 1:54
  Bert Rotundo: And I look and I looked down and it said actor, and I had no idea.
• 1:58
  Bert Rotundo: And I looked up with surprise, and he looks at me and he goes, You know what they say?
• 2:02
  Bert Rotundo: And I go, What?
• 2:02
  Bert Rotundo: And he goes, Third one always makes it.
• 2:04
  Bert Rotundo: He was like, Oh, wow, you know, and that was such a nice blessing from my grandfather.
• 2:09
  Bert Rotundo: But early on growing up, movies were celebrated in this house, theater was celebrated in this house.
• 2:15
  Bert Rotundo: It was always we had movie nights pretty much five to six nights a week.
• 2:20
  Bert Rotundo: Wow.
• 2:20
  Bert Rotundo: My dad was a big cinephile, and what he had one of the first VHS home movie cameras.
• 2:26
  Bert Rotundo: So from a very young age, I was in front of the camera, and my dad was like trying to get me to do commercials and copy, you know, and stuff like that.
• 2:34
  Bert Rotundo: So I had this entitled, not entitled, but an entitled sense of like I want to be in front of the camera.
• 2:40
  Bert Rotundo: And I started doing plays very early.
• 2:42
  Bert Rotundo: And we used to watch the Oscars.
• 2:45
  Bert Rotundo: It was like a high holiday in my house, you know.
• 2:47
  Bert Rotundo: Like, oh God, the you know, everybody quiet, nobody come over, you know, we had the TV on, watched all the red carpets.
• 2:53
  Bert Rotundo: So from a very early age, movies and theater and acting was celebrated and and and put on a pedestal.
• 3:00
  Bert Rotundo: So I started doing plays at a very young age, really fell in love with it, got really comfortable in front of an audience.
• 3:06
  Bert Rotundo: And then eventually I went to theater school and really my dad was very big on like, look, you know, you got to pay your dues.
• 3:13
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 3:14
  Bert Rotundo: If you want to do this as a profession, you can't just willy-nilly just walk in.
• 3:17
  Bert Rotundo: The people that you know and respect and love their work, those people just didn't walk in and get the job.
• 3:22
  Bert Rotundo: They worked on their craft.
• 3:24
  Bert Rotundo: And so my dad instilled that in me.
• 3:26
  Bert Rotundo: And I was very lucky to have my mom and my dad, who were very, very supportive, knew very early on that there was nothing else for me.
• 3:32
  Bert Rotundo: This is what I want to do.
• 3:33
  Bert Rotundo: It's great.
• 3:34
  Bert Rotundo: And which is great.
• 3:34
  Bert Rotundo: Not everybody has that.
• 3:35
  Bert Rotundo: So I'm exceptionally.
• 3:38
  Jeff Ornstein: Not everybody wants their son to be an actor.
• 3:39
  Jeff Ornstein: No.
• 3:40
  Bert Rotundo: Well, my mom was pushing for a lawyer there for a little bit, but I think she kind of got it really quick that that wasn't gonna happen.
• 3:45
  Bert Rotundo: So I went to theater school.
• 3:46
  Bert Rotundo: I went to uh American Musical and Dramatic Academy in New York City, met some great people, got really great theater training, and then cut my teeth in New York for a little bit, doing some theater and bouncing around, and then got my taste of film for the first time.
• 4:00
  Bert Rotundo: A producer friend asked me to come and audition, and I auditioned and then I got the part and got to do my first movie at around 21.
• 4:06
  Bert Rotundo: Wow.
• 4:07
  Bert Rotundo: And fantastic.
• 4:08
  Bert Rotundo: Yeah, I I had auditioned as a kid.
• 4:10
  Bert Rotundo: My dad would take me to these big open calls, and I had some brush with almost success early on.
• 4:16
  Bert Rotundo: I had auditioned for the young Tom Cruise role in Born on the Fourth of July.
