Director Tracy Trost – Living The Dream | 049 - Actors Talk - Come Inside The Acting Business

IF YOU COULD DO ANYTHING

...I'll tell you this: If you believe it's impossible, then it is. But if you believe it's possible, then it is. It comes down to you.

What would you do? If you could be anybody you wanted to be, if money weren't an issue and failure not an option, what would that one thing be? That THING that defined you as a human being?

RELEASE YOUR BRILLIANCE

The questions above were ones Tracy Trost and his employees and associates discussed some years back when they were reading, as a team activity, a book called RELEASE YOUR BRILLIANCE by Simon T. Bailey.

Here's a bit about the premise of the book from the author:

Each of us is born brilliant. Then we spend the rest of our lives having our brilliance buried by people, circumstances, and experiences. Eventually, we forget that we ever had genius and special talents, and our brilliance is locked away in a vault deep within. So we settle for who we are, instead of striving for who we were meant to be.

And here is how reading this book became the tipping point for Tracy Trost to begin working toward his life long dream of becoming a filmmaker:

Each week, Tracy has a book meeting with his employees where they go through a chapter of a book and look at how they can use the lessons in the book to become better at what they do at the company and in their lives. One week, Tracy asked his employees, “If money wasn't an object and you couldn't fail, what would you do?” As he went around the room, each employee shared their dream for their life with everyone. After they shared their dream, Tracy then asked them the following question, “What are you doing on a daily basis to make that happen?”

He went on to explain, that in order to take a trip there are certain steps we all have to take. If you want to somewhere you need to get plane tickets, book a hotel, get a rental car, pack your things, and a number of other small steps that will make your trip not only possible but successful. Tracy told his employees that the same is true in life and unfortunately most people spend more time planning a weekend getaway then they do their lives.

After he finished, one of Tracy’s employees, asked him what it was that he has always wanted to do. Tracy quickly replied that he had always wanted to be a director. As long as he could remember, he has always wanted to direct movies. Then the employee asked him what he was doing on a daily basis to get there. He fired her. No not really, but that “dare” is what it took for Tracy to follow his own dreams and Trost Moving Pictures is the result of it and all of us at TMP Studios couldn't be happier that he took it.

Making movies is what we do, but making a difference is what we love!

FOCUS ON WHAT I CAN GIVE NOT WHAT I CAN GET

I first became aware of filmmaker Tracy Trost around 2010. He was in production on his first full length feature film, A CHRISTMAS SNOW. A couple of things attracted my attention about that production. First was that Muse Watson, probably most widely known as Mike Franks on the hit CBS show NCIS was one of the leads along with Catherine Mary Stewart and Anthony Tyler Quinn.

AS LONG AS YOU HAVE BREATH IN YOUR LUNGS IT'S NOT TOO LATE

Tracy Trost - Director's Diary

The second thing that attracted my attention and led me to follow the progress of the film were the 'directors diary' videos that began during pre-production and were posted frequently during production.

In preparing these show notes I went back and visited some of those videos. The Video below is the whole playlist for A Christmas Snow Director's Diaries. Hit the drop down in the upper left corner of the video to choose from among all the videos available. Video 7 features Muse Watson.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORvYlx0cseo&list=PLF008DEFA793C6C6F

NOTHING IS EVER POSSIBLE UNTIL YOU BELIEVE IT IS

In retrospect,