The Alchemist Monologue

It's good that you brought up Zak Santiago 'cause that's another Hallmark tie-in which is great for my readers.

Yeah, it's nice to see that. Zak and I--it's the second project we've done together--but we've known each other since we were about nineteen or twenty.

He's very well-loved on Signed, Sealed, Delivered.

His character is hilarious on that. And he is the busiest guy in the world! Zak is tough to pin down. There were days he couldn't be on Dirk 'cause he was doing another show called Shut Eye.

In addition to Dirk Gently and Hailey Dean, is there anything else upcoming you can mention?

Yes, I am a part of the ensemble for When We Rise which is coming out in January. In terms of the scope of the story, it's amazing and ground-breaking
We needed to concentrate on having a life. The industry and what I'm chasing is amazing, but it's not as important as nurturing a relationship between someone I was friends with for six years before we ever started going out. Then making sure that that was working. And then we got married and had kids, and we have to make sure that that is working. To concentrate on that. And then have the good fortune to make it through. It hasn't always been as easy to get to this point. The industry is feast or famine, and so it becomes a very difficult thing. My wife is not in the industry, so it's coming from a place outside the industry. But my wife is also self-employed. There have been years where we look back and I think, "How did we make it through?" But we did. And for everything ticking like it has now, and my kids--Vienna is ten, Lennox is eight and a half, and Elias is six. For us to have built this and now be able to run with this, I'm so happy that it's worked out. You kinda think sometimes that you only have one shot at it, and my twenty-seven-year-old self would not really believe that he was gonna get another shot because that's just the way the industry works. It doesn't matter how talented I was. It's just the nature of the parts I was getting. And yeah, it took a long time 'cause there's fifteen years in between 2001 and 2016. But it's finally kinda kicked in. Again, it's
That's been the reality. Without the support of this amazing group of people--my agent, my manager, and my family--it would be tough. My wife is absolutely incredible in that she has never complained about the fact that the industry can get in the way of a lot of stuff. It's hard to plan things 'cause of course, I don't always know my schedule. Until you become a little more established, it's hard to tell when you will be or won't be working. And that makes things difficult family-wise. I give props to my wife. She plans our life and makes it happen 'cause a lot of times, I'd be reluctant to plan things. But that's the point of it all--you have to live. No matter what you think is gonna happen, you have to live. You have to keep pushing to have that normalcy or else you're never gonna have it. As far as the industry, there's not a lot of guys that get to say they chased down one dream, and I've also been able to chase another dream at the same time. It's a rarity. I know how lucky I