• 4:21
  Bert Rotundo: They'd open cast here on Long Island, and I had it gone, and I got the final callbacks.
• 4:26
  Bert Rotundo: In fact, I was on a veil to play it, and then they production decided to move locations to Texas, decided to get somebody there or close to the West Coast.
• 4:35
  Bert Rotundo: So that was my first brush with success, and my also my first feeling of that Hollywood uh letdown, you know.
• 4:41
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 4:41
  Bert Rotundo: Yeah, it was it was it was you know, it was so big.
• 4:45
  Bert Rotundo: It was it was crazy.
• 4:45
  Bert Rotundo: I read for Oliver Stone, and it was a very cool experience at a young age to get that experience.
• 4:50
  Bert Rotundo: And had it gone the other way, I don't know where I'd be right now.
• 4:53
  Bert Rotundo: Maybe I would have burnt out and been, you know, maybe I would have been a lawyer at this point.
• 4:57
  Jeff Ornstein: But yeah, that's interesting because looking back at it, the actor that played his younger brother did have a more ethnic look than the rest of the family.
• 5:06
  Jeff Ornstein: Yeah.
• 5:07
  Jeff Ornstein: And you, you know, I'm imagining you with a l a fuller head of hair than you have presently at 14 or however old the kid was, would be your Long Island kid.
• 5:17
  Bert Rotundo: Yeah, well, Ronnie Kovic, who he was playing, they were from Long Island, they were from Massapequa, so just a couple times over.
• 5:23
  Bert Rotundo: And I was actually auditioning to play the younger Tom Cruise in the movie.
• 5:26
  Bert Rotundo: And in the film, they would that role, because it was based on the book, Born on the Fourth of July, that part was much larger.
• 5:33
  Bert Rotundo: Uh and in the film, I believe when I saw it, they had they had really narrowed it down and got got to the meat of the story.
• 5:39
  Bert Rotundo: In fact, I have a birthmark in the same place as Tom Cruise.
• 5:42
  Bert Rotundo: It's not as prominent now as I'm older, but Tom and I have the same birthmark, which I I guess they saw that and were like, okay, can this kid act?
• 5:49
  Jeff Ornstein: Right.
• 5:49
  Bert Rotundo: And nine callbacks later, you know.
• 5:52
  Jeff Ornstein: And then you started dating Nicole Kidman, and it was a castle.
• 5:54
  Jeff Ornstein: Right.
• 5:58
  Jeff Ornstein: So we started early, and then you know, that's a common thread that we hear.
• 6:02
  Jeff Ornstein: People get bitten by the bug early.
• 6:04
  Jeff Ornstein: But it's fun, it's you know, when you're a kid, it's carefree and you're doing it, you know, but you're you've got a roof over your head and you know, three squares a day.
• 6:12
  Jeff Ornstein: But a lot of people don't follow through with it because it's like you say, you know, there's the heartbreak of rejection, there's the unknowing about uh how you're gonna sustain yourself, but you did actually.
• 6:23
  Bert Rotundo: Well, you know, I I had some really great teachers coming up, um, some fantastic teachers all along the way, both in college and then privately.
• 6:31
  Bert Rotundo: I studied with a bunch.
• 6:32
  Bert Rotundo: And one of the things that a lot of them had made very clear very early on was if you're looking to get famous, and that's what you're looking for, there are plenty of ways to get famous.
• 6:42
  Bert Rotundo: If you really love acting, then pursue acting for the love of the art itself and do it for that reason, not for what the the spoils of acting.
• 6:54
  Jeff Ornstein: Right.
• 6:55
  Bert Rotundo: Great advice.
• 6:56
  Bert Rotundo: Going for the spoils, you're gonna be highly disappointed.
• 6:58
  Bert Rotundo: There's a great Sufi saying that you're not entitled to the fruits of your labor, you're only entitled to the labor itself.
• 7:05
  Bert Rotundo: So the labor itself has to be something that you enjoy.
