By Freddy Moyano
Corresponding
We had the opportunity to sit down with Apple TV star Todd Waring, who traveled to Green Bay over Labor Day weekend to talk about 2 Timers, his award-winning short was produced by, among others, his longtime friend, Tony Shalhoub. .
Much like Shalhoub, Waring is no stranger to stages and television sets.
He’s had an extensive TV acting career spanning over 40 years, with titles like Splash Too, Star Trek, NYPD Blue and Monk on his resume.
For the past three years, he has worked on the Apple TV horror series, Servant, portraying the character Frank Pearce.
Attached to the theater from an early age
Born in Ballston Spa, NY, Waring began acting in plays when he was in 4th grade.
A stage adaptation of a fairy tale set his passion for acting in motion.
“My teacher, Mrs Fruworth, came up with a scenario based on The Merry Pranks of Till Eulenspiegel, which sounds like a fairy tale. She gave me the lead role in this little play. It was really my first time performing on stage,” said Waring, who continued to pursue acting opportunities throughout high school.
Waring fondly recalls a role in his freshman year of high school that required him to wear a canopy to look like Yul Brynner’s character in the 1956 musical The King and I, based on Margaret Landon’s Anna and the King. of Siam.
“I had long hair at the time, I wore a ponytail. I wore dark makeup on my face and they couldn’t make it look like the bald tone. They tried to darken the bat, but it came out as a bit clear, like a piece of chocolate that had been in the fridge for too long, with a powdery appearance,” he said.
Replace Tom Hanks
After graduating from college in 1977, Waring moved to New York, where he met his wife and fellow actress, Eve Gordon (Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves and Monk).
He said his television acting career began in the early 1980s, a decade that would indirectly link him to Tom Hanks.
“I played on TV [version of] Tom Hanks twice,” Waring said. “We were nothing in common” (1987). I played Tom Hanks and Bill Macy played Jackie Gleason.
Waring said Disney approached him to do the TV version of Tom Hank’s Splash (Splash, Too in 1987) replacing Hanks and co-starring Amy Yasbeck, who played the mermaid.
The production was not without challenges.
“In Los Angeles, we worked in a swimming pool. It was like winter, on Disney land. They had to clean all the leaves from the pool and it was freezing cold. Shortly after, we had to fly to one of the Florida Keys, to work in Marathon Key. It was a lot warmer,” Waring said, adding that he somehow developed an ear infection that proved troublesome by the time they wrapped filming in the Orlando area.
1990s to present
Waring said he and his wife moved permanently to Los Angeles in the early 1990s.
Waring has since logged more than three decades of significant television acting roles.
He said his role as serial killer Malcolm Culinan on NYPD Blue was among his favorites, as well as the most recent recurring opportunity as Frank Pearce on Servant.
Of Servant, Waring highlighted the attention to detail in cinematography and camerawork by the Apple TV production helmed by M. Night Shyamalan.
“He’s a very nice, unassuming guy. He’s very easy to work with,” Waring said of co-star Ruppert Grint, who is best known for his role as Ron Weasley in the Harry Potter saga. .
Scriptwriter
Waring has also been writing screenplays for just over a decade, including the screenplay for 2 Timers, which premiered at the Tarlton Theater in Green Bay last weekend.
“I probably started writing it in 2017 because we started touring before the pandemic hit,” Waring said. “It was an idea I had in Los Angeles on my way to a story meeting about short film ideas. At the time, someone was making headlines because they were stalker. So I thought the idea of ’hiring a stalker’ might be a good angle,” Waring said.
Waring said the entire cast of 2 Timers – Steven Weber and Jane Kaczmarek among the most well-known names in the production – had been reunited before he and the directorial tandem of Shane Cibella and Tim Aslin approached Tony Shalhoub (executive producer) and other contributors to the project. like Alfred Molina and Jamie Lee Curtis.
Waring said “Rewrite, rewrite, rewrite” is the one constant in a screenwriter’s challenge to adapt to production needs.
Among other screenplays he wrote, he highlighted his work in Heartland (2016), directed by Maura Anderson, a film where Todd himself also stars as a preacher.
Waring ended up reaping an award for Lyin Landre, the editor of 2 Timers, which was recognized as the best edited production of 2022 at the MLC Awards gala ceremony held at the Tarlton.
Freddy Moyano is a Green Bay-based film producer, entrepreneur, actor, critic and voice-over artist. Follow Freddy on instagram.com/freddymoyanoofficial