Gregor Collins
 |
Gregor Collins | |
|---|---|
| Born | Gregor Schenk Collins Mountain View, California, US |
| Occupation | Actor, Writer, Producer |
| Nationality | Italian, Irish, German, Czechoslovakian |
| Alma mater | Florida State University (BA) |
| Years active | 2000–present |
Gregor Collins (born August 22, 1976) is an American actor, author, scriptwriter and producer best known for playing Matt in the independent film Goodbye Promise, and for writing the book The Accidental Caregiver: How I Met, Loved and Lost Legendary Holocaust Refugee Maria Altmann.[1][2][3][4]
Early life
Gregor was born in Mountain View, California and moved to the East Coast of the United States when he was three. He spent his childhood and adolescent years in the Washington, D.C. area and attended Centreville High School in Northern Virginia, where he was the top-seeded player on his school golf team. Collins subsequently received a golf grant to Ohio Wesleyan University,[5] played for a semester, then transferred to Miami University for two more semesters before taking a year off to work as a production assistant for the television series World Business Review with Caspar Weinberger. He completed his undergraduate studies at Florida State University, where he majored in Media Production.
Career
Collins moved to Los Angeles in 2000 to pursue a career in entertainment.[6] He worked his way into producing various reality television shows such as Blind Date, The Mole season 4, and E!.[3] In 2004 he left reality to pursue acting, eventually performing on stage, in television and in independent films, landing lead roles in the indie films Night Before the Wedding[7][8] and Goodbye Promise,[9][10] the latter a micro-budgeted, 100% improvised feature about a failed actor's introspective last days in Hollywood that the Los Angeles Times called "A visually alert, enormously well-observed film that deftly captures Hollywood heartbreak."[11]
Books
The Accidental Caregiver
In late 2007 a friend of Collins', Tom, answered an ad on Craigslist for a caregiver to a 92-year-old lady from Austria who lived in Cheviot Hills, Los Angeles. Tom mentioned to Collins he had taken the job, moved into her bungalow on Danalda Drive, and on several occasions suggested he come by the house to meet her. Collins never took him up on it. A few weeks later, in January 2008, an additional caregiver quit, leaving Tom as the lady's sole caregiver. The family asked Tom if he knew anyone who could fill the vacant position, and Tom thought of Collins, who at first resisted, and subsequently accepted the job. The lady, it would turn out, was Holocaust refugee Maria Altmann.
Four years later – a year and a half after Altmann's death – Collins published a book to commemorate the unlikely 37 months he and Altmann spent together, called The Accidental Caregiver: How I Met, Loved and Lost Legendary Holocaust Refugee Maria Altmann, meticulously detailing their chance meeting and unusual bond culminating in Altmann's death in early 2011.[12] The self-published book has been in the top ten categories on Amazon for European Art History, Art History, and History and Criticism, and has ranked as high as 37 in Amazon's Top 100 Memoirs.[13][14][15][16][17][18]
Aside from their day-to-day relationship chronicled in folksy, journal-entry-style chapters, the book depicts Maria's childhood growing up in pre-Hitler Vienna as a member of the influential Bloch-Bauer family, the family's relationship with the painter Gustav Klimt – who was regularly commissioned by Maria's wealthy Uncle Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer to paint portraits of his wife Adele Bloch-Bauer, a prominent Jewish patron of the arts – Altmann's several anecdotes about her meetings, connections and relationships with eclectic notables such as Joan Sutherland, Walter Slezak, Hedy Lamarr, Placido Domingo, Danny Thomas, Gary Cooper, Ezio Pinza, Paul Henreid and others, and Altmann and her husband Fritz's harrowing escape from Austria, their subsequent fleeing through Holland, England and Massachusetts, and their eventual nesting in Los Angeles.[19][20]
Altmann is portrayed by Helen Mirren in the BBC Films production The Woman in Gold. The film chronicles Maria's nearly decade-long fight to recover Klimt paintings looted by the Nazis during World War II.
The Accidental Caregiver stage production will debut at the Robert Moss Theater in New York City on January 26, 2015.[21]
Other Projects
Collins created a social media class called How To Win Friends and Influence People on Social Media on the global teaching platform Udemy,[22] has contributed to Film Courage,[23] Filmmaking Stuff[24] and Cinema Editor Magazine,[25] and worked on the second season of the hit TLC show Welcome to Myrtle Manor'.[26]
Filmography
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2004 | Passions | Bartender | TV-series |
| 2005 | Creepies 2 | Jeff Quest | Film |
| 2005 | Manhater | Jackson Botero | Film |
| 2005 | The Witch's Sabbath | Derek | Film |
| 2006 | The World's Astonishing News | Prison Guard | TV-series |
| 2006 | Blood Legend | Clark | Film |
| 2007 | Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide | Bouncer | TV-Series |
| 2007 | Ocean's Thirteen | Stickman | Film |
| 2007 | Loveless in Los Angeles | Peter | Film |
| 2009 | Night Before the Wedding | Bronco | Film |
| 2009 | Chloe and Keith's Wedding | Zach | Film |
| 2011 | Urban Jungle Dating Dilemmas | Matt | TV-Series |
| 2012 | Goodbye Promise | Matt | Film |
References
- ^ http://articles.latimes.com/2012/jun/01/entertainment/la-et-goodbye-promise-capsule-20120601
- ^ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=el7BCaVAup8
- ^ a b "Gregor Collins". IMDb.com. Retrieved September 20, 2013.
- ^ http://venusnytheaterfestival.com/the-accidental-caregiver/
- ^ "Gregor Collins | Actor | Producer |". Rexsikes.com. December 1, 2009. Retrieved September 20, 2013.
- ^ http://edenbaylee.wordpress.com/2013/09/27/get-inside-the-mind-of-author-gregorcollins/
- ^ "'Night Before the Wedding' to 'Goodbye Promise'". Filmfestivals.com. Retrieved September 20, 2013.
- ^ http://blip.tv/talkingabout/talking-about-gregor-collins-4247735
- ^ http://www.filmthreat.com/reviews/53857/
- ^ "One on One With Gregor Collins at the Red Carpet Premier of "Goodbye Promise"". YouTube. June 10, 2012. Retrieved September 20, 2013.
- ^ http://articles.latimes.com/2012/jun/01/entertainment/la-et-goodbye-promise-capsule-20120601
- ^ http://edenbaylee.wordpress.com/2013/09/27/get-inside-the-mind-of-author-gregorcollins/
- ^ http://azsal.com/book-review/the-accidental-best-seller-the-accidental-caregiver/
- ^ Weiss, Holly (September 2, 2012). "Book Review: The Accidental Caregiver by Gregor Collins". seattlepi.com. Retrieved September 20, 2013.
- ^ "Interview With Actor & Author Gregor Collins". Entertainment Vine. Retrieved September 20, 2013.
- ^ http://www.amazon.com/The-Accidental-Caregiver-Legendary-Holocaust-ebook/dp/B0092GS96K
- ^ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JSCXfw7l9yQ
- ^ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=el7BCaVAup8
- ^ http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/bloch-bauer-adele
- ^ http://www.amazon.com/The-Accidental-Caregiver-Legendary-Holocaust-ebook/dp/B0092GS96K
- ^ http://venusnytheaterfestival.com/the-accidental-caregiver/
- ^ https://www.udemy.com/how-to-win-friends-and-influence-people-on-social-media/
- ^ http://filmcourage.com/blogs/gregor
- ^ http://www.filmmakingstuff.com/
- ^ http://www.cinemaeditormagazine.com/
- ^ http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1859942/?ref_=nmmd_ql