• 7:08
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 7:08
  Bert Rotundo: Um, and it's something that I really do I do love, and uh it and it's sort of propelled me into other areas of writing and directing and producing.
• 7:16
  Bert Rotundo: I like making films.
• 7:17
  Bert Rotundo: Um, I like getting together with a bunch of like-minded people who are all dead set on getting something created and making something that will live forever.
• 7:27
  Bert Rotundo: That's one of the things that's great.
• 7:28
  Bert Rotundo: It doesn't matter what happens on the day, you know, there's fires that you're putting out and this, that, and the other thing, and pulling your hair out, and that's why I don't have any hair.
• 7:36
  Bert Rotundo: But at the end of the day, it doesn't matter because no one's gonna remember all the craziness that happened on the day.
• 7:40
  Bert Rotundo: They're only gonna remember what's in the can.
• 7:43
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 7:43
  Bert Rotundo: What we've made.
• 7:45
  Bert Rotundo: And so there's something really special about that.
• 7:47
  Bert Rotundo: There's it's capturing lightning in a bottle, you know.
• 7:50
  Bert Rotundo: It's really lit me up inside.
• 7:52
  Bert Rotundo: And so for that, you know, it's that's what keeps me coming back.
• 7:56
  Bert Rotundo: And the rejection, yeah, it's rejection, but I I keep coming back because want to capture that lightning again.
• 8:03
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 8:04
  Jeff Ornstein: Right.
• 8:04
  Jeff Ornstein: That's what creatives do.
• 8:05
  Jeff Ornstein: What?
• 8:06
  Jeff Ornstein: So Frankie and Johnny in the Claire Dalone, that's some serious heavy acting going on down there.
• 8:12
  Bert Rotundo: That was a big undertaking.
• 8:13
  Bert Rotundo: That was one of those moments where it was like, okay, Geronimo, let's do this.
• 8:17
  Bert Rotundo: I was very lucky to have a fantastic director and Frank Ross.
• 8:21
  Bert Rotundo: I was encouraged by my acting teacher, the the late and great Sal Romeo.
• 8:25
  Bert Rotundo: And I had the greatest co-star anyone could want, uh, Jessica Blair, who I saw doing another play.
• 8:32
  Bert Rotundo: And after the show, I went up to her and I said, Hey, I'm thinking about doing this play.
• 8:36
  Bert Rotundo: I really want to do this play with you.
• 8:38
  Bert Rotundo: And she said, Let's do it.
• 8:39
  Bert Rotundo: We workshopped it for about six months, and then when we felt like we were good with it, we jumped into rehearsals and produced it ourselves and put it on in a little 33-seat house in Tulica Lake, California.
• 8:51
  Bert Rotundo: Um, and it was really well received, great reviews.
• 8:54
  Bert Rotundo: It really, for the first time, made me realize that I could lead a film, I could lead a production.
• 8:59
  Bert Rotundo: I wasn't just a character actor in the background, you know.
• 9:02
  Bert Rotundo: And and it it was sort of a coming of age.
• 9:08
  Bert Rotundo: In fact, funny enough, my dad flew out to come and see the show, and my dad came to see the show, he came to see it every night that he was there that opening weekend, and I was driving him back to the airport, and we're driving back, and he goes, you know, and I hear a little crackle in his voice.
• 9:24
  Bert Rotundo: And my dad's pretty stoic.
• 9:26
  Bert Rotundo: And he goes, You know, you've grown up, you're a man now.
• 9:29
  Bert Rotundo: I was in my mid-30s at the time, and he goes, You did a great job.
• 9:33
  Bert Rotundo: And everybody that came to see it came up to me and thank you and was just like, Oh my god, your son's fantastic.
• 9:38
  Bert Rotundo: And and he says, You paid your dues, you're ready.
• 9:42
  Bert Rotundo: Nice.
• 9:42
  Bert Rotundo: And I was like, I'm driving.
