An Actor’s Career Retrospective and Observations

During a virtual press junket for 2024’s summer blockbuster, Borderlands, actor Benjamin Byron Davis spoke with host Tara Jabbari to discuss his role in the film, plus his experience working in over 50 projects ranging from Gilmore Girls to Guardians of the Galaxy. They talked about what makes a successful and worthwhile colleague in the film industry, his friendship with James Gunn, plus his advice for actors who are starting out. Listen to one of the most dynamic and versatile actors as he shares what he has learned over his career. 

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#BorderlandsMovie
#Borderlands

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Transcript

00:10 - VO (Host)
Welcome to Media Maker Spotlight from Women in Film and Video in Washington DC. We bring you conversations with industry professionals for behind-the-screens insight and inspiration. 

00:23 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Welcome to Media Maker Spotlight. I'm your host for this episode, Tara Jabari, and our guest is Benjamin Byron Davis. Thank you so much for coming on. We're here to talk a little bit about Borderlands, but I also wanted to ask you a little bit about your career and all the things like all your background in theater and directing and your friendships and things like that, because I got a little bit of your bio and I did a little bit of research. You've been in a lot of stuff that I really like and I got to geek out a little bit. We'll get to it. 

00:57
The biggest project that's coming up is Borderlands, which is based off of a really popular series of video games. And were you involved with the video games? I couldn't quite figure that out. No, no, no, you have been a voice actor for many other video games in the past. 

01:17 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Well, it's a bit of a fraught term given the nature of the word, voice actors. Now it is a bit of a misnomer, I guess, technically speaking. I was a voice actor on a title called Grand Theft Auto, san Andreas, and the voice actor meaning in a booth at a microphone with pages in front of you, the work that we did on the Red Dead series, did on the Red Dead series Red Dead 1 and Red Dead 2, were often called voice actors, but that work was entirely performance capture. So it's the same work, the same tech. Andy Serkis did the Planet of the Apes films with the same tech that they did Avatar with. 

01:58
So it was for the second Red Dead game. 

02:01
It was five years of getting up and down on fake horses and learning how to spin guns and do lots of stunts and all manner of things, and so voice acting leaves the wrong impression, I think, in the fans' minds of what it was, because really what it was was an ensemble of 15, 20 of the finest actors I've been lucky enough to be associated with, working alongside one another, making what I think is one of the great game series of all time Red Dead. Another great game series of all time is Borderlands, which I believe that, and I spoke to Randy Pitchford when we were doing, when we were shooting Borderlands, and he let me know I think the process on the Borderland games at least maybe not for the new one, but that was a combination of motion capture so they would have actors on the day doing the physical work and then voice acting and that was where actors in a booth would do the dialogue. That would go on top of the motion capture. Got it? It's really wonky but I do think it helps to know. 

03:13 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Yeah, because there are so many different ways of it, with how it's been, with the tech and all the different ways. It's definitely been changed since Mario Brothers. 

03:25
It's absolutely very, very different but with with this one it was like a huge deal because I'm not too familiar with Borderlands the video game, but I know. But I know Cate Blanchett is, I know Eli Roth is, and so this was a huge deal. And then your character is a pretty big deal and I was actually looking at some of the trailers and also a little bit of your social media posts and they're like, but where's your character? Because you are, let me find it. Hold on, I have it. You're playing Marcus Kincaid, a weapons dealer, an entrepreneur, who mostly deals with Cate Blanchett's character, the outlaw Lilith. And there was a couple of comments that are like where's Marcus's centered trailer? Because there was a couple that concentrated on Lilith or you know, jack Black's little robot character or something like Marcus is actually a pretty important character throughout the video games. So can you share a little bit about his character, your character? 

04:30 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Well, marcus Marcus in the game and in the film is a jack of all trades to a point. He runs a munitions company, he's an arms trader, an arms dealer, and he also has a bus that he travels around Pandora on and typically in the games, where he has played and has been played for a great many years by a wonderful actor named Bruce DuBose, whose work was my North Star. In everything, he's always the narrator of the games as well, and he's a bit of an unreliable narrator as we find him in the game, we meet him where we do, in the bus that he's typically associated with alongside Lilith, who he is also quite associated with. Beyond that we'll get. Beyond that, fans will get to see him in environments that they're familiar with him. 

