TOP 20 IN N.S.

D’aw shucks, The Chronicle Herald has named me one of Nova Scotia’s “Top 20 Twenty-Somethings” in their annual round-up of young folks in N.S. who are kicking some butt.

I’m actually really honoured by the selection and happy to have had a chance to tell the Halifax film community how awesome I think they are via newspaper article…

TAPPING INTO FILMDOM’S WILD WEST

by Elissa Bernard

Filmmaker and actor Glen Matthews, 26, moved back home from Toronto to be part of “the real emergence of quality films that are coming out of here.”

“I was missing all these great roles!”

The Halifax-based, Lunenburg actor starred in Josh MacDonald’s The Corridor, a hit on thehorror/fantasy film festival circuit, and in all three of Jason Eisener’s films, the cult favourite Hobo with a Shotgun, the earlier Treevenge and Eisener’s first film Streets of Domination, which has never been released.

Matthews is editing it. “I think Streets of Domination is the most [ambitious] no-budget film made.”

Matthews shot videos with his friends when he was a kid dreaming of being a pro wrestler. “I moved to Halifax at 19 to pursue a career in graphic design and started taking classes at Neptune, and I met Jason Eisener and he put me in a film, so acting just happened to me.”

Down on his luck in Toronto, Matthews wrote a short film, Room Service, which he shot in Halifax in 2012 with actors Vanessa Walton-Bone, Molly Dunsworth, Samantha Wilson and Mauralea Austin.

“It was an amazing experience. I cast people I respect and know. I plan on having two more shorts in the can by next fall and the dream of dreams is to do a feature eventually.”

Room Service, the tale of a middle-aged woman confronting her husband’s mistress with unexpected consequences, premiered at the CBC Atlantic Shorts Gala at the Atlantic Film Festival in September, and won best short film at the Parrsboro Film Festival.

“The next couple of short films I’m playing with are absurdist, a little bit. Holy Motors, that was probably my favourite film this year. I’m hoping there’s a resurgence of really fun but arty films.

“I follow the Walter Gretzky quote, ‘Don’t go where the puck is, go where it’s going to go.’”

Matthews will be on stage next spring in Poem for the Smallest Boy, written by his girlfriend, Halifax actor-writer Kristin Slaney.

“I love Halifax because I’m in control of my own career. Here, it feels like the Wild West. I can talk to filmmakers. There’s more of an open dialogue between everyone.”

(ebarnard@herald.ca)

Direct-link: http://thechronicleherald.ca/novascotia/317513-tapping-into-filmdom-s-wild-west

*Photo by Ted Pritchard.

Source: http://glenjm.wordpress.com/2012/12/29/top-20-in-n-s/