We were lucky to catch up with Ray Buffer recently and have shared our conversation below.

Ray, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.

I have followed an interesting, somewhat circuitous path getting to where I am today. I began working professionally as a teenager, singing at churches, opera companies and with pops orchestras, while also working as an actor in theatre. This led me to working as an actor in TV and film just as I relocated from Florida, where I was born, to California in 1999. After hitting a wall with performing work around 2006, I began working behind-the-scenes in marketing and development and later as a general manager for a non-profit arts company. I was then inspired to begin my own theater companies, and did so in 2007 and again later in 2015. After wearing multiple hats for a number of years, I yearned to return to pure performance work. I didn’t want to be responsible for all the minutiae of a production, and just wanted to be the guy that shows up and performs. Since 2019, I have been doing just that.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I am a bass-baritone singer with a resonant speaking voice that comes in handy for voice over roles and acting. I am big and tall, at 6’4″. I have a bit of an imposing presence which gets me cast as imposing characters. I have worked on a great many productions, sometimes as a background actor, sometimes as a supporting role and sometimes as a guest star. I would call myself a character actor. There are certain characters and certain types of characters that I play repeatedly. Santa Claus, Western Villains. Thugs. Gangsters. Gods. Monsters and Dads. Recently I had a scandal of my own making interrupt the momentum I was building in my career. I was prosecuted for petty theft in San Diego. The news of the incident was broadcast far and wide, even though I am not a celebrity, it made me infamous for a few news cycles. I accepted responsibility for my actions, and paid restitution; did community services, and I dissected the causes of my misbehavior. I had to come to terms with some weaknesses in my mental health and took steps to rectify them. I also had to accept the irony that after playing villains as an actor – I had become one in some people’s eyes. The damage I did to my reputation still haunts me today. When I lose a job, I don’t know if it is due to a flaw in my talents or due to what people read in my Google results. However, I have made a choice to be resilient and move forward even though the wind is blowing against me. My mistakes have caused me to lose friendships, working relationships, employment opportunities and my agent. I have accepted those losses and choose to create momentum in my career, again.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

Times are hard right now with the strikes. I am in Fi-Core status with SAG/AFTRA and have been for a few years. I still pay dues, and have a membership number, but I traded my ability to vote for my ability to accept non-union work in accordance with the labor laws of California. It is primarily how I have enabled myself to make a living as an actor. If I relied on union work alone, I would not be able to call myself a full time professional actor. I support the strikes, and I hope the unions succeed. However, I don’t think real change will happen until the studios and streaming services run out of material to pacify their audiences with, and begin to lose lots of subscribers and revenue. It’s not just up to Producers to negotiate with the unions. The unions themselves need to change. SAG/AFTRA should be ashamed that 85% of its members do not earn enough to qualify for health insurance. They can blame producers, but the threshold is a union policy. Another part of the problem is that SAG/AFTRA is so desperate to gain contracts for its members, that they enter into ultra low-budget agreements that are many times, far less than the prevailing non-union rates. It’s completely possible for a non-union extra to make more money than a principle SAG/AFTRA actor on the same production. Rights to images and voices are a real concern as AI shows each day what it is capable of and it is evolving exponentially. The Unions need to keep up and the producers need to compromise and come to a fair agreement. Consumerism is the fuel. When enough people begin cancelling their Netflix and Disney Plus subscriptions – that is when the CEO’s will be forced off of the golf course and into the negotiating room. A lot of actors are moving to theatre in the meantime, but those opportunities are limited. I continue to take as many jobs as I can, and try not to say “no” to anything – in hopes that some of those projects will propel me forward. Recently, I began to relax into the work and take the time to look around and truly appreciate how fortunate I am to work in this career.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

There’s nothing quite like being part of a team who all want to create a quality “storytelling” product. There are so many components that all work together to create the things we watch on TV and in theaters. Its always rewarding to hear a chuckle or a gasp in response to something your character does or says on screen. A lot of people are responsible for that guffaw or wince, its not just the actor – but when you get that response you know that you’ve connected, that the illusion has worked and you have gotten your audience invested. I think that in the past I have been a bit robotic and stoic in my relationships with others I work with, for no real reason. I am enjoying the work a lot more, now that I make an effort to connect with team members – even if I only work with them on that day and never again. Life is too short not to enjoy all the benefits of collaboration.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://raybuffer.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/therealraybuffer/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/therealraybuffer
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ray-buffer
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmMQ8uulGFgEP25tUoPg_9Q
• Other: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1338528/