05:31
When I got the audition to play Marcus and that was really my first sort of foray into who this guy was and I saw the character design and then I listened to him and I was like I think I might be able to deliver on this and, yeah, one thing led to another and about three months later I was in Budapest opposite Cate Blanchett in one of the coolest leather jackets I've ever seen. So life is good, yeah. 

05:57 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Was there any reservations? Because it's so. There's a lot of pressure with such a fan base with these video games or something that existed before, whether it's a book series, a video game, or if it was a previous film from a different country and it's being turned into something else. Were you a little hesitant, like any fans of Bruce's work, and you're like taking the role, anything like that? 

06:23 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Oh, I was. Well, I was certainly cognizant of it and I viewed it as a as a responsibility, and I have. I continue to view it as a responsibility in the sense that when I have an opportunity like this one to highlight the work that this is based on, I will. I will, and the the character that Bruce created, uh, is so dynamic and so fun. It was a great challenge, but it was a great honor to get a chance to try and help translate that character into another medium. 

06:55
And one of the things that's great, I think, about these adaptations they can drive audiences to the original material that might not have found it otherwise. I think the Last of Us is an example of that. I think Fallout that just came out is a great example of that. That people saw that show and then they wanted to go spend more time in that world and it brought them back to games that they might not have engaged with. So on that level, I hope that we can be an ambassador to a new generation of fans for the source material. 

07:23
But yeah, it was certainly front of mind, and it wasn't just front of mind for me, it was front of mind for all of the actors, and I'm going to go even further and make clear it was front of mind for Eli, it was front of mind for everybody in the design crew these sets, these vehicles, the weapons, these fans of the game will, when this becomes available for them, to pause and zoom and look, and they are going to find that a maniacal attention to detail and respect for the source material that I think for a general audience is not necessarily something that they are even aware of, but for an audience that's been invested in this property, for a general audience is not necessarily something that they are even aware of, but for an audience that's been invested in this property for a very long time, I am quite hopeful that they will feel seen and honored and I hope very much that they enjoy what we were able to put together. 

08:19 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
That's a good point, because there is now this ability that theoretically they could have the video game in one screen and then they could have it on blu-ray on another I'll get the many ideas you know what I mean. 

08:36
Like there are fans that really get into it and all that stuff, so so they're like, oh, good job, they did do that. And the set designers and the costume designers are like, yeah, we know, because we know you would do that. And so that's great to hear that you guys took it really seriously and you have a good point, because you are ambassadors to a whole new audience, members who would become new fans to the original work. Like me, like I didn't know about the video games and I was like, oh, what's this? And I'm like, huh, uh so. But now I wanted to touch base on some of your other works and of your other experiences I learned that you have a long friendship with the filmmaker james gunn yes, james and I met 25 years ago. 

09:22 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Okay, I'm gonna. I was at the time an actor in a theater company called Zoo District out here in Los Angeles, and another actor in that company was an actor named Jenna Fisher, and Jenna was married to James. And my recollection of meeting James was I was doing a show called the Master Margarita where I was playing the devil, and so I was feeling very powerful and there was there was some party and Jenna's husband was at it and he had just sold the screenplay for Scooby Doo and I thought that was the goofiest thing I'd ever heard in my life and I wanted to meet the guy that had written the movie Scooby-Doo and that was my first meeting with James. So I yeah, I've been very lucky to know James, to work alongside James, and to one side of that is the work that I've got to do alongside him as well. So getting to know him as a friend, as a person, is, you know, I feel, very fortunate. Getting to work with him as a colleague is beyond my wildest dreams. 

10:38 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
I know that you guys worked on and you worked on with him with Gardens of the Galaxy. 

10:43 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Yeah. 

10:44 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
And then you also worked with him on, like the indie project, the Belko, as. 

10:49
I say experiment. So I was like, oh, that is interesting and it's, the Belko experiment was made while he was still making big budget films for Marvel and Disney and stuff, Marvel and Disney and stuff. So I was curious as a person who's working with someone in the industry, like in charge, as a writer and a director and a producer. They have so much responsibility and they are being quote unquote like a big shot having all this money and all this responsibility for Marvel and Disney, guardians of the Galaxy, for instance, and then they're still want to be like no, I want to do this indie thing which is kind of I want to see the movie. I remember I was like, oh yeah, I did want to see this movie. I'm still not seeing it. 

