Happiness Is A Warm Gun

In the summer of 1991, I did a film in which I had a very juicy part. It was really the best film role I had been cast in at that point. Too bad the film turned out to be so bad that it went straight to video. Still, it was very fun to play a character that kills several people, gets hog-tied to a log over a stream in the woods & then dies from a booby-trapped stack of logs. Really. The film- Edge Of Honor starred Corey Feldman ( who was behaving very badly), Don Swayze (brother of Patrick), & the very talented Ken Jenkins. I played a white supremacist who kills a group of Boy Scout’s that had stumbled onto his cache of weapons.

I have always been anti-gun. As a vegetarian, I find the notion of hunting difficult to comprehend. I grew up with guns, locked in a cabinet & I was never even vaguely interested. I believe in strict gun control while recognizing the 2nd amendment to our Constitution (with its controversies & ambiguities). So, I needed to find some strength of character to deal with the fact that I would be using real firearms for the filming. I had, of course, lied at the audition & had told the casting director that I was very familiar with using guns (I once had boasted that I knew how to fly a helicopter at an audition, thinking I could learn to fly before filming began, if I were cast).

On a union (SAG) film set, there is a gun wrangler who keeps, maintains, & handles the firearms. They are placed in the actor's hand before the camera rolls & taken from them the moment the director says “cut”. My wrangler taught me how to handle & fire a rifle so that it would appear that I knew what I was doing. I had a half day of shooting lessons. After decades of freely giving my opinion about the evil of guns in our country, when it came time to actually use one, I pulled that trigger, felt the kick back against my shoulder, heard the noise made by the blank… & I was thrilled. Really thrilled. I spent 10 days of filming looking forward to every moment with my gun. I wanted to touch it & hold it. It made me feel really sexy. I loved my gun. When filming was over I made a promise to myself to take lessons & continue to practice at a firing range. but, when I returned to my civilian life, I quickly forgot my love for my gun & returned to my liberal peacenik- ban the guns persona. Actually, that is a good thing. As a guy that is given to total outrage, I don't need to be holding a weapon. Trust me on this one.