| FM Interview #10: All My Children |
[Mar. 19th, 2007|11:15 am] |
Here's another interview from Forbes's All My Children days, Soap Opera Digest 11/2/99, found on AMC Central Library
Great Scott Soap Opera Digest Magazine Dated: November 2, 1999
A Long, Strange Trip Brought ALL MY CHILDREN's Forbes March To Pine Valley
"I got into modeling through acting. I had no master plan," muses Forbes March.
You could say that again. If anything, March's big break was a matter of, um, timing. "I got a job selling those $10 imitation Gucci and Rolex watches they sell out of eel skin suitcases door-to-door," recalls the actor. "[One day] I walked into an acting agency to sell watches. They asked me if I did any acting because my pitch was very flamboyant."
The animated newcomer, who assumed the roll of ALL MY CHILDREN's Scott in May, turns uncharacteristically bashful when asked for a demonstration. "It was totally embarrassing. It was so tacky. I got briefcases thrown at me, I got chairs thrown at me, but you had to be very aggressive," he explains. "I made a dollar a watch - a dollar Canadian, that is - so [that's equivalent to] 60 cents a watch. I had to sell 100 watches a day to make 60 bucks. One hundred watches a day! Try selling 100 fake, phony, cheap watches a day. Every day ... So I walked into the acting agency, they asked me to be an actor, I said, 'Sure.' Then I went on an audition and got the job."
March's first gig, hawking Kenner glue guns, convinced him to give up the glamour of peddling knockoffs. "That paid more than 100 days of selling watches, so I was hooked. My next audition was for a TV show and I got that."
That was a role on NORTHWOOD, a now-defunct Spelling-esque sudser. "It's 90210, but Canadian-style," laughs March, breaking into sample dialogue from the show. "'Hey, geez, Josh, I hear your girlfriend's pregnant, eh?' It was a lot of fun, but I had no acting experience, so I didn't know what the hell I was doing."
March played good guy Brendan. "Brandon, Brendan, hmmm," cracks the actor. "[I was] hired by the same guy who gave Jason Priestly [ex-Brandon, BEVERLY HILLS, 90210] his first job, fancy that?"
Before March could devote a lot of time to acting classes, another career path loomed. "I was looking for work, and through acting I met a lot of fashion people. They got me into modeling."
March took off to Milan, Italy, where he quickly discovered what it's like when you're not one of the top models. "My first few months stunk because I wasn't working. Nobody was working. Everybody was depressed and wanted to go home. And there were like eight of us in a one-bedroom apartment."
No glittering parties with Naomi Campbell? "We were just buddies," he cracks. "No, I was a schlump. I was one of those newbies. The ultimate newbie."
Things picked up, however, and March found the work easy and a great way to see the world. After four years, though, the globetrotting had lost its luster. "I was in four countries a week. It sounds amazing, and it was amazing - for a month or two. [Then] one night I woke up in a complete panic in a Swiss hotel. I was drenched in sweat. I had no idea what month it was, what day it was, what country I was in, what city I was in or why I was there. I had no idea. It was a total blackout. I just lost it. I did four intercontinental flights in 10 days, bouncing around the world: New York, L.A., Milan, Miami, Toronto, Spain. It sounds great." It wasn't.
March did return home with a beautiful export - fianc饠Vanessa Sergio. "She's fabulous. We met four years ago in Milan. I'd been dating a terrible model. Who knows where she is? I never want to know. I was staying with a friend trying to recuperate emotionally. In a fit of tearful anguish, I told her the type of woman I wish I could meet and she said, 'I know just the one.' And she was right."
Back in New York, March once again turned his attention to acting: "As soon as I got here, I got my butt into acting classes." He studied at the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute and began auditioning for New York soap roles, which led to him being cast as Tim Dillon on AMC.
Somewhere along the way, plans to age the character, which had been played for eight years by Tommy J. Michaels, were apparently scrapped. "[The show said], 'We changed our minds, you're Scott.'"
March's reaction? "I said okay. I didn't know who Tim was and I didn't know who Scott was, either. I don't know why they did that," shrugs the actor.
March is content to play the recast Chandler scion. "The opportunity to work on a character that's growing so much adds a whole different twist to the acting," he says. "You're faced with new decisions and challenges to develop [the character] every day."
Of course, the biggest challenge in March's life right now is impending fatherhood - March and Sergio are expecting a girl around the end of November. "I feel as excited as I do frightened ... and paranoid ... and fearful ... and ecstatic ... It's absolutely everything all turned into one sleepless, nine-month wait."
© Soap Opera Digest
And because the month of March deserves a March picture...
( Here ya go! ) |
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