11:35
But the Belko experiment and wants to still. And also, you just know that he has always worked with his brother, for instance. To me it's like the bigger star because, hello, kirk, we're going to get to that, so and stuff like that. But it shows to you know, have you seen that versus somebody else who might have been like you might be like, oh, the ego has hit them and it's not going to be as successful. You should watch yourself. Have you seen that? What makes a person keep level headed? Or do you know what? 

12:12 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
I mean, I know exactly what you mean. You know there's terms like breakthrough or success, or there's all of these sort of notions of arrival right that if I get this accomplished, I will have arrived. And you can start to recognize the people who are like, oh, this person's here because they think that it's like a get rich quick scheme or something which is just a dumb, dumb, dumb idea. Because the reality is is what success means in in this craft is more work, you know, and the and the more success you have, the harder, the more work you have to do, and the more success you have, the harder, the more work you have to do. Now, hopefully you understand that and that's your. You are, pardon the expression, a pig in shit when you are filled with work. James is one such. 

13:10
But James is like everybody else, has dealt with disappointments and setbacks and worse, and he's never been somebody who from the cheap seats, mind you, where I'm sitting that I've seen as somebody who's waited for permission or waited for someone to grant him an opportunity, and when there wasn't work with a studio, he would find work of his own. He would generate work of his own. He would generate work of his own. He would generate scripts of his own. Belko experiment is a fine example. That was a script that he had. I think at that point it was in a drawer and because of the success that Guardians one sort of put him in the catbird seat and all of a sudden everything that he had that was written was something that a studio might want to produce. I think that's what happened with Belko. But the thing with James is there's no arrival. He's still working. I don't think he yet has the appreciation that I expect his oeuvre will have when time has really sort of allowed people to understand really the depths of his accomplishments, which I think are profound. 

14:24 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
It's really the goal is to keep having work and doing it for the art and stuff. You have always been working for a very long time and have over 50 guest spots on television shows, drama, comedy, all sorts of things and all that thing. And so one of the like I was like I'm like, okay, let's like, I'm like, I'm like. 

14:49 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Gilmore Girls yeah, that was a rough day. That was a very hot day on gilmore girls speak everything, then tell me everything. 

14:58 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
What's it? Uh, what, what happened? You were truck driver I was. 

15:02 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
I was a tow truck driver. It was the final season is season seven. So, uh, amy sherman paladino was, was no longer there. It was a different showrunner, a different writer, but the thing was it was season seven. 

15:16 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Yeah. 

15:17 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Right, the scripts for Gilmore Girls. A script for an hour-long television show is supposed to be about 45, 50 pages long. The script for Gilmore Girls I have it somewhere is, I think, 80 pages For 45 minutes of television 80. It's a screenplay is 110, 120. This is for an episode of TV 80 pages. 

15:41
And so the only note that I had on this 95 degree day, on the back lot and it sounds like I'm complaining I am, but understand, within I'm complaining, within the aegis of I'm living my dream, but within living my dream, this awful thing happened, which is I had to work on this. I'm sweating like a stuck pig. I'm wearing this car hard shirt. I was off book. I was pretty sure I was off book, but I was not off book the way you need to be off book to do 80 pages. So so who was the director? She was anyway. She came up to me after the first take and she was like it's, you got to think Noel Coward. And I was like I don't think this is Noel Coward, but okay, and I prided myself in you never have to give me the same note a second time. That was from starting in theater. It was absolutely critical in my mind that if a director gives me a note, they only have to give it to me once, and I managed a good 10, 12 years until Gilmore Girls, when the note was faster, and then I went faster, and then the note was faster, and then faster and faster, and I kept getting the note faster, faster, faster, to the point where it became a vocal exercise. And the thing is is you're working opposite these actors that have been on this show for seven years, so they're all in the gear of and you're just trying not to screw it up, which eventually you did. But so I'm delighted that I get to be a part of Gilmore Girls. 

