Matt/Canadian Jewish News

[-|~Cassandra Fisher~|-]

Toronto actor all green about role in Power Rangers

By KATHRYN KATES
Special to The CJN


Matt Austin

Matt Austin is a new force to be reckoned with in the entertainment business. He’s an actor, playwright, screenwriter, director, musician and children’s book author.

Austin is perhaps best known for his current role as the Green Power Ranger on Disney/ABC’s popular kids show Power Rangers – Space Patrol Delta, seen by more than five million viewers every week.

The coming season is the 13th for Power Rangers, a show that changes its cast and theme every year. This year’s theme is space cops. Austin is one of four Canadians in the cast of five main characters.

“I filmed in New Zealand from September until May. It was amazing going there. Up until then, I had only really travelled for work, as far as Vancouver and as close as North Bay,” the Toronto resident says.

“The place was beautiful. I wish I had time to explore more, but we were shooting such a rigorous schedule – it was a lot of work,” says Austin, who was able to fulfil a dream and travel to neighbouring Australia for a holiday while down under, and produce and direct a production of the George F. Walker play Problem Child.

Austin was born Matt Sadowski. “My first agent… told me that unless you have an ethnic appearance, ethnic and religious sounding names are a nail in the coffin of an acting career. So, I said OK to changing it, and while away at camp, I was trying to think of a new last name. Another camper’s first name was Austin; he took a liking to me and gave it to me as a last name. It really caught on and people remembered it.”

Austin started acting seven years ago in national and international commercials including for McDonald’s, Pepsi and Oh Henry.

During the Oh Henry campaign, his visibility became much higher when additional ads of his face were posted on the side of buses. This eventually led to Austin’s first series that aired in 2003 – he played a spy on the CBC children’s series Spynet.

Prior to the series, Austin acted in his first short film, Shawn Postoff’s Coming to Terms. The film was screened at more than 30 international film festivals, broadcast on CBC and garnered the actor Best Male Performance awards from the Yorkton Short Film Festival and the Manitoba Film Festival.

In 2004, Austin made his short film debut as a screenwriter, director and producer. His film Jimmy won an Awareness Award from the Seven Minute Film Festival in Canmore, Alta. He followed shortly thereafter with another short called Credit Role, in which he also performed. It was named Best Short Film at the Michigan Film Festival and the 2004 Austin Film Festival.

“I’ve produced, directed and filmed my own short films and now I’m trying to get a few of my TV and screenplay treatments sold or produced by other people,” he says.

“I’m working on a feature film called Dirt that I’ve written and directed. We are shooting it in October. It is made up of an ensemble cast. I’m not acting in it because for my first feature experience, it is better to focus on the writing and direction of it as opposed to wearing every single hat.”

Concurrently, he has had a successful career as a playwright, writing and producing a play called In Between with the Noble Players Company in Toronto. His second play, Someone, a one-man vehicle was featured in the New Ideas Festival with another actor. He plans to act in the role himself and take the show to New York.

Austin’s third play, Two People in Complete Darkness, was a finalist for the 2004 Actor’s Retreat. It’s a play he wants to make into a film.

Immediate plans include acting in a short film in Collingwood called Gone Fishing with another up-and-coming actor, Drew Nelson. He’s also teamed up with Aimee McLaughlin, a British illustrator, for a children’s book he’s penned, due out in the fall.

As for the future, “I would love to act in my own work that I have written for film. I would predominately want to be a film actor.”

When not working, Austin enjoys playing music, going to clubs to hear jazz and catch unknown local trios or catching a play or movie. His website is www.matt-austin.com.