• 9:44
  Bert Rotundo: And so I was like, Okay, thanks, Dad.
• 9:45
  Bert Rotundo: And then I I dropped him off of the airport, and I got about two exits from the airport, and I had to pull over because it's and I called him and I was like, Dad, I love you.
• 9:54
  Bert Rotundo: Thank you so much.
• 9:55
  Bert Rotundo: And you know, we had a good little cry on the phone.
• 9:57
  Bert Rotundo: And but it was that it was that coming of age that sort of like, okay, you know, I got that that approval I guess I'd have been seeking from a young age as a kid.
• 10:06
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 10:06
  Bert Rotundo: Yeah.
• 10:07
  Jeff Ornstein: Well, you know, it's really important because, like we were talking about, you do go through a lot of rejections.
• 10:11
  Jeff Ornstein: And, you know, it takes a a seasoned sort of uh auditioner to understand you you're not gonna not only not gonna get every audition, you're not gonna get the majority of the auditions.
• 10:21
  Jeff Ornstein: And it has nothing to do with your skill sets or talents or performance even that day.
• 10:25
  Jeff Ornstein: It has to do with how the director or the producer sees the character in their eye.
• 10:30
  Jeff Ornstein: So getting that kind of affirmation from someone whose opinion you really, really value, yeah, it's a good dad.
• 10:37
  Bert Rotundo: He's a great dad, and he's still very supportive.
• 10:39
  Bert Rotundo: Uh, we just launched uh, I have a movie that just we just put on YouTube, uh, just launched YouTube and did a festival run, and it was a short, but uh it was uh guys that I've worked with a couple times were really proud of it, called Prada and Pumpernickel.
• 10:51
  Bert Rotundo: And we literally launched it yesterday, and my dad's been blowing up social media with it, and my sister, my family's so supportive, so it's so great, you know.
• 10:59
  Bert Rotundo: So great to have that supportive team.
• 11:00
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 11:01
  Bert Rotundo: You were born with your own PR a couple.
• 11:03
  Bert Rotundo: I really am.
• 11:04
  Bert Rotundo: I uh you know my dad should be my my agent.
• 11:06
  Jeff Ornstein: That's great.
• 11:07
  Jeff Ornstein: Well, if it sticks the family together with the glue.
• 11:10
  Jeff Ornstein: I want to um understand.
• 11:12
  Jeff Ornstein: So you you obviously were pretty involved in acting.
• 11:15
  Jeff Ornstein: I mean, having studied it as a young child and then doing these early works or even into your 30s, but you've also done producing, and that's hard.
• 11:24
  Jeff Ornstein: You know, when I'm on small indie films or even a feature film, that's hard.
• 11:29
  Jeff Ornstein: That producer is like juggling like a million things.
• 11:32
  Bert Rotundo: It is the wild, wild west.
• 11:34
  Bert Rotundo: And yeah, uh, and people have asked me several times, how do I get into producing?
• 11:38
  Bert Rotundo: And I honestly don't really necessarily uh have an answer.
• 11:42
  Bert Rotundo: I lucked out.
• 11:43
  Bert Rotundo: I had I had worked, I was bartending, and I was doing, I was working with a group of guys producing some viral videos, some short comedy videos uh with uh Generation Awesome.
• 11:54
  Bert Rotundo: And we were a little ahead of the curve before social media.
• 11:57
  Bert Rotundo: We were putting stuff on YouTube and putting stuff on Funnier Die, which had just started at that time, and we were getting some buzz.
• 12:04
  Bert Rotundo: We were presenting them at a local bar where we'd invite people to come and see the premiere, and we'd get 250 people come out.
• 12:10
  Bert Rotundo: And and what I realized was that what I was doing was I was actually producing.
• 12:16
  Bert Rotundo: And so when I started working at this place called the Village Idiot, they just closed a couple of years ago.
• 12:21
  Bert Rotundo: Great place on Melrose, great group of artists all working there.