17:12
I know how beloved Gilmore Girls is. I, oddly, will get people that are like tow truck driver. It's the most, it's the most. The two most unexpected things in my career that people get excited about is tow truck driver in Gilmore Girls, like I'll get letters. People want an autograph for tow truck driver. And then the other one is I did a day's work as an extra on an episode of Drake and Josh which blows people's minds. They're like you were the guy in the line and the thing. And I'm like, yeah, that was me. So you don't ever know, you never know. 

17:51 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Yeah, that was the other. Well, and also the director was Lee Charlotte Shamel. 

17:57 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Lee Charlotte Shamel, who directed a ton of those. She is an absolute pro and her note to me every take was faster. 

18:06 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Yeah, and the episode you're in is the Long Morrow. Oh, that was dramatic. 

18:12 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
The Long Morrow and that's. And sean had to do a stunt that day. Right, he drove a car through uh probably he was kurt yes, but there were other things. 

18:22 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
You were in parks and rec and bones and all sorts of stuff. So, and then, um, you're also in another part of the marvel universe, but as a different character. 

18:35 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Yeah. 

18:35 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Do you have people come up to you and you're like, oh, my God you're from. And you're like you think you know what they're going to say. And you're like, oh, this is going to be a Gilmore Girls fan. And then they're like, hey, man, you know. And you're like, oh, did not see that coming. And then, too, do you have advice for people who want to start working and going on auditions and things like that, what it is like when you are the guest and when you are sort of seemingly like the background or like an extra and things like that? You know you keep getting work, so that kind of advice. 

19:09 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Well, there's a lot there. Yeah, it does happen where people are like I think I know this guy, I don't know where he's from, and then they'll ask what have you been in? 

19:23
Which I always hate when I never want to do that because I feel so bad. Well, what I learned? I learned a pretty good response that I've only used once or twice now, which is to say, well, what have you seen? Oh yeah, and you just list the shows and I'll tell you if I've been on any of them. When I was doing Red Dead 2, I was in the same hotel on Long Island for a very long time and you'd go and you'd be at the hotel bar and it would be a lot of traveling salesmen and so everybody's talking about what they do and you stop At a certain point you just say you're a contractor, because it's not a lie, because once the conversation is you're an actor, then there's their opinion about actors in general comes into play. 

20:00
Their opinion about what you've been a part of comes into play and it's best to leave it to one side to answer the question about being on set and being in a position like you're in on a show like gilmore girls. From a practical point of view, you're at least at that time. You're quite excited. You're in season seven or something, because that means it's already stripped syndication. That means there's going to be a residual backend. There's nuts and bolts, things about surviving in the industry that come into play with that, but ultimately a lot of actors, I think, put themselves through a great deal of unnecessary agita because of this whole notion of rejection. That is part of the perception of what a career in acting is, and I reject the notion entirely. You will have parts that you want that you don't get. You will have parts that you don't want that you do get. But the notion that you are rejected when you do not book is a pervasive one and it's a mistake to think that way. But you're excused for thinking that way because there's all manner of agents and managers and casting directors that will go to actors and they'll say you didn't get the part because of X, y or Z. 

21:22
At the beginning of my career there was a lot of talk. You didn't get the part because they went younger or they went older. Lately there's talk you didn't get the part because they wanted to go in a different way. Some people will offensively say they wanted to make an ethnic choice as opposed to this, that or the other. None of those reasons are the reasons why a person doesn't get apart. The reason a person doesn't get apart is simple. They are not the one that can help with the thing. That's it. Why did you get hired? You got hired because you can help with the thing. Why did you not get hired Because you can't help with the thing? And sometimes the guy that can help with the thing is me and I get the part. Does that mean I'm better than the people that didn't get the part? No, it means I could help and they couldn't, and that's the same with every job. 

22:11
So my advice to younger actors, or to actors starting out, is to understand that, to pull your ego to the best of your ability out of the casting process, because it doesn't matter. And so people will get to the end of the day and they'll say I said the wrong word or I didn't shake their hand well, or I didn't. They'll look for. This is the reason why and that's what yields they went older or they went you know, god forbid a different way. That's why I didn't get the part. No, that's not why you didn't get the part. You got the audition, you got the callback. That means they're willing to hire you already. So you didn't get the part because they hired somebody that looks just like you for a different part. I mean, you'll never know the why. So why concern yourself with the why? 

