Actor shares his craft with students
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Actor Dennis North enjoys challenging roles that stretch his skills and demand he create characters who movie fans either adore or give them goosebumps with a capital G.
When North is not on a film set or a stage, he’s teaching his craft to students at Oakland County Community College, Orchard Ridge Campus, Oakland University or Wayne State University.
“I teach by often using my real experiences to convey a lesson. It’s been a blessing to be able to teach what I actually do,” North said. “For a lot of students, it’s a first-time experience taking an acting class and I really try to make it a good one.”
North has appeared in lead and principle roles in nearly a dozen films and television programs including “Gifted Hands,” in which he played a doctor and shared scenes with Cuba Gooding Jr., starred as a terrifying pedophile in “Small Beautiful Hands,” and just wrapped up a role as the father in the Miley Cyrus/Demi Moore film, “LOL (Laughing Out Loud).”
“‘LOL’ was truly fun because we had this international feel, the director/writer was from France; the (director of photography) was from Ireland; crew from Detroit, L.A., France and New York; and the actor playing my son was from London, U.K.,” North said. “Miley Cyrus is very nice person, very down to earth.”
Growing up in Los Angeles, North moved to the Midwest as a teenager. He came to Detroit for his master’s degree at Wayne State University and landed his first film, “Singapore Harbor,” shortly after graduation. Since then, he has been featured in “SWAT,” “Butterfly Effect: Revelation, Restitution,” now in post production, “Salvation Boulevard” starring Pierce Brosnan, also in post production, and others.
North is dedicated to acting and mentoring his students, and uses a video camera in the classroom to record student performances. He says the camera is a wonderful tool that allows students to see what works in a scene and what doesn’t.
“We performed monologues and scenes and he would have us perform it without any direction, and then coach/direct us for a second take,” said Oakland University theater major Lauren Knox. “When we played the tape back, we’d see our own improvements. He doesn’t settle, and didn’t let us settle, for anything less than the truth in our performances. I can still hear him saying ‘Yeah, I just didn’t buy it that time.’ or ‘Beautiful. That was it. I believed you, you were telling the truth,’ in response to some of our work.”
Rami Paulus took four acting classes from North at Oakland County College and is now in Hollywood testing the waters.
“I feel prepared, 1,000 percent thanks to Dennis,” Paulus said. “He takes the time to teach us the correct way because he wants to build actors. He gives us the armor we need to be successful by mentoring and caring about us.”
“I’ll tell you one other thing that’s been great to be able to say to students — Michigan is a great place to work, especially film. The Midwest has always been a great area for theatre and commercial work, but when it comes to film, I’ve truly never been able to say that before but now, at least as long as the incentive holds out, I can. It’s nice.”
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