action – Downtown Magazine

Photo credit Josh Beech

Oliver Trevena is a British actor and longtime host of the interview show Young Hollywood. In the two years after leaving the show, he has been part of more than a half dozen projects, two of which have already been released. In 2018, he had a role in Ariel Vromen’s The Angel. The Rising Hawk, a joint US-Ukrainian film, opened in Ukraine in October. A third film, Grand Isle, will hit theaters in December.

Downtown Magazine: So how did your work with Young Hollywood get started?

Oliver Trevena: Kind of just a chance thing, really. I grew up in entertainment. I was in ballet and theater for 12 years. Um, and when I came to the States, I obviously found a lot of theater and acting and trained abroad. And when I came to America, hosting was never something that I thought I’d do. I’ve seen presenters–we call them presenters in London–but never really considered it at all.

And on a chance night out, I was actually hosting a friend of mine’s birthday and we were doing karaoke and I ended up hosting the karaoke, I guess. I thought I’d be like, “Oh, next up we’ve got this…” You know, just for fun. And someone in the audience was the founder of Young Hollywood and he said, “Oh, you’re a great host.” And I actually had no idea what he meant. “He’s like, do you want to do some work for us?” And that lasted nine years.

DT: So, What changed?

OT: I think in the last year or so I just made a conscious decision. I was missing my acting. It’s tough when you go to meet some incredible people and it’s amazing to sit with some of the people that I look up to as actors, but also I’m constantly talking to them about what they’re doing and this work. I was getting the itch again. Yeah. So it was time to kind of pullback. Uh, yeah, like last may–may of 2018–I let the contracts end that I was stuck in and I said, I want to take a gamble and get back into my acting.

DM: What sorts of things that you learned interviewing all of those actors?

OT: It was great doing the interviews because a lot of the people that I’m now working with on set, I’ve been interviewed or I’ve met before. That’s great. I also go into some of these jobs and people would say, “you nervous? You’ve got to be acting on the side of…whomever.” I don’t have any of that because I’ve spent so many years around them.

Also, just like realizing that the most memorable people are the people that are really just themselves. I mean I’ve done thousands of interviews. I understand why people obviously have guards up and stuff like that, but when you sit with someone and they’re just themselves, it’s an easier way to connect. It could be crazy. They could be quiet, or they could be funny, as long as it’s who they are.

I guess what I learned is to just be myself and be comfortable with it. Um, yeah. Embrace all the craziness, you know, embrace the good, the bad, the ugly. It’s been good–and weird. It’s like I’m now 38 years old and it’s just been an amazing time in the last year. I feel like I’m in my early twenties, again, with an excitement for life and the lessons I’ve learned on the way.

DM: You play one of the villains in Neil Marshall’s The Reckoning. How does it feel playing like that bad of a bad guy?

OT: I love it. I think that’s what I really miss about acting. I spent so long, the hosting world was great cause I got to be me. Which is fun. But I think that’s why it got a bit repetitive cause I was just being me–someone that loves to perform and create to just be someone else in moments. Acting is what I really miss. So it’s been nice because every role is just so, so different from real life.

DM: So you have a film coming out in October, The Rising Hawk.

OT: It’s a 13th century kind of pre-Ghengis Khan film. Everyone in Ukraine has this book. It’s like the equivalent of Romeo and Juliet. It’s like their, their story, which is called Zakhar Berkut. They basically made it into a movie as a U S Ukraine kinda co-production. I play Bohun. Who’s this kind of Irish killing machine.

DT: I’ve heard people describe that the only difference between a dance number and a fight scene is the number of swords. Did you feel like that a lot of that on the set?

OT: It may shock a lot of people, but I was in ballet, modern and tap for 12 years. Um, and it definitely helps because it is a sequence, you know, it’s all memory. Everything is a dance routine with a sword. I will say I found it extremely difficult, at first. I didn’t grow up, playing with the whole sword thing wasn’t kind of part of my upbringing. I just played football, soccer, that was it. So a lot of the other cast members that had been in previous movies or had some sort of experience. So for me, it was completely new.

DM: So are you going to be trying anything else new?

OT: I’ve started to project produce, which a lot of friends are telling me I was doing anyway.

DT: How so?