23:01
The most important part of vital life in the arts, in my opinion, is to avoid bitterness. It's to avoid being discouraged, because you can't make good art from a place of bitterness and you won't make it if you're discouraged. And so if you frame every opportunity that doesn't cut in your direction as a failure or as a rejection, well, you're inviting that bitterness into your worldview. You're inviting that discouragement, and needlessly, because it's not based on anything real. The other thing I think answering your question is advice that I give any actor, which is when you are on a set, find somebody with more experience than you and watch them. 

23:53
Watch them. You don't have to talk to them, you don't have to engage with them, you don't even have to know them. You don't have to talk to them, you don't have to engage with them, you don't even have to know them, you don't have to tell them. That's what you're doing. Watch them. Watch how they conduct themselves. Notice how they treat people. Notice how they treat people that are working as extras. Notice how they treat people that are working as co-stars. Notice how they treat the people in the sound department, the people in craft services, recognize that. Learn all that you can. 

24:19
I mean, I think ultimately, that making a movie, making a TV show, making an indie is. It's an ecosystem and you're a piece of it. The actors that work the most are the actors that make that ecosystem better, and the actors that work the least, I think, are the ones who are assholes and behave like assholes. So don't do that and I think if you find an actor you admire on set, you're going to find that most. In my experience, the sort of higher up you go on the food chain, the better behaved everybody is. There is just sort of this threshold of people that are sort of backbiting and nasty and zero sum gain kind of. But that's just an element of the ecosystem. Most of the people that I've been lucky enough to work alongside do it because they love telling stories and if that's what you're doing it for, it's a great job. I wouldn't trade the road I've walked with anybody. 

25:29 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Oh, that's a lovely way of putting it, thank you. I haven't heard that. Refusing the notion of rejection, that's a really great way of putting it Honestly. You can use it for a lot of other professions as well. Also, just watching someone with more experience and observing them, that's a really great one. Also makes you feel like a spy. I like it. 

25:52 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Well, my grandfather, malcolm, would say that which you admire, you cannot help but emulate, which is a double-edged sword, right? So you have to be very cautious with what you admire, because you will emulate it. But I think if you can find a pro on a set and see how they conduct themselves, that's a great way in, because they have a breadth of experience you don't have. Yeah, that's a great way in because they have. 

26:19 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
They have a breadth of experience you don't have. Yes, at NYU and. University of Chicago and then you now live in Los Angeles and you are and you predominantly work in Los Angeles and you also have a huge theater background and you work also as a director Seems more in theater than on screen and in theater in these different places in the East Coast, midwest West Coast and all that stuff. 

27:05 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Yes, there are a broad degree of differences. I think among the things that you can add to that kind of geographical resume is also just time I got my degree at NYU, I think in 95. I've been in the union since 1999. So we can talk about what it was like working in various locations, but we can also sort of talk about what it was like working in various eras. 

27:35
The on-camera industry in the age of streaming has changed dramatically. From the industry that I entered into all those years ago, the aim was to get five years on a series. You wanted a series regular, you wanted five years on a series and that meant that you would have 22 episodes a year for five years. If we get stripped of syndication, none of that exists anymore. It's just gone, it's just disappeared. Um, but so that's a function of time, not geography. Like, I've been based in LA since the turn of the century and I've worked a great deal in Los Angeles. But some of the largest gigs that I've I've done I've booked in Los Angeles. But some of the largest gigs that I've done I've booked in Los Angeles but you go work someplace else. Borderlands I booked in LA but worked in Budapest. Belco Experiment, booked in LA, shot it in Bogota, colombia. The Marvel Projects booked in LA, shoot in Atlanta. Geography, I think, is becoming less and less essential, and I don't know what that's going to mean, because as geography becomes less essential, what does that do to community? And is that community an essential element of the way these projects are made? We don't know the answer to these questions, but this is the environment of the profession as we find it. 