• 12:25
  Bert Rotundo: And one of the women I got to work with, uh Susannah Hillard, her boyfriend at the time, Ryan Reese, who's now her husband, I met him at the Christmas party and she had showed him some of my videos, and him and I started talking became fast friends at the Christmas party.
• 12:38
  Bert Rotundo: And he's like, you know, look, anytime you need help, I'd love to help you.
• 12:41
  Bert Rotundo: And I said the same thing to him.
• 12:43
  Bert Rotundo: And about three months later, he he called me up and was like, Hey, we're we're shooting a sizzle reel for a film, which ended up being It's God.
• 12:51
  Bert Rotundo: I'd love for you to come out and uh associate produce it.
• 12:54
  Bert Rotundo: Uh, we're trying to raise the money to make this movie.
• 12:56
  Bert Rotundo: If you do it, you know, I can only pay you this much.
• 12:59
  Bert Rotundo: And I was like, Oh, you're gonna pay me?
• 13:00
  Bert Rotundo: I was gonna do it for free.
• 13:02
  Bert Rotundo: Great, you know?
• 13:03
  Bert Rotundo: And so I was partaining at night and and producing during the day, and we were all kind of new at it.
• 13:08
  Bert Rotundo: So we were all learning as we went, and I've since produced numerous things with them.
• 13:13
  Bert Rotundo: Gary Brunskill, the director of that and the writer of that.
• 13:16
  Bert Rotundo: We also produced a movie called The Adventures of the Naked Umbrella, which is on Prime, which I actually have a co-star uh role in that.
• 13:24
  Bert Rotundo: I play the villains, don't tell anybody.
• 13:26
  Bert Rotundo: But you know, one of the things is find your people.
• 13:29
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 13:29
  Bert Rotundo: And, you know, and the only way to really do it is get out there or find somebody who's been doing it for a really long time that's willing to kind of hip pocket you and and let you follow them around and see.
• 13:40
  Bert Rotundo: Because I'm sure there are people who are legit.
• 13:43
  Bert Rotundo: I have producer friends who are line producers where there's more about the budget and the and really kind of dealing with the actual overall production and getting the money and and making sure that the budget's good.
• 13:53
  Bert Rotundo: That's not really what I was involved with.
• 13:55
  Bert Rotundo: I was more about the hands-on making sure that you know we had this location and that and and just being there.
• 14:01
  Bert Rotundo: You are the everything, the glue that holds it together.
• 14:05
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 14:05
  Bert Rotundo: The best way to do it is make your own stuff.
• 14:08
  Bert Rotundo: Get out there, fail forward, right, and learn from your mistakes.
• 14:13
  Bert Rotundo: And then you it's not an accident, it's not a mistake if you keep doing it that way.
• 14:17
  Jeff Ornstein: You know, this is part of this podcast, is also for people to say, could I do this?
• 14:21
  Jeff Ornstein: You know, I mean, I've been, you know, an IBM executive or I've been, you know, a mechanic, you know.
• 14:25
  Jeff Ornstein: The common theme that's spoken through our guests is the sense of camaraderie and the support.
• 14:31
  Jeff Ornstein: And kind of once you find this little niche of director, writer, producer talent, that support group a lot of times maintains, you know, I'll recommend you for this, and can you join us for that?
• 14:41
  Jeff Ornstein: And I think a lot of people might be surprised that they wouldn't see the entertainment industry as so supportive.
• 14:47
  Bert Rotundo: And it is, it is, it really is.
• 14:49
  Bert Rotundo: You know, there's a lot of, you know, I moving back to New York, for instance, there's a lot of people like, oh, you lived in LA.
• 14:55
  Bert Rotundo: And I'm like, have you been to LA, first of all?
• 14:58
  Bert Rotundo: A lot of people talk smack about LA, and a lot of people have ideas of what it is, you know, but there are there's a lot, yes, anywhere in any business, there's gonna be shady folks, right?
