Caffeinated Clint
In “The Loneliest Road in America”, newcomer Colin Michael Day plays Jamie, a young man who, disillusioned with a dead-end job and a suffocating relationship with his girlfriend (Jennifer Devereaux) is an a quest for enlightenment. Jamie takes a road trip from Denver to LA with friends Mat (Chris Hayes) and Ashley (Abby Leigh) in search of it. Clint Morris caught up with the actor in this exclusive interview.
How did you get involved in “The Loneliest Road in America”?
I got involved in the Loneliest Road in America because when my roommate, Mardana, and I moved out to Los Angeles together to get into the film industry, we decided to do our own projects. We wanted to create our own film. So Mardana worked on the script and became the lead writer and the director as well. I filled the lead role in the movie as well as contributed to the script.
Who and what makes ‘Jamie’ tick?
The Jamie character is lost. He has a girlfriend back in Denver who really cares about him, but he feels trapped in the relationship. He feels unsure about what he wants in his life as far as his career and his personal relationships. So he decides to go on a road trip, a personal voyage to discover himself in a way. This journey takes him to all these small mining towns in Nevada to explore how capitalism has destroyed them and left them with almost nothing. Along the way, he meets different types of people and ends up falling for another girl. In the end, Jamie betrays everybody, and becomes what he hated. He becomes like the corporations that exploited the mining towns, only he exploits women. Basically, Jamie is trying to find himself, like many 24- or 25-year-old college students who graduate without really knowing where they’re going in life.
You anything like him?
There are a couple traits I share with Jamie. First, there’s the desire to want more, to keep looking for more, always expanding your life and what you want to do. That’s what I connect with the most. Second, I connect with the concept of finding yourself, because I have experience with that in my own life.
What do you think of people, personally, that exploit women – like, say, this ‘Tucker Max’ character seems to do?
This is a really tough question because I have mixed feelings. I don’t feel anyone should be exploited, per se, but I have learned that there are people who bring it upon themselves. It’s difficult to explain, but I think the people who play games in relationships and friendships have manipulative tendencies, and more often than not, those people are the ones that get exploited and hurt. If you are an honest and straight forward person, then you’ll be treated that way. But exploitation happens; it’s life, and it’s just like these corporations that came in and ruined these towns, but the people chose to stay, they chose that life.
True. So where did you shoot the flick?
We filmed the movie in Denver, Utah, Nevada and Los Angeles.
And you and Mardana are working on other stuff together?
Mardana and I are best friends and roommates. We want to continue making projects together because we’re a good team. We have our own personal goals, but we would like to work on as many projects together as we can, because we enjoy working with each other.
Has “Loneliest Road in America” been good for your career? A great show reel to get you in the door on some big auditions?
I have not gotten any big auditions, yet. The film is still in the initial phases of the film festival process, and it just started the film festival tour. Obviously the publicity is good, but it’s only been a few months, and it’s only going to bet better. So I haven’t had any huge doors open up, but smaller ones are definitely appearing. And hopefully bigger doors will be opened for us to do more projects in the future.
What’s the release plan for the film?
We are currently in discussions with distributors so there is no set release date right now. Like I mentioned before, the film is still on the film festival tour so we’re letting that run its course, and then afterwards we will put down a more concrete date.
What else are you working on?
I just finished up a few plays, which were awesome experiences for me. One of the productions I was in, Block Nine, won best production in LA, so that was exciting. As for new projects, there are some plays at Elephant Theater Company that I would love to get involved with. Mardana and I are currently finishing up a few scripts and we’ll be going into preproduction on those in early fall. Also, there’s a web series that we are going to be working on over the summer. Other than those projects, I’m keeping my schedule pretty clear because I’ll be heading to South Africa mid-June for the World Cup, and I cannot wait for that.