28:56
When I made the decision to move from New York to LA, I had gotten out of NYU and I was doing a lot of work in off-off-Broadway, a lot of work in theater, some off-Broadway. The last show I did was with a company I don't know that it still exists called New York Theater Exchange. We worked at the Classic Stage Company in 13th Street Theater, a wonderful play called Bloody Poetry, and we had just we loaded in on the back of a show called Sideman that Edie Falco was in prior to the Sopranos and there's a lot of heavy hitters in that show, and that show moved from Off-Broadway to Broadway and when it did, the actor that was playing the young lead was replaced by an actor from Hollywood in that role and that had started happening more and more, and so at the moment that I moved out here, it seemed very clearly that if you wanted to get on Broadway, you weren't going to get on Broadway. Going from off-Broadway to Broadway at least to me at that moment in time that's what it looked like and I wanted to get paid and I wanted to get health insurance and I didn't see that happening in New York and I moved out to LA and heard they needed another actor here and I came and and who knows? You know you make these choices. 

30:20
Maybe if I stayed in New York things would have gone a different way, maybe not, you know, ironically, one of the largest opportunities in my career was this Red Dead Redemption video game series. I booked it. The first one I booked in LA, the second one shot in New York and I don't know that I ever would have booked it if I'd stayed in New York. So you don't. You can only make sense of these things in backwards, in terms of the differences between acting on film, acting on camera for television, acting in performance capture, acting on stage. There's differences to all of them, but the root of all of it is honesty, and if you can find something honest in your work. It'll play on stage, it'll play on camera, it'll play in performance capture. Just getting out of the way and just being present and honest, which is not easy. 

31:29 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
And you have a good point. Things have changed and with all the different ways of streaming and geography is different, all the different ways of streaming and geography is different. And also we learned through COVID things are being changed like people were filming virtually also. 

31:45 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Yeah. 

31:49 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
Is there anything else that you wanted to share or touch on that we haven't really discussed. 

31:52 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Yeah, I do think things are changing, but I will say, at least in my experience, much of the change that's happening is still centered around acting. It's still set. Performance capture is still centered around the actor. With all of this remoteness and the fact that we can shoot things independent of each other, is that sense of community that we talked about earlier. Acting is not something that you can do by yourself. Acting is something that happens in between two performers. It's not something that one performer does. It's my connection to you right here, even this virtual connection. What's happening between us is what acting is. It's not anything that I'm doing, it's not anything that you're doing. It's the fact that we're connecting To me. That's where it is. So my hope is, as technology changes, as geography becomes less determinative, that we do not, in all of that, lose sight of the fact that the human connection is the most essential element, in my mind, to telling stories honestly. 

33:08 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
I was reading some other articles and stuff and they were saying one of your first scenes in Borderlands is with with kate blanchett. And she was saying I was so happy to have finally another person to to do a scene with because apparently she was doing it with like a robot or like she had a trash can for about a week yeah, which I mean I was like. 

33:31
I mean I don't know, I saw like she was with kevin hart the whole time in the trailer. I don't know, but it showed like yeah, it's annoying, I'm sure, or even I think it was like Lord of the Rings Some of the actors, they really bonded. But there was one or two actors who had to film by themselves in a green screen because they were either really tall or really small, or something like that. And then they're like I didn't get to bond with everyone else because I was sort of like kept by myself and you can't tell as a viewer. They did such a great job. But for the actors they were like I was, you know, they didn't get to get the tattoo and or something like that. You and kate was like oh, thank god there's somebody else here and I can actually work off of yeah, well, that was listen. 

34:23 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
Uh, making, uh doing anything to make kate stay better is high on my list of things I'd like to do. 

34:31
Uh, I'm an enormous good well, I'm enormous fan of hers, and you want to talk about serving a craft. She is an example I think any actor should hope to emulate, both in her conduct on set and her work on camera. She has got one of the greatest careers in the history of cinema and I think she has just shown us the tip of the iceberg. I am amazed by her. And so to go from lockdown to working with her yeah, I recommend it. I definitely recommend it. But I was smitten with her the day I met her. I'll be smitten with her until the day I die. I stan it, but I was smitten with her the day I met her. I'll be smitten with her until the day I die. I stand Kate. 

35:22 - Tara Jabbari (Host)
That's lovely to hear. Well, thank you so much, Ben, for your time. It was such a great pleasure to talk to you. I really appreciate your time. 

35:33 - Benjamin Byron Davis (Guest)
I'm delighted to be here. Thank you so much for having me. 

35:37 - VO (Host)
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