Lance Guest
- Actor
- Soundtrack
Lance Guest's family lived on an 11 acre prune ranch in the then-rural
Saratoga, Ca for most of the 1950's. More than 10 years younger than
his boomer siblings, Lance was born in 1960, when his father, a Navy
fighter pilot, moved the family to a larger house with running water.
At a young age, he was memorizing the comedy records of Bill Cosby,
Stan Freberg, Allan Sherman, and Mel Brooks, as well as all the early
60's Bob Dylan records. He learned to play guitar at age 10, and was
performing plays in junior high school. At 15, his friend Michael
Gurley asked him to join his garage band, Stillwater, for their first
and only gig in the summer of 1975. He was cast in plays all throughout
high school, his first being Nathan Detroit, and knowing nothing of New
York, other than TV detectives, performed the entire role as Mel
Brooks. He then trained in the summers at an intensive workshop created
by former members of ACT in San Francisco. Planning to attend ACT and
work at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, his acting teacher
convinced him to attend college at UCLA instead.
After two years of back to back college theatre, and garnering the
school's Shakespeare award in 1980, Guest, upon discovering that they
made films and TV shows in LA, made a plan to acquire an agent by his
senior year, and moved out of the dorm and into a 2 bedroom apartment
with 5 other roommates, including fellow students and future
screenwriters Ed Solomon and Shane Black. He worked two part time jobs,
attended UCLA, and began rehearsals for " Transgressor", an original
play developed the previous year at school. Within weeks he had
attended his first open call for the TV show "Fame", and though not
initially cast, received a call from an agent the next day inviting him
to come in for a meeting. Guest was then sent out on auditions so much
over the next few months that he had to quit UCLA by the end of fall
term to pursue acting full time.
Within the next year, he had a recurring role on "Lou Grant", a pilot,
2 screen tests, an after school special, some episodic TV, and a role
opposite Jamie Lee Curtis in the horror cult classic "Halloween 2". The
Writer/producer of Halloween 2, John Carpenter, was going over the film
before it's release and Carpenter's friend, Nick Castle, took note of
the young actor, and remembered him for his current project in
development, "Centauri's Recruit", later to be called. "The Last
Starfighter".
More television movies, recurring roles (St. Elsewhere) and small film
roles followed, and Guest visited NYC for the first time. He came back
to LA , inspired by the theater, and ready to move back east, when he
was called in by Castle for what became "The Last Starfighter".
Principal photography was completed in the spring of 1983, a couple
months shy of his 23rd birthday. He was then cast as the protagonist in
"The Roommate", an American Playhouse production, also starring Barry
Miller and John Cameron Mitchell, based on a John Updike short story,
which later won the grand prize at the LA Film Festival (1985). After
wrapping "The Roommate", Guest escaped to New York and lived there for
the first half of 1984 seeking theatre roles. He was working at the
Santa Fe Festival theatre when The Last Starfighter opened in July of
1984. He was then cast in a TV drunk driving cautionary tale with Val
Kilmer, Mare Winningham, and Michele Pfeiffer. Back in LA, he turned
down a couple of subsequent offers in favor of a $3MIL indie about
bluegrass musicians in the Blue Ridge mountains. When that project fell
apart, he starred in another TV movie,"My Father, My Rival" for HBO,
alongside Wendy Crewson.
He was told that Starfighter reportedly made no money on it's initial
release, so he returned to the theatre, this time in LA for the West
coast premiere of Chris Durang's "Baby With the Bathwater" with
Jennifer Tilly, which ran for 5 months at the Coronet Theatre. More
regional theatre over the next year, "Key Exchange" with Anthony
Edwards and Jennifer Beals, and "Look Homeward Angel" at Playmakers Rep
in NC. Later that year he was offered the part of Michael Brody in
1987's "Jaws: The Revenge." with Michael Caine. Wrapping "Jaws" in
July, he was then cast in what he calls his favorite film, "The Wizard
of Loneliness", a small WWII era piece about a 12 year old growing up
in Vermont, with Lukas Haas, Lea Thompson, Dylan Baker and the late
John Randolph.
Over the next decade, it was mostly TV, co-starring with Robert Loggia
as FBI agents in the political thriller miniseries "Favorite Son", a
year as a bitter, ex-con photojournalist in "Knot's Landing", recurring
on "Life Goes On" as an environmental metal-sculptor and street
musician, McGoverns campaign manager on the '72 election episode of "
The Wonder Years", a computer geek, a fireman, a high school teacher,
another sculptor, an enviro-terrorist in "The X-Files", and back to the
independent film "Plan B" with Jon Cryer, playing a regular-guy pilot
who tries with his wife to conceive a child.