• 15:08
  Bert Rotundo: Everywhere at any business is gonna be an underbelly looking to take advantage of people, right?
• 15:12
  Jeff Ornstein: Right.
• 15:13
  Bert Rotundo: And the acting and the entertainment industry is no different, but at the same time, there's there's so many people that have this incredible integrity that are there for all the right reasons and are really there at the end of the day because they grew up like me, watching movies, falling in love with being in that theater and being transported for two hours.
• 15:32
  Bert Rotundo: And there are great people.
• 15:34
  Bert Rotundo: And the the thing is it's it's about finding your community.
• 15:38
  Bert Rotundo: You find your community, and you know what?
• 15:40
  Bert Rotundo: You may work in a job and you may 90% of those people might be people that you know they treated you like crap and they they weren't nice to you, but there's one person that you're like, that person I want to work with again.
• 15:50
  Bert Rotundo: And that's how it works.
• 15:51
  Bert Rotundo: You go, hey man, can I get your number?
• 15:54
  Bert Rotundo: I'm uh you know, I want to do this thing, and you start to build this community, and the next thing you know, 10 years goes by, and you've got this community of like-minded people that you know you have a shorthand with now, you know, like working with Ryan Reese and and Jerry Brunskill on several features.
• 16:09
  Bert Rotundo: Now, Ryan will look at me and be like, and I'll be like, I got it.
• 16:11
  Bert Rotundo: I know what you doesn't even have to say it anymore.
• 16:13
  Bert Rotundo: I know exactly what needs to be done, and that's where you want to be.
• 16:16
  Bert Rotundo: You know, you look at great, great, uh, the great teams, you know, Adam Sandler, all these guys, Marty Scorsese, all these guys who have their team together, they work with all the same people.
• 16:26
  Bert Rotundo: You see them time and time again.
• 16:27
  Bert Rotundo: Because we have these people who they're like-minded, they they kind of meld and they merge and they they work as a cohesive unit.
• 16:35
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 16:36
  Bert Rotundo: It's it's I play volleyball with my best friend since I moved back.
• 16:39
  Bert Rotundo: In fact, I got a tournament tonight.
• 16:40
  Bert Rotundo: We're in the playoffs.
• 16:41
  Bert Rotundo: Good luck.
• 16:42
  Bert Rotundo: And I play with all my best friends and that I grew up and I played in high school with, and it's no different.
• 16:48
  Bert Rotundo: You know, it's it's being able to understand and move as a unit because it is not about a singular person, it's about a team moving together, and it's about building that team, you know, both creatively and commercially.
• 17:02
  Jeff Ornstein: Right.
• 17:02
  Jeff Ornstein: You know, it's not uncommon that while people are pursuing careers in theater as a performer, that you have a day job.
• 17:10
  Jeff Ornstein: And we've had people here who have been in the food service industry, nannies, tech industry, all different kinds of ways to make money to support themselves while they pursue their craft.
• 17:22
  Jeff Ornstein: I will say you are the first bartender.
• 17:25
  Jeff Ornstein: And the reason I bring it up is that it's been said or alleged that people, after a libation or two, might share personal details with their bartender.
• 17:36
  Jeff Ornstein: So I'm just wondering, did any did you ever have a customer that left an impression on you that maybe was a basis for a character that maybe you played or or developed?
• 17:45
  Jeff Ornstein: Oh yeah.
• 17:46
  Jeff Ornstein: Yeah.
• 17:47
  Bert Rotundo: I should have I should have an honorary PhD in psychology, sociology, mixology, and anthropology at this point for the amount of years that I've spent behind the bar.
• 17:57
  Bert Rotundo: And it's been look, a survival job is necessary.
• 18:01
  Bert Rotundo: It's great.
• 18:02
  Bert Rotundo: And bartending would really afforded me the ability to work nights and audition and work during the day.
