Amir Abdullah is one of these special actors that is truly gifted. His instincts are spot on, the depth of his characters layered, his on camera presence undeniable, yet  he is the only actor in ELEVATE that I had no prior knowledge of before casting him. In fact, our co-producer Charlotte Marie and I were casting a different project at the time, a short script I wrote entitled ON THIS DAY.  Amir came in to read the role of Douglas, Harriet’s son, and he booked it. His audition was excellent.

Weeks later that project fell through but I could not forget him. The story line in ELEVATE that his character is in was not included in my original screenplay,  The Untimely Concurrence.  I added him later. Initially it was just the father, played by Ben Jurand and the Daryl character played by Kit Williamson. I wanted so badly to include Amir in my next project, I thought: why not add the son? Let’s see the son that the father speaks of. That is one of the main reasons Amir’s character doesn’t have much dialogue, and for some reason, it worked.  He made it work.

SMART ACTORS

Some of the best performances that Amir has in Elevate are scenes that I didn’t even write. Without giving anything away, there is a powerful scene in a hotel room that was supposed to be MOS.  Amir Abdullah was completely in the moment that we kept the camera rolling. The volume is a little dodgy because capturing room tone was our only sound objective, and at one point Amir looked right into the camera, I think he was looking to see if I was going to yell “cut” but I didn’t because I was in awe of what he was doing. At the end of the day  we used that scene even though there are a few “technical” errors.

Amir improvised his performance but since we had the location for a limited amount of time there was only one take of that scene. I made the decision to use it and I am so glad we did. It may be a bit off technically, but the acting is brilliant and what he did added to and supported his character’s journey and helped the overall plot of the story.

There is another scene in the bar at the opening of the film that he improvised as well. I didn’t give him that specific dialogue but what he did made so much sense that I could’t not use it. You see, what I didn’t know then is that Amir is a writer as well. I am not suggesting that actors get on set and start making shit up, but a smart and talented actor like Amir Abdullah can get away with it.

Everything he added supported the plot points and was simply smart and great writing. Amir is such a gift to this project and I am so glad that other project fell through!

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