Bryan Greenberg stars as Ben on HOW TO MAKE IT IN AMERICA on HBO
After a few movies that didn’t exactly light up the box office (Prime, Bride Wars) and a television series (ABC’s October Road) that didn’t last long, actor Bryan Greenberg is hoping for a bigger hit with the new HBO half hour series How To Make It In America, which premieres this Sunday at 10/9c. As Ben Epstein, a twentysomething enterprising New Yorker who strives to start a new denim line with his BFF Cam (played by Victor Rasuk), Greenberg said during a recent press call to talk about the show that he knows something about striving for dreams much like his on-screen persona.
Speaking of his time after finishing up his acting studies at NYU, Greenberg shared, “You have to take jobs that you don’t want to achieve the dreams that you do want. And you know the thing about trying to make it, in any career, I think, if you give yourself a plan B, you’re going to take it because it’s so hard out there, pursuing your dreams, that if you give yourself an out, you’ll take it. So I never did that. I never pursued an alternate career because I felt like that would be giving up on my dreams.”
Cam (Victor Razuk) and Ben (Greenberg) work on their hustle.
Just as he relates to his character, the Omaha, Nebraska native thinks viewers are going to feel the same way. “I kind of hope that these characters…they do get some success but at the same time it’s taken away. You know, the show is called ‘How To Make It In America.’ It’s not ‘Making It.’ And it’s not ‘Made It’ so it’s all about these guys and their struggle, and while they’re going for their dreams, life happens. They prove their friendship to each other, they run from the cops, they fall in love with girls and fall out of love, they party, have good times. That’s really what the show’s about, it’s about the journey, and it’s really not about the destination.”
Greenberg described filming the series, which is produced by the same team that created HBO’s hit series Entourage, as having a ‘looseness.’ He added that he thought that casual feeling actually helped maintain the authenticity of the series. “We’re striving to achieve realism here. I mean, it’s definitely my biggest take away after seeing four episodes is how real the show is and when we’re filming, some of these people on the street…they’re not extras, they’re real people, and they come up and talk to me and Victor while we’re shooting a scene. We’re selling jackets on the street and they’re like ‘So how much are they?’ I’m like ‘Yo, this is actually…we’re shooting something [and the] camera is right there. That’s how real it is, you know?”
HOW TO MAKE IT IN AMERICA shares blood with HBO's ENTOURAGE
The realistic feel also helps when the actors sometimes open the door to straying from the script. “When you’re doing that kind of filmmaking you have to keep it loose a little bit, and fresh, and just be honest to the moment and sometimes that calls for an improv, and sometimes it doesn’t. I mean the writing’s all there…these guys did such a great job on the scripts, but just sometimes a moment comes up where you got to address it.”
Greenberg’s character is not your typical fashionista so the actor had to do a little research of his own to understand the world that his character was so committed to. “I talked to a lot of guys in the fashion world…like street fashion though and just realizing that it takes…I had a conversation with one guy who was like ‘Look, at the end of the day, we’re selling denim, it’s not any different from the next guy’s denim, but it’s how we convince the consumer and how we brand it and make you think that it’s cooler.’ And I was like ‘Wow, so it’s really about your hustle.’
One thing that Greenberg is happy about is that there are many layers to Ben but is making sure to not make him too much of a depressing guy for audiences to connect with. “He’s a very complicated guy and he’s got a lot of demons and a lot of insecurities. Ian [Edelman, the series creator] and I work really closely to not make Ben a bummer Ben. The hardest [and] the biggest challenge was to find a fine line where yes, he’s kind of down on himself, yes things are tough, but at the same time he’s got that fire inside of him that he’s going to fight and achieve his dream no matter what. Hopefully the audience will take away that it’s a positive upward swing instead of an introverted downer lead character. So that was the challenge, and I think we’ve gotten a good middle ground, I think, I hope.”
Greenberg, who can also be seen in the upcoming indie film The Good Guy with Alexis Bledel and Scott Porter, got the part partly from previous work that Edelman had seen but it also didn’t hurt that they had had experience together on the basketball court. “It was so funny,” Greenberg said, “because we sort of look alike in real life, which is funny, but then on the court, we have the exact same basketball game…a couple of months later, I read that [Ian] sold a project to HBO and that it’s going and I was like ‘Whoa, HBO, Ian!’ I didn’t even know Ian was a writer. I read it and I really responded to it and I just wanted to sit down and talk to him and see where he was planning on going with it.”
One of the things that Greenberg loved about the script was the way that Edelman portrayed New York City, where the show is set. “To portray New York in a way that I’ve never seen portrayed on a television show or in a film before, like a real New York, not like some Sex in the City, girls drinking martinis and wearing fancy dresses, this is like the New York that I lived in, downtown, people on the hustle.
Greenberg also talked about the different look of the show and the use a lot of shots of NY life. “It’s almost like you’re flipping through a magazine and you’re like ‘OK, here’s a shot of sneakers, here’s a shot of like aesthetic Jews,’ it just gives you a flavor and you’re in right away without any sort of explanation or back story, it kind of just tells the story for you.”
One technique that aided the show’s realism was the use of modern technology to shoot various images in a unique manner. “In the second episode where it opens up with this party scene that we had, we shot the whole thing on iPhones and Blackberries and I’ve never heard of anything like that. I thought that was the coolest idea because it just seemed so real and current…the crew left and they just hired a bunch of beautiful girls and cool looking dudes and then we were just partying and having a good time. And honestly, I was shooting it on my iPhone and then the next day they’re like ‘We need that footage.’”
In playing a guy trying to make his dreams come true, one of those dreams includes perhaps getting back together with his ex-girlfriend, Rachel, played by Lake Bell. Greenberg remarked that he liked the spot where their relationship was at the start of the series. “I thought it was really brave and interesting for Ian and the writers to start off a series at the beginning of a breakup. I just thought that was a really interesting entry point that I’ve never seen before and how two characters have to deal with that. And, yes, I’ve gone through some breakups in my own life that I could easily draw upon, and it wasn’t that hard.”
How To Make It In America premieres this Sunday on HBO at 10/9c.
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Jim Halterman is a freelance writer who spends his days interviewing the top tier of talent and creative forces in the entertainment world and then, because he's that kind of guy, he brings it all to YOU! And, because we all like free stuff, check back on Fridays for the best giveaways!! (Photo: Interviewing actor Ray Ford - from DONT TRUST THE B**** IN APARTMENT 23 - at The Abbey, West Hollywood, 4/2012)