Guest has continued to work in LA small theatre developing strictly
original works, as well as touring for two and a half years('97-2000)
with the satirical folk-group The Foremen, playing guitar and banjo. He
also began planting vineyards in different locations in Northern
California, and making wine.
A handful of indie films: a wrongfully defrocked priest in "The Least
of These", a gitmo-type interrogator in "Shadowbox", a hippie political
adviser in "Mach 2 ", a MASH type ER doctor in "21 and a Wake-Up" with
Amy Acker, a recurring role as a no-nonsense Navy pilot on JAG, a
couple of Disney Channel movies: one as wacky alien Cosmo Cola in
"Stepsister from Planet Weird", and chimp-adopting primatologist Hugo
Archibald in "The Jenny Project", episodic roles on" Becker", "NYPD
Blue"('05),"House",('06) TV movie now called "Alibi", starring Famke
Jahnsen ('07) and a cynical journalist on "Jericho".('07)
After the birth of his, and partner Danna Hyams' son Jack in 2004,
Guest started preliminary readings and workshops for a new musical
created by Floyd Mutrux about an historic 1956 reunion at Sun Records
in Memphis of Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee
Lewis. Based on the actual jam session these four attended, and hosted
by legendary producer Sam Phillips, "Million Dollar Quartet" had two
full tryout productions in Daytona Beach('06) and Issaquah, Wa. ('07)
before moving to Chicago in 2008, where it still is running. The
original production then moved to The Nederlander Theater on Broadway
in March of 2010 and ran for 15 months (over 500 performances) before
moving to the New World Stages Off-Broadway where it played for almost
another year, closing in June of 2012.
Guest created the role of Johnny Cash and has been in all productions
since it's inception excluding London and now Las Vegas, choosing to
stay in NY with his family rather than go out on the tour, which is set
for it's third incarnation. The unique aspect of this play is that all
the actors play their own instruments; they ARE the orchestra, and the
show features blockbuster renditions of rockabilly and traditional
hits, covered by the four main characters. It also tells the story of
Sam Phillips' relationship to all the artists, and his particular
contribution to pop culture and history in general. Guest received
great reviews in particular as Cash, as well as a Distinguished
Performance Award Nomination by the Drama League of New York. The show
was also nominated for Best Musical in 2010.
Guest completed filming indie thriller "Late Phases" in June 2013.
Saratoga, Ca for most of the 1950's. More than 10 years younger than
his boomer siblings, Lance was born in 1960, when his father, a Navy
fighter pilot, moved the family to a larger house with running water.
At a young age, he was memorizing the comedy records of Bill Cosby,
Stan Freberg, Allan Sherman, and Mel Brooks, as well as all the early
60's Bob Dylan records. He learned to play guitar at age 10, and was
performing plays in junior high school. At 15, his friend Michael
Gurley asked him to join his garage band, Stillwater, for their first
and only gig in the summer of 1975. He was cast in plays all throughout
high school, his first being Nathan Detroit, and knowing nothing of New
York, other than TV detectives, performed the entire role as Mel
Brooks. He then trained in the summers at an intensive workshop created
by former members of ACT in San Francisco. Planning to attend ACT and
work at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, his acting teacher
convinced him to attend college at UCLA instead.
After two years of back to back college theatre, and garnering the
school's Shakespeare award in 1980, Guest, upon discovering that they
made films and TV shows in LA, made a plan to acquire an agent by his
senior year, and moved out of the dorm and into a 2 bedroom apartment
with 5 other roommates, including fellow students and future
screenwriters Ed Solomon and Shane Black. He worked two part time jobs,
attended UCLA, and began rehearsals for " Transgressor", an original
play developed the previous year at school. Within weeks he had
attended his first open call for the TV show "Fame", and though not
initially cast, received a call from an agent the next day inviting him
to come in for a meeting. Guest was then sent out on auditions so much
over the next few months that he had to quit UCLA by the end of fall
term to pursue acting full time.
Within the next year, he had a recurring role on "Lou Grant", a pilot,
2 screen tests, an after school special, some episodic TV, and a role
opposite Jamie Lee Curtis in the horror cult classic "Halloween 2". The
Writer/producer of Halloween 2, John Carpenter, was going over the film
before it's release and Carpenter's friend, Nick Castle, took note of
the young actor, and remembered him for his current project in
development, "Centauri's Recruit", later to be called. "The Last
Starfighter".
More television movies, recurring roles (St. Elsewhere) and small film
roles followed, and Guest visited NYC for the first time. He came back
to LA , inspired by the theater, and ready to move back east, when he
was called in by Castle for what became "The Last Starfighter".