• 18:08
  Bert Rotundo: And it's flexible, you know.
• 18:09
  Bert Rotundo: I don't have a nine to five where I have to be there Monday through Friday.
• 18:12
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 18:12
  Bert Rotundo: So, you know, working weekends, a lot of things don't shoot on the weekends.
• 18:16
  Bert Rotundo: Very rarely will you shoot on a weekend, especially, you know, network television and such.
• 18:20
  Bert Rotundo: But yeah, definitely a lot of it makes you good with people.
• 18:24
  Bert Rotundo: That's uh in fact, when I got asked to come on as associate producer for the sizzle reel of It's God, which ended up I came on as an associate on the actual feature a year later.
• 18:35
  Bert Rotundo: The reason why I got the job was Ryan came to me and Jerry came to me and says, You're great with people.
• 18:40
  Bert Rotundo: You know, and that is an attestament to just working behind the bar.
• 18:44
  Bert Rotundo: You have to you have to be able to roll with the punches, you have to be able, you're dealing with high stake high stakes, but you know, you're in this, you're moving around, you're you're you've got 18 things going on in your head.
• 18:55
  Jeff Ornstein: Time is money on a set, you know.
• 18:56
  Jeff Ornstein: Time is money.
• 18:57
  Jeff Ornstein: You gotta it's on track.
• 18:59
  Bert Rotundo: Yeah, and you gotta be able to, you know, spin a lot of plates at one time.
• 19:02
  Bert Rotundo: And bartending really helped me.
• 19:04
  Bert Rotundo: It was a great training ground for that.
• 19:06
  Bert Rotundo: I think I was I spent way too many years there.
• 19:08
  Bert Rotundo: I overstayed my welcome a little bit, but it was a blessing to be able to have that as a go-to.
• 19:14
  Jeff Ornstein: All right.
• 19:14
  Jeff Ornstein: The producers encouraged me.
• 19:16
  Jeff Ornstein: First of all, they thought you were a gem of a guy.
• 19:19
  Jeff Ornstein: I just thought I'd let you know your personality vibe was like right up there with like St.
• 19:23
  Jeff Ornstein: Sebastian or somebody.
• 19:24
  Jeff Ornstein: One of the questions that they encouraged me after they had spoken with you was did you have find a moment or project that made you feel like you were truly contributing to something meaningful?
• 19:33
  Jeff Ornstein: And I think it was when your dad said, You done good, kid.
• 19:36
  Jeff Ornstein: So I think we covered that ground.
• 19:38
  Jeff Ornstein: But is there anything else you would want to add about a particular role that propelled you in your mind and in your confidence?
• 19:44
  Bert Rotundo: Um, yeah, you know, I think anytime you as an artist, but I as an actor, anytime that I did a role that when I was offered it or auditioned for it and got it, where I was like, oh crap, how the hell am I gonna do this?
• 19:58
  Bert Rotundo: And you know, you'd sort of walk through the fire sort of situation and you come through it and you're like, wow, I did it.
• 20:04
  Bert Rotundo: You know, and not by sheer luck, but by sheer will and going, okay, got it.
• 20:10
  Bert Rotundo: Now you gotta show up and do the job.
• 20:13
  Bert Rotundo: The Adventures of the Naked Umbrella, that film, because I was producing and co-starring in it.
• 20:18
  Bert Rotundo: Um, that was a rough shoot.
• 20:20
  Bert Rotundo: I mean, uh making movies is tough.
• 20:23
  Bert Rotundo: We made a movie in the Salton Sea in Southern California in July.
• 20:28
  Bert Rotundo: The low temperature was 110 degrees, the high was 125 degrees.
• 20:34
  Bert Rotundo: At about 107 degrees, cameras stopped working, cars stop working, electronics, people stop working, you shuts down.
• 20:42
  Bert Rotundo: And so to make a movie that is good and looks good and sounds good and checks all the boxes, that was that was an accomplishment on, and we didn't kill anybody, you know, no one no one no one died, and and you know, it was a rough go.
