We were lucky to catch up with RJ Pratt recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, RJ thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

I came by my skills and passion primarily through my family. I learned to act from my grandfather and my wonderful mentors, from elementary school all the way through my college career. I learned to write from my mother and father. I learned to direct from YouTube, books, and experience!
Learning different skills from non-traditional sources relates to the second question – I think If I could give my younger self any advice to hasten my growth as an artist, it would be to not be so rigid. I had this idea that I wanted to be an actor and only an actor; I would leave the directing, writing, and all other parts of the job to others. This idea set me back once I got to Los Angeles. I realized that in order to be the best actor I could be, I had to have the creative freedom to familiarize myself with all aspects of production – not just acting.
As for essential skills, I think the skills of connection and self-motivation are key. Connection is invaluable when it comes to getting any project you love off the ground. Finding like-minded, passionate artists and people skilled in their crafts aids not only in the realization of the project, but also refines it and makes it grow and take shape in ways you could not have imagined on your own. On the other side of that coin, self-motivation and ambition is a necessary piece of the puzzle. If you have an idea, the only person really stopping it from becoming reality is yourself. Get the permits, get creative, find a way around or through the roadblocks, and don’t stop pushing it until you can look at the project with pride and satisfaction.
There are always obstacles. Budget is always like a dark, looming cloud over anyone starting their pursuit of any art. Having the education and the skills to do everything you need, if you don’t feel like you have them, can seem insurmountable. Finding ways to get around these things is certainly a challenge, but not impossible. I recommend the power of the internet and thrift stores, for starters!

RJ, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

For all of my technical knowledge in acting, I have my family and my wonderful mentors to thank. When I was very young, my parents and my grandfather (a teacher and devotee to the arts himself) laid a well-lit path to the playground of the theater. I attended camps and took part in school productions as far back as I can remember, and I always found acting and participating in productions to be the most fulfilling of endeavors.
However, when I got to Los Angeles looking to start a career in entertainment, I learned firsthand a lesson I had heard, but was somewhat dismissive of: being a well-trained actor isn’t always enough. You can recite Stanislavski and meditate on Strasberg, but the industry today is full of extraordinarily talented and disciplined actors. On the one hand, this is wonderful. There is no shortage of people to share knowledge and exchange creativity with. On the other hand, there is also no shortage of competition. With the advent of self-tape auditions, this is more true than ever. After nearly a year of toiling away, I realized my friends and I were sending in endless auditions, seeking jobs through connections and classes, and making inches of progress if any at all.
So I took myself in a different direction. The actors strike was in full swing, and there was less work than ever. I decided that if I could not find work for myself and my friends while the industry was failing us, I would build something for my friends to work on with me. I drafted a film, and discovered the greatest skill I believe you can have in the arts; building connections. I brought my film to my friends, acquaintances, even people I had never met. They were all enthusiastic about working on this project, even though it was solidly in the “low-budget” category.
As I continued with the project, I realized there were things I could not find people to take the lead on. The second skill I’ve mentioned, self-motivation, comes into play in moments like these. Rather than allow production to grind to a halt, I did research on the things that needed to be done. I learned from online sources, books lent to me by friends, and trial and error. Slowly but surely, I picked up the basics of skills and jobs I never thought I would have or do. If nobody else is able to do it for you, you can do it. In fact, you should do it – the next time it comes up, it won’t seem like so much of an issue.
Now, I am pursuing a few lines of work! I’m putting the finishing touches on that project (Freeman’s Pass, find us @freemanspassfilm on Instagram) and expect it to be released to film festivals in the early fall. I am also launching a demo reel filming business with the skills I’ve learned and continue to polish, so if you are a performer in need of a reel, contact me through my website (www.rjpratt.net) and I will help you stand out from the crowd! And of course, at my roots I will always be an actor, so I am always auditioning and seeking work participating in projects as an actor. If you want to get familiar with my work, my website (mentioned above) or my resume on actors access (https://resumes.actorsaccess.com/RJPratt) are great places to start and to learn more about me!

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

In November of 2023, I received the results of an MRI which determined I had a cancerous growth in the left frontal lobe of my brain. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the first time I had received this diagnosis. In 2018, right before I started college, I had a craniotomy to remove part of that left frontal lobe which had that same growth. Now, I was being ushered rapidly toward another craniotomy to remove even more of my brain – and hopefully to permanently rid myself of the cancer.
I had another pressing matter going on simultaneously: Freeman’s Pass was shooting that same month, and I was slotted for surgery in mid December. Recovery from this surgery could be unpredictable, and the surgeons let me know there was a slight, but not non-existent, chance that my speech capabilities could be impacted by this surgery.
Needless to say, I was feeling the pressure. If recovery from the surgery went poorly, production on Freeman’s Pass, my first real project as an artist, could grind to a halt for an unknown amount of time. On the slim chance that my speech was impacted, I may never be able to create as an actor in the same way again. I let my closest friends working on the project know, and they said that if need be, they would carry the torch and finish the film. I was endlessly grateful to them, but the fire was still lit under me. I pushed preparations, pulled connections and favors, and had more than one late, late night with the production team. Filming days came, and we filmed for three days straight in the deserts of Arizona. I got a maximum of two hours of sleep a night for those three days, and pushed the filming of our other shoot days up. Through some miracle and the work of my amazing friends and team, we completed our shoot. I handed off the next steps and all the files to my companions, and went in for surgery.
Now, I am fully recovered and can speak just as well as before (to the chagrin of some of my friends, I’m sure). As soon as I set foot back in Los Angeles, and even before, I was back onto the production of Freeman’s Pass, and dreaming of the future that I can have if I keep that fire under me. Given my family medical history and my own history with cancer, I may well have a recurrence at some point in my future. Until then, I will not give up on pursuing my art, and everything that makes me happy. Why should we spend our time doing anything that doesn’t strike us as worth doing?

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

I think the value of being an artist, for me, comes in the impact of the art I make. Being a storyteller, every story you share with an audience has a lesson, warning, or message. The strength of art is that the message isn’t hammered in through reading it in a textbook, or writing it on a chalkboard one hundred times; the strength is that it is a lesson taught through emotion. In our hardest moments, we don’t always think of what we learned in our education or our training at whatever it is we may do. Though these learned skills may help us in difficult situations as well, the messages we learn from the people we know and the stories that strike a chord in our hearts are what inform us of how and why we should behave. Seeing people react emotionally to something I have helped create as an actor, writer, or director, fills me with great satisfaction. I can only hope that I can create stories that people hold in their hearts and take good messages from.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.rjpratt.net
• Instagram: @rjpratt37
• Other: @freemanspassfilm (Instagram)
  https://resumes.actorsaccess.com/RJPratt (Actor’s Access)

Image Credits

Ryan Cuan

Katie Fox