Erin Gray and Tim O’Connor, who starred together in the television series “Buck Rogers in the 25th Century” and each have a long list of TV and movie credits, will be in Mount Shasta to participate in a film making seminar Oct. 12 as part of this year’s Mount Shasta International Film Festival.
Jerry Alden Deal, the writer, director and producer of “Dreams Awake,” which was filmed in the Mount Shasta area, will lead the seminar from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on the final day of the 2008 Film Festival at College of the Siskiyous in Weed.
Gray stars in Dreams Awake as Hope Emrys, and O’Connor came out of retirement to play the role of Ambrose. They will be joined at the seminar by Deal’s wife, executive producer Berry Deal, film editor Bob Gordon, and production designer Renee Prince.
Like Gray and O’Connor, Gordon and Prince are film veterans with many credits to their names.
The seminar will feature a behind the scenes look at Dreams Awake, described as “an intriguing, controversial film about a modern, disconnected family and their search for a greater reality.”
Several clips from “Dreams Awake” will be shown, along with a trailer and behind the scenes footage. A panel discussion featuring Gray, O’Connor, Gordon, and Prince will be included, along with a question and answer session.
The feature length directorial debut for Jerry Alden Deal, Dreams Awake is currently in post-production with an anticipated premiere early next year in Mt. Shasta.
Erin Gray
Erin Gray has some 70 acting credits to her name dating back to 1976. She starred as Col. Wilma Deering in Buck Rogers (1979-81) and was Kate Summers Stratton in the television sitcom Silver Spoons (1982-87).
Before acting she was one of Hollywood’s most sought-after models, and she has long pursued interests in spirituality, health and humanitarianism. In recent years she has played roles in more than a dozen independent feature films that starred actors such as Burt Reynolds, Robert Urich, Stacey Keach, Jesse Metcaffe, and William Atherton.
As a model Gray appeared in television commercials for Breck, Max Factor, Clairol, Camay Soap, RC Cola, and English Leather cologne (“My men wear English Leather – or they wear nothing at all!”). She was one of the original Sports Illustrated models, the original “I’m Worth It” woman for L’Oreal, and the Bloomingdale’s spokeswoman for 10 years.
In 2002 she was honored with the Entertainer Award at San Diego Film Festival.
Gray teaches Tai Chi and Tai Chi Knife and wrote columns for the online magazine VIVmag, in which she shared anecdotal stories about Taoist philosophy and taught Chi Kung exercises.
She and her husband, director of photography Richard Hissong, are producing a series of videos on Chi Kung and Tai Chi, while Gray and friend Mara Purl co-wrote a an award-winning professional guide for actors.
Gray established “Heroes for Hire,” a company which books celebrities for personal appearances and speaking engagements, and she and her husband created a production company, Wu Wei Entertainment.
She is spokesperson for the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence and a board member for Haven House, the oldest battered women’s shelter in the U.S. She co-produced and wrote PSAs with Women In Film and has been speaking out against domestic violence for more than a decade.
She also hosts such programs as Lifetime Cable’s “Drug & Alcohol Intervention Program,” gives motivational speeches, and is the recipient of nine community service awards, including The Guardian Angel Award from the Mothers Against Sexual Abuse, The YWCA’s Women of Achievement Award of Distinction, and the 2002 Woman of the Year Award by the Commission For Women.
Tim O’Connor
Tim O’Connor is best known to television viewers as Elliott Carson in the long-running TV series Peyton Place in the 1960s.
He began his acting career just after World War II and went on to garner more than 100 TV credits, mostly as a character actor in series and made-for-TV movies. He appeared frequently on The United States Steel Hour and the “Family Classics” series, in which he starred in such productions as The Three Musketeers and A Tale of Two Cities.
Some of his best-known roles include: Dr. Elias Huer in Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, Jack Boland in General Hospital, and Elliot Carson in Peyton Place. He had recurring roles on Barnaby Jones, Dynasty, Cannon, The Defenders, and The FBI, and portrayed an alien ambassador on an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation.
He is currently a director for The Foothill Theater Company in Nevada City, California where he lives with his wife.
Bob Gordon
Film editor Bob Gordon has worked on more than 30 films during a career that spans more than 30 years.
In 1991 he began working as a consultant, and eventually was editor on Disney’s “Toy Story,” the first all-digital full length animated film, made by the animation studio Hi Tech Tunes, which later became Pixar.
Before working in Hollywood, Gordon got his start as a producer and director of public information films in Vietnam.
Then, while working as a production assistant at Disney, he said that he “got the feeling I was going to like the cutting room.”
His film editing career began with some low budget features before his first studio film, 1980’s Blue Lagoon, which was filmed on a small island in Fiji and starred a young Brooke Shields.
Gordon also edited 1985’s “Return of the Living Dead,” a cult film that was one of the first movies in the horror/comedy genre.
He spent this past summer putting together “Dreams Awake” in a small building on Jerry Alden Deal’s Mt. Shasta area property.
Renee Prince
Production designer Renee Prince’s sculpting and scenic art is part of some 30-plus feature films, including “The Abyss,” “Rose Red,” and “Army of Darkness,” as well as a stint on the TV series, “The Wonder Years.”
Her interest in physics, psychology and consciousness led her to work on such films as “What the Bleep Do We Know?,” “Indigo,” “Into Me See” and “Conversations with God.”
Her film skills include scenic art, sculpture, foam and RTV casting and mold-making, miniatures and model-making, plastering, set decorating, and art directing.
Prince was one of only a few women dolphin trainers in the country when she started college and worked in a lab doing early cognitive studies of dolphins.
Her undergraduate study at UC San Diego and her graduate work at San Diego State included experimental and cognitive psychology, human information processing, and special graduate work on concepts in consciousness.
She earned her Masters degree in experimental psychology and coauthored with orca researcher Alex Morton a chapter in the book, “Behavioral Biology of Killer Whales.” She also coauthored several research papers on human learning and memory and has been featured in articles about dolphin research in such magazines as International Wildlife and in Morton’s most recent book, “Listening to Whales: What the Orcas Have Taught Us.”
