For his starring role in the short film “Sleep Running,” Larnell Baxter played a man experiencing post-traumatic stress after having a car accident. The actor realized early on that the part would call for vulnerability. “I knew that I had to go to a dark place to be able to portray internal hurt,” he says.
The gig was made doubly challenging by the fact that there was no dialogue, nor did Baxter have a stunt double for vigorous running and crash scenes. “Those were really my emotions [in the scenes],” he says, adding, “Plus, it was extremely cold in Seattle.”
Baxter booked the gig through Backstage—and he didn’t even have to audition! “Surprisingly, I was cast based off of my headshot since there was no dialogue,” he remarks. In early 2016, Baxter committed himself to using Backstage, and he says he has seen an immediate payoff.
“I subscribed at the beginning of 2016 and it has truly made the difference by making me a more informed actor,” he says. “I trust Backstage’s process of verifying casting notices. It allows me to go on a personal ‘scavenger hunt’ to find the notices that fit my personality or would give me a challenge.”
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