Three Great Things is Talkhouse’s series in which artists tell us about three things they absolutely love. To mark the June 19 digital release of the new family-themed comedy drama Finnegan’s Foursome, starring writer-director Edward Burns, Brian d’Arcy James, Erica Hernandez and Brian Muller, much-loved character actor d’Arcy James shared some of the things he loves most in life. — N.D.
My Daughter Grace’s Songwriting
My daughter Grace is a burgeoning singer-songwriter who's starting her career as an artist in Los Angeles. I'm very proud of her. We have this little game I love where, when she's working on a song, she will send me a melody or a bed of usic and ask me, “What do you hear?” I love writing music as well, but I do it as a hobby and she's doing it as a profession. However, nothing gives me more satisfaction than sharing musical ideas with my daughter. She's extremely talented and has got a real great gift for melody and an incredible singing voice, so I absolutely adore watching her take ideas and then see how they evolve by virtue of her songwriting. She's just starting her career, so it's really cool to watch her find their voice. It's mind-blowing to me, because you think you know your child, and then all of a sudden you see canyons and mountains of their character that you never really knew were there. That is profoundly heartwarming to me, and I absolutely love it.
I definitely relate to her creative journey and I suppose it's inevitable, since she’s also pursuing an artist's path. One thing that I wish I would have done more as a young artist was have confidence in my writing, in my ideas, in the generation of my own thoughts. I think I was very intimidated by the craft of, say, writing a screenplay or a song. I would always jump into writing songs, but I didn't spend enough time honing that craft. She's very dedicated to that, though, so I give her a lot of credit. And I think it's courageous to be able to do that, if you have an understanding of where you want to be, because then you can actually evolve. If you push the parameters of your abilities, by virtue of failing and trying again, then you can really find your voice. So for where I am in my life and my career, it's fun for me to see someone who's just starting their pursuit of all the things they don't know that maybe I do – and all the things she knows now that I never knew and still don't! It's a wonderful, beautiful pursuit, and what I absolutely love the most is seeing that transpire with her.
Golf
I'm currently obsessed with the game of golf, as a result of shooting my new movie, Finnegan’s Foursome. As a kid, I played golf with my dad and I was OK. As a young adult, I continued to play now and again, but I always got really mad because I could never be as good as I was when I was 13. I’d just throw a club in the river and think, That's it. But being in Ireland and playing golf every single day for six weeks while making Finnegan’s Foursome really taught me a lot about the mechanics of golf (which, I guess, I thought didn't apply to me!). So, I've been humbled by the game and thankfully so, because now that obsession comes with a never-ending exploration of the science of golf, which is why people get so swept away with it. When you start making advances in the mechanics of the body and the swing – or whatever it is you're working on – if you make even a small improvement, it feels profoundly satisfying.
I've never been a big fan of watching golf, but I'm watching it more now, just to see how masterful the great players are. There's nothing more boring than someone telling you about their golf game, but the truth of the matter is that there's something about golf that gets inside of me, and many other people, too. I know I'm not alone! It's just such a rewarding thing to do. I know people look at it as a ridiculous way to pass the time, but there’s something about being outside, about carrying your bag, about walking from shot to shot and really having to play the mental game as well as the physical game – it's just endlessly fascinating and maddening and rewarding, all at the same time. So I'm in love with the game of golf right now.
When I’m working on my golf swing, I basically have to redesign my neural pathways to let the brain and the body commune to understand new ways of moving the body. Once I can start to rewire that physiology, then I have some chance of cutting a groove into a swing that's effective. I'm not there yet, because I'm so broadly working on the macro, just trying to take care of the big things. Once I can get consistent with those things, then perhaps I can get into the minutiae. Right now, I'm a 15 handicap, so I'm not terrible, but I'm not great. I've got a lot of work to do!
The Music of Kevin Gilbert
I love a musician and a songwriter from the ’90s named Kevin Gilbert, who most people don't know and who’s sadly not with us anymore. I'm obsessed with a musical he wrote called The Shaming of the True, which is a rock opera. I'm a big fan of pop-rock from the ’70s and the ’80s, so that's my wheelhouse. I was introduced to his work through a band he was in called Toy Matinee, who put out just one (self-titled) album, which is incredible. I was astounded by the songs on that record, and then I came to learn that he had done many other different things, like another album of his called Thud. And then I found out he’d written The Shaming of the True (a play on the title of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew), that never really saw the light of day. It's about a musician with pure intentions and pure talent, who enters the industry and is corrupted by becoming focused on the business of music, rather than the artistry of it.
The Shaming of the True is extraordinary. The music runs the gamut of all kinds of styles. At one point, I talked to Kevin Gilbert’s manager, who now runs the estate, and did my best to try to bring it to life as a theatrical venture. I do a lot of theatre and always had this idea that The Shaming of the True could be an amazing, super muscular, visceral, poignant, theatrical musical. We organized a live concert recording with a lot of help from some of the original musicians that Kevin knew and worked with who were kind enough to come in and give us their blessing. I was happy that I had the chance to do that, but sadly nothing more came of it.
Something about the sound of Kevin Gilbert’s music and his artistry just really resonates deeply inside me, and I encourage everyone to go check him out. He's no longer with us, but he was a great artist, a great pop writer. If I talk to someone and they don't know who he is, it's super exciting to say, “Oh my God, I can't wait for you to hear this, because you might feel the same way as I do.” There's a great satisfaction in wanting to spread the word and say, “Hey, this is something worth your time.”