OT: I always help friends out. They’d be like, “Oh, can you read the script? We need suggestions,” and I’ll be like, “Oh, I just interviewed this actor or he’s great or she’s great and I’ll put them in touch and it would go that way.” So was kind of similar to what I’m doing now, but we raise some financing and we’re funding a few projects and I’m really enjoying that side of things as well.

DT: And then what’s next in the acting department?

OT: Right now there are a couple of movies that I’m attached to. I’m just waiting for them to be greenlit and then we’ll move forward on them. One called Misdirection. It’s a great script for a thriller. The others, you know, it’s just a bit of a waiting game between projects. I’ve been very lucky to do so much in the last 14 months. So a bit of downtime right now is okay, but I could be on a plane next week. That’s the nature of it.

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Downtown: What excited you about All Rise?

Jessica Camacho: I get to play this incredible human being who is committed to justice in a very clear and true way. I got to really understand and explore what it is to be a public defender. That particular line of work is so heavy and burdened by the knowledge that so many lives are reliant upon the public defender as their last line of defense. The clients often have nothing and are in situations that are so dire. They are trusting in this human being to help them have a shot at the rest of their lives. I get to play somebody who is committed to something so much greater than themselves. I was very honored.

DT: Did you have an interest in the legal system before this role?

JC: Before I became an actor, before I even knew that acting would be a part of my life, I thought about going into law. It’s something that always interested me. It fascinated me: fighting on the right side of things, fighting for something bigger than yourself. I was always moved by that.

The problem was that I could never decide if I wanted to be a prosecutor or a defense attorney. I was not very good at making decisions, so I’m like, I might not be the best lawyer. I see the gray a lot of times. I’m not a person that is more apt to see things in black and white. So it was just like, “I don’t know if this is the right pursuit for me.” And then pretty soon after that, I discovered acting.

DT: Were there any issues in All Rise that were particularly close to you?

JC: I think the thing that’s closest to me in my personal life is Emily’s struggle with relationships. But also I know that the topics that we explore in All Rise–as a human being, as an American–a lot of those really resonate with me, hit home with me. So I often find myself being really, really stirred emotionally by the things that we’re exploring on the show.

DT: Did you read Watchmen or seen the movie before you, uh, audition to be part of Watchman?

JC: I had seen the movie. As I was auditioning, I started to read through the original graphic novel and I was blown away. It was dark and it was stirring and it was uncomfortable. It was talking about real fears and real anxieties, and the paranoia and the darkness within us.

So that’s when I kinda realized like, “Oh, this is special, this is really special. This is like a different kind of look at life through the lens of the comic filter. This is something different.” So, yeah, it was very exciting.

DT: In addition to Watchmen, you were also on The Flash. Why do you think superhero shows are so popular right now?

JC: (Superheroes) speak to the possibility, the potential within us. I think as human beings, we feel limited in our lives. We feel the separation between how we want to see ourselves and how we actually see ourselves. I think the fascination with superheroes, it kind of picks up where our limitations leave us and there’s something beautiful and there’s something freeing about that.

But I think in terms of Watchman, I think this is the perfect time for Watchman because, with the constant stream of news and updates that technology brings us, we’re blown away by how much war, darkness, fighting, racism, and fear there is in the world. I think we want even our fantasies, even our heroes, to reflect what we’re experiencing as human beings.

I think people now want to see real. Yes, (Watchmen is) dealing with fantasy and yes, it’s dealing with heroes. Yes, it’s dealing with masks, but why the masks? What are the masks hiding? What are they disguising? I just think we’re just ready to delve in, even in our fantasy, to the darker nature of what is behind all of this.

When you see Watchman it’s like, Oh shit, this is not shying away from ugliness. This is not shying away from the horrible parts of American history. This is actually digging straight into that. Like, let’s address it so we can stop hating. Let’s address this. Then we can stop pretending that this is not at the core of us right now because we need to heal from it. And wounds need air to heal. I think it’s actually a really positive and beautiful thing that we’re starting to present things that are of the darker nature of us because I think it means that we want to heal.

DM: What’s next?

JC: Right now, we just found out that uh, all rise is getting a full season, so we’ll be shooting until about March. I think we’re just all kind of like, “Cool, all right, let’s buckle down. Let’s make this, let’s combine our efforts and make a really beautiful piece of work.” So that’s what’s on my agenda. I’m excited to see what comes next. I’m bubbling over with passion and energy. I love what I do. I am so, so excited to show up for it, to show up for every project that I get to do, and I’m just excited to see what comes next.