Actor John Boyd ’03 on his work in film, TV, and theater

If you didn’t know the details, it might seem like the typical actor’s story: Move to New York (or LA) after graduation; go on as many auditions as you can; get a day job to pay the bills. All of which John Boyd ’03 did. “I lived in Harlem with my sister. I worked construction, I babysat, I catered, I did ten different odd jobs at once while I went on auditions...whatever I could do to avoid waiting tables.”

And then, after nine months of auditions, along came legendary pinup model Bettie Page.

Or a movie about her, at least. “I got a part in The Notorious Bettie Page,” he says, “and it paid what seemed to me at the time this huge amount of money, like a few months’ rent. That was my first gig. And then I started working more steadily.” Over the next three years, several more jobs followed—including a number of film and theater roles, guest parts on Law & Order, and a national Cingular commercial—and John found himself making it as a working actor.

“Every project I do,” he says, “every single one I do, there’s a moment—between takes, or when I’m about to go on stage, or even in the car on the way there—where I go, ‘Oh my God, this is amazing. I’m actually getting to do this.’”

“Bennington urged me to follow those kinds of instincts, the kind that you have to carry out in order to understand."

John is getting used to hearing a particular phrase when he goes on auditions: “Hmm...you’re different.” His management company must agree; they snapped him up before he had even graduated from Bennington.

So what is that about?

In one way, it’s about the choices he’s made, some of them while still a student at Bennington. Spending one of his Field Work Terms working with homeless children in Africa, for instance. “In my sophomore year, I found this album in a pile of used CDs at this store in L.A.,” he says. “I bought it for five dollars and took it home, and from the first track, it completely blew my mind. It was this African a capella group. These guys from Zambia singing their hearts out. I just got so into it. I heard this music and thought, ‘I have to go to Africa.’”

So he did. For his Field Work Term that year, he traveled to Nairobi, Kenya, and worked at an orphanage for street kids, where he taught almost every subject from mathematics to art.

“Bennington urged me to follow these kinds of instincts,” he says. “The kind that you have to carry out in order to understand, which to me is just as important as anything that can be learned through actor training. Those kinds of decisions shape and serve whatever it is you choose to do. They have to.”

"Even though I was terrified and thought this thing was impossible, when it was time go to work, I was completely ready."

When he returned home, he became interested in the effects of poverty not only in Africa, but in his native Los Angeles. He was inspired to write a play, Muzingu Song, which was later produced at Bennington with student actors and a student director, Dannikke Walkker ’03.

“The way I learned to communicate and learn and work with people at Bennington,” John says, “served me in a way that I didn’t even see coming. It really helped me. Even though I was terrified [right after graduation] and thought this thing was impossible, when it was time go to work, I was completely ready. I knew what it took to really work with people.”

John Boyd '03 (right) in M. Night Shyamalan's Lady in the Water (2006)

After The Notorious Bettie Page, John was cast in several more projects. M. Night Shyamalan, writer/director of The Sixth Sense and Signs, was making a new movie called Lady in the Water, and John landed a part as one of the pontificating smokers called on to help the main character. It was John’s first studio film, and gave him the chance to work alongside actors who are household names. “Paul Giamatti had a huge influence on me,” he says. And not just regarding acting. “I’d recently started to get really into Bob Dylan’s music, and he turned me on to all of this obscure Dylan stuff. It was really fun.”

But the indie films Boyd has acted in—including his starring role in Jelly, now in post-production and due to come out next year—have been equally satisfying. “They’re really fun to make,” he says. “The people are really passionate and hard working. The producers told me they’re planning on sending Jelly to Sundance. So many independent films’ famous last words, but I have high hopes for this one.”

M. Night Shyamalan, writer/director of The Sixth Sense and Signs, was making a new movie called Lady in the Water, and John landed a part.

And then there’s Boyd’s current project—The Piano Teacher, a play at New York’s Vineyard Theater, in which he is working with Tony-award winning actress Elizabeth Franz. “I’m really excited to be doing a play in New York City. It’s the reason I came here. It’s a great play, and it’s a great part.”

After that, it’s back to Los Angeles for winter—pilot season—and, eventually, back to New York again. Although, as John says, it’s impossible to predict what comes next: “Sometimes I’ll get three jobs in a row, sometimes I won’t get a job for several months.

“But it’s funny, the path I find myself on. There’s so much garbage out there, so much fluff, but really, because of Bennington—the direction it moved me in, the things it showed to me—it’s kept me working with interesting people and doing interesting things. And so far, it’s blowing my mind.”

John’s Field Work Terms:

Field Work Term (FWT) is Bennington's yearly winter internship period, in which all students participate. Many students find that the skills and connections they make during FWT are invaluable as they pursue a career after graduation. These were John's Field Work Terms:

• First year: Interned for avant-garde jazz record label Nine Winds and worked at a preschool.
• Second year: Worked at an orphanage for Homeless Children International in Nairobi, Kenya.
• Third year: Independent study, writing his play Muzingu Song.
• Fourth year: Interned at The Signature Theater in New York.

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