Filmmaker/Actor/Teacher Anthony Meindl: "I Was Very Ram-a-Lama-Ding-Dong"
DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley
Release Date: 03/11/2020
Filmmaker-Actor Stephanie Koenig ("A Spy Movie"): "I Feel Like a Construction Worker"
DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley
Dennis is joined via Zoom by Stephanie Koenig, the writer-director-producer-star & editor of the feature film A Spy Movie, an action movie parody which recently dropped on You Tube. She talks about coming up with the idea while hanging with friends on a bench in Marina Del Rey, mining her Mission Impossible: Fallout obsession for tropes to skewer, doing her own stunts and how she strikes a balance between scripted moments and improv. She also talks about the no-budget Do-Everything-Yourself process of making A Spy Movie--and previous projects like The Gay and Wondrous Life of Caleb...
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Author Eddie Shapiro ("A Wonderful Guy"): "I Do Get Sassy Sometimes"
DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley
Dennis connects via Zoom with author Eddie Shapiro to discuss his book A Wonderful Guy: Conversations with the Great Men of Musical Theater and the actors featured in it including Raul Esparza, Michael Cerveris, Joel Grey, Ben Vereen, Cheyenne Jackson, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Christopher Sieber, Jonathan Groff, Gavin Creel and many more. Eddie talks about why he thinks the world of musical theater seems to favor female performers over men and how the men he interviewed reconcile that. Eddie also talks about the passing of Stephen Sondheim, how Sondheim personally mentored the men in the...
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Actors & Writers Mitch Silpa & Drew Droege: "Our Messy Gay Brains"
DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley
Dennis chats via Zoom with performers Mitch Silpa & Drew Droege about their stage show "It's Mitch & Drew and We've Never Felt Younger," which plays Tuesday, November 23 at 8:00 PM at Dynasty Typewriter in Los Angeles. They talk about some of the sketches that will appear in the show, including one that was conceived while they were watching The White Lotus and another that features the characters from their hit Instagram videos "Two Old Queens Who Just Have a Minute To Catch Up." Mitch and Drew talk about how they first met over 20 years ago at the Groundlings, how the sketch-improv...
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Filmmaker Jesse Moss ("Mayor Pete"): A Love Story at the Center of a Political Story"
DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley
Dennis connects via Zoom with filmmaker Jesse Moss, the director of the new Amazon documentary Mayor Pete, about the history-making presidential campaign of openly gay South Bend, Indiana mayor Pete Buttigieg. Jesse talks about how he came to make the movie, how keeping up with Pete and the campaign was like being on The Amazing Race, how Pete and Chasten's love story became the center of the film, Pete's chemistry with Joe Biden on the trail and the jolt of energy outspoken Communications Director Lis Smith brought to the campaign and the documentary. Other topics include: Pete's famous...
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Illustrator Glen Hanson: "You Can't Turn That Flow Off"
DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley
Dennis connects via Zoom with illustrator Glen Hanson whose work as been seen on everything from animated TV shows like Beetlejuice and Daria to magazines like GQ, Entertainment Weekly and TV Guide, for whom he did four different covers when Seinfeld went off the air. His ubiquitous illustration of the Golden Girls is on everything from book covers, to T-shirts to phone cases. Glen talks about when he knew he was gifted as an artist, his creative process, dealing with procrastination, getting turned on while drawing hot guys (or not) and the extensive research he does before he sits down...
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Poet Steven Reigns ("A Quilt for David"): "This Book is David's Panel"
DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley
Dennis connects via Zoom with poet Steven Reigns to discuss his new book A Quilt for David, which explores through poetry the story of David Acer, the dentist from Treasure Cove, Florida who was accused by multiple people of giving them HIV through dental work in the early 1990s. The story made national news, led to several $1 million-plus insurance settlements and turned David into a convenient scapegoat for a nation wary of gay people and terrified of AIDS. Steven talks about the book's mixture of poetry and investigative reporting, going to Florida to research and interview people who were...
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Filmmaker Wes Hurley: "He's Talented, He Couldn't Be Gay"
DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley
After surviving a breakthrough case of COVID, Dennis returns with this Zoom with filmmaker Wes Hurley whose delightful autobiographical film Potato Dreams of America is currently playing the festival circuit and will be released in 2022. The film tells the story of how he moved from Eastern Russian at 16 when his mother became a mail order bride for an American man in Seattle. He talks about his decision to use magical realism to tell his own story, using two sets of actors to play the mother and son characters and how he came to cast Mean Girls Jonathan Bennett, Orange Is the New Black's Lea...
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Filmmaker Todd Stephens ("Swan Song"): "All of These Magical Things Kept Happening"
DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley
Dennis is joined via Zoom by Todd Stephens, the writer director of the new film Swan Song, which is about retired hairdresser named Mr. Pat played by Udo Kier who busts out of his nursing home to do one last job, styling the hair of the dead society matron for her funeral. Todd talks about the real-life Mr. Pat who inspired the movie, collecting stories from people who knew the real Pat, and how the character of Mr. Pat was supposed to be in Todd's first film Edge of 17 but got cut. Todd talks about the inspired casting of Udo Kier as Pat, meeting Udo--and his dog Liza Minelli--at his...
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Actor Arianna Ortiz ("Nine Days"): "I Got Pizza Hut Socks!"
DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley
Dennis is joined via Zoom by actor Arianna Ortiz one of the stars of the new film Nine Days, a unique and moving film about seven souls and the man who decides whether or not they're going to go to earth. Arianna talks about the role she plays Maria, what it's like to create a character with virtually no backstory and what made Nine Days a dream-come-true experience. She recalls how the audition came to her, the thrill of getting the part and what it felt like to shoot the scene in the movie where her character is in the center of a lot of cinematic magic. She also talks about the mind-trip of...
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Summertime Magic: w/ filmmaker Carlos Lopez Estrada & actors/poets Paolina Acuña González, Raul Herrera & Marquesha Babers
DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley
Dennis is joined via Zoom by four of the creative forces behind the new film Summertime; director Carlos Lopez Estrada, and actors / poets Paolina Acuña González, Raul Herrera and Marquesha Babers. Carlos shares the projects origin story, recalling how he saw a live performance of a group of LA poets and was so knocked out by their performances that he came up with the day-in-the-life-of-Los Angeles idea as a way to showcase them all in a feature film. Paolina talks about her poem "Red Lipstick" and the spectacular choreographed dance number the comes out of it in the film. Raul talks...
info_outlineDennis visits the Hollywood Hills home of Anthony Meindl the writer-director and one of the stars of Where We Go From Here, a new film that just hit Hulu about people in three different places--Orlando, Paris and Binghampton, NY--whose lives are affected by gun violence. Anthony talks about what made him sit down and write the film, putting his own experiences into the film's gay relationship, appearing nude in the film and shooting in Paris in French without speaking the language himself. He also talks about his work as an acting teacher, how he got started, why he believes his philosophy connects, having schools in ten cities around the world, what it's like when one of his students hits the big time and how the world has changed for aspiring gay actors. He also discusses growing up gay in Indiana as the son of German immigrants, getting bullied for being gay and pulling a John Cusack in Say Anything move to try and win over a dude named Tim. Other topics include: coaching Camilla Cabello on the set of Cinderella, carbon offsetting your flights when you travel, getting shut down in Altadena, his first dirty magazine, playing the title character in Hard Hat Harry, getting shamed in school for watching Helter Skelter on TV and how he feels about dating actors.