• 20:57
  Bert Rotundo: And every day was like, okay, here we go.
• 20:59
  Bert Rotundo: Put one foot in front of the other and show up.
• 21:01
  Bert Rotundo: But I think Frankie and Johnny was the first one that made me go, okay, there's something here I can do this.
• 21:08
  Bert Rotundo: And that led to the next, okay, now I'm gonna go up and climb up to this plateau and then keep, you know.
• 21:14
  Jeff Ornstein: Of course, as is my nature, every interview we go over.
• 21:18
  Jeff Ornstein: So, of course, we've gone over significantly.
• 21:20
  Jeff Ornstein: I got time, so as long as you can tell.
• 21:22
  Jeff Ornstein: The producers will make it work.
• 21:23
  Jeff Ornstein: But I wanted to just kind of echo back or hearken back to something you just said earlier, because I think a lot of people that might be listening to this might take from it an important lesson that there are people like you and other guests who have been on and talk about, yeah, I decided I was gonna make this commitment, I've got this passion for it.
• 21:40
  Jeff Ornstein: And then you're given a break.
• 21:41
  Jeff Ornstein: You get a role, you're you win an audition, and then you go into that rehearsal or something, and you're like, I'm an imposter, I don't belong here, you know, your confidence is shattered.
• 21:52
  Jeff Ornstein: But like you just said, you are worth it, you know, and you pull it from inside of you, and you arrive, you know, with the performance that you're supposed to give.
• 22:02
  Jeff Ornstein: So, like that self-questioning is just part of the process of growing.
• 22:06
  Bert Rotundo: It it is, you know.
• 22:07
  Bert Rotundo: I think it's a a safety mechanism that we have to keep us safe.
• 22:11
  Bert Rotundo: You know, our nervous systems don't like to go outside of that that that zone that we've set up for ourselves.
• 22:17
  Bert Rotundo: And as an artist, you have to push that.
• 22:19
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 22:19
  Bert Rotundo: If you're really truly being true to your art, you're trying to push through that boundary every time.
• 22:25
  Bert Rotundo: Look, there are plenty of people who are doing great and they do the same thing over and over again, and they knock it out of the park, and their box offices are huge.
• 22:32
  Bert Rotundo: But for me to get excited about something, it has to scare me.
• 22:35
  Bert Rotundo: Right.
• 22:35
  Bert Rotundo: Because I've done a lot of things that I'm like, it's a paycheck, and I'm like, cool, I can do this in my sleep.
• 22:39
  Bert Rotundo: I still do the work, I still make sure that I do all the homework that I need to do.
• 22:43
  Bert Rotundo: But when it's scary, when it's like, ooh, I I don't know, can I do this?
• 22:47
  Bert Rotundo: Can I pull this off?
• 22:48
  Bert Rotundo: You know, that's when that's where the the cheddar is.
• 22:51
  Jeff Ornstein: And you grow.
• 22:52
  Jeff Ornstein: Yeah, who wants to be the liberty bibberty guy all their life?
• 22:54
  Jeff Ornstein: Great meaning you good luck at volleyball.
• 22:57
  Jeff Ornstein: I don't know what to say.
• 22:58
  Jeff Ornstein: You don't break a leg at volleyball, whatever you do.
• 23:00
  Jeff Ornstein: I wish you the best.
• 23:01
  Jeff Ornstein: Good luck.
• 23:02
  Jeff Ornstein: And it was a pleasure having you.
• 23:04
  Jeff Ornstein: Thanks for tuning in to Next Act with Jeff Orenstein.
• 23:07
  Jeff Ornstein: Follow, subscribe, and stay connected to your favorite socials at www.nextdackpodcast.com.
• 23:14
  Jeff Ornstein: Keep chasing your next act.
• 23:16
  Jeff Ornstein: The best is yet to come.