Principal photography was completed in the spring of 1983, a couple
months shy of his 23rd birthday. He was then cast as the protagonist in
"The Roommate", an American Playhouse production, also starring Barry
Miller and John Cameron Mitchell, based on a John Updike short story,
which later won the grand prize at the LA Film Festival (1985). After
wrapping "The Roommate", Guest escaped to New York and lived there for
the first half of 1984 seeking theatre roles. He was working at the
Santa Fe Festival theatre when The Last Starfighter opened in July of
1984. He was then cast in a TV drunk driving cautionary tale with Val
Kilmer, Mare Winningham, and Michele Pfeiffer. Back in LA, he turned
down a couple of subsequent offers in favor of a $3MIL indie about
bluegrass musicians in the Blue Ridge mountains. When that project fell
apart, he starred in another TV movie,"My Father, My Rival" for HBO,
alongside Wendy Crewson.
He was told that Starfighter reportedly made no money on it's initial
release, so he returned to the theatre, this time in LA for the West
coast premiere of Chris Durang's "Baby With the Bathwater" with
Jennifer Tilly, which ran for 5 months at the Coronet Theatre. More
regional theatre over the next year, "Key Exchange" with Anthony
Edwards and Jennifer Beals, and "Look Homeward Angel" at Playmakers Rep
in NC. Later that year he was offered the part of Michael Brody in
1987's "Jaws: The Revenge." with Michael Caine. Wrapping "Jaws" in
July, he was then cast in what he calls his favorite film, "The Wizard
of Loneliness", a small WWII era piece about a 12 year old growing up
in Vermont, with Lukas Haas, Lea Thompson, Dylan Baker and the late
John Randolph.
Over the next decade, it was mostly TV, co-starring with Robert Loggia
as FBI agents in the political thriller miniseries "Favorite Son", a
year as a bitter, ex-con photojournalist in "Knot's Landing", recurring
on "Life Goes On" as an environmental metal-sculptor and street
musician, McGoverns campaign manager on the '72 election episode of "
The Wonder Years", a computer geek, a fireman, a high school teacher,
another sculptor, an enviro-terrorist in "The X-Files", and back to the
independent film "Plan B" with Jon Cryer, playing a regular-guy pilot
who tries with his wife to conceive a child.
Guest has continued to work in LA small theatre developing strictly
original works, as well as touring for two and a half years('97-2000)
with the satirical folk-group The Foremen, playing guitar and banjo. He
also began planting vineyards in different locations in Northern
California, and making wine.
A handful of indie films: a wrongfully defrocked priest in "The Least
of These", a gitmo-type interrogator in "Shadowbox", a hippie political
adviser in "Mach 2 ", a MASH type ER doctor in "21 and a Wake-Up" with
Amy Acker, a recurring role as a no-nonsense Navy pilot on JAG, a
couple of Disney Channel movies: one as wacky alien Cosmo Cola in
"Stepsister from Planet Weird", and chimp-adopting primatologist Hugo
Archibald in "The Jenny Project", episodic roles on" Becker", "NYPD
Blue"('05),"House",('06) TV movie now called "Alibi", starring Famke
Jahnsen ('07) and a cynical journalist on "Jericho".('07)
After the birth of his, and partner Danna Hyams' son Jack in 2004,
Guest started preliminary readings and workshops for a new musical
created by Floyd Mutrux about an historic 1956 reunion at Sun Records
in Memphis of Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee
Lewis. Based on the actual jam session these four attended, and hosted
by legendary producer Sam Phillips, "Million Dollar Quartet" had two
full tryout productions in Daytona Beach('06) and Issaquah, Wa. ('07)
before moving to Chicago in 2008, where it still is running. The
original production then moved to The Nederlander Theater on Broadway
in March of 2010 and ran for 15 months (over 500 performances) before
moving to the New World Stages Off-Broadway where it played for almost
another year, closing in June of 2012.
Guest created the role of Johnny Cash and has been in all productions
since it's inception excluding London and now Las Vegas, choosing to
stay in NY with his family rather than go out on the tour, which is set
for it's third incarnation. The unique aspect of this play is that all
the actors play their own instruments; they ARE the orchestra, and the
show features blockbuster renditions of rockabilly and traditional
hits, covered by the four main characters. It also tells the story of
Sam Phillips' relationship to all the artists, and his particular
contribution to pop culture and history in general. Guest received
great reviews in particular as Cash, as well as a Distinguished
Performance Award Nomination by the Drama League of New York. The show
was also nominated for Best Musical in 2010.
Guest completed filming indie thriller "Late Phases" in June 2013.