Guest Post by author Jack Kearney
Today I am pleased to welcome Jack Kearney to the blog to share his inspiration for his debut novel Inside Out.
Inside Out One Actors Nightmarish Journey of
Incarceration
I Guarantee You Have Never Read This Plot Before
For anyone
looking for a thriller that offers Tarantino like twists with multidimensional
characters that you will both love and hate, "Inside Out" is for you.
. There has never been a story line where the protagonist, a non criminal, is
thrown into prison where he already knows some of the inmates.
Inside Out
weaves together an engrossing story of a young actor who, after volunteering
for a unique project to teach drama to inmates of the local mediumsecurity
prison,months later finds himself locked in a cell as a convict. Where he now
has already made friends and unforgiving enemies. It introduces the reader to
multitude of characters. Some are good, some are bad, and a few are just evil.
It is a fictional account of what happens to an “Everyman” that gets caught up
in a system deliberately designed to treat all felons the same.
Utilizing a
groundbreaking format, Follow Danny Belson as he goes from a care free beach
volleyball loving, pool shooting, actor, who's only worry is knowing when his
next audition will come, to a convicted murderer. Written using flashbacks,
with no chapters, learn what a struggling actor goes through, and how, after his
incarceration, Danny's life is turned INSIDE OUT.
The Inspiration
For most of
my life I was a struggling actor. I appeared on such shows as Mash, WKRP in
Cincinnati, and General Hospital. For a short time, I even taught an acting
workshop. I was a graduate of the very prestigious American Academy of Dramatic
Arts where I was part of the first graduating class in Los Angeles. After that
I joined the ranks of the other sixty thousand wouldbe stars that acted in
showcase plays, occasionally went on a professional audition, and attended a
weekly workshop.
The women
that ran my workshop got involved in an interesting experiment directing a
group of prisoners at the Federal Correctional Institution, Lompoc, California,
in a production of Short Eyes. Except for the lead character, all the roles
were played by inmates. Because of its success she was granted a weekend to
conduct an improvisational workshop with the men who had been in the cast, as
long as she was accompanied by a male from the outside. When she proposed the
idea to me, I was excited at the possibility of being part of something that
unique and agreed to be her assistant. As it turned out, nothing of any real
consequence came about, but it was a very interesting weekend that few if any
will ever experience. I met some very fascinating guys, some of whom I got
along with and others that—let’s just say, I was glad that there were guards
stationed just outside of our room.
After I got
back to my regular life, a few years later I had a scare that made me think,
what would happen if someone were to be part of this program and, by a twist of
fate, end up back inside as an inmate? “Inside Out” is that story. My
experience in the late seventies inspired me to write a script in the early
eighties. It was to be my “Rocky.” At the time though,the subject matter was to
controversial, because it is a very realistic depiction of prison life.
However, with the recent popularity of prison based shows, I decided in 2013,
at the age of 62, to write my first novel.
Dreamers rarely rule the world but they can change it.
No comments:
Post a Comment