Workaholics Anonymous Cast

We, the newly chosen cast members of Workaholics Anonymous, met with Rob, Allison, Ted and Dan at the Celtic Coffee House situated on a sweet little cobblestone street in New Bedford (New Bedford actually has pockets of “charm” and “quaint” happening, for real!  Who knew??). The coffee was divine, the cookies were memorable, and our orientation together as a cast was only positive.

Meeting a new group of people always has the chance to be awkward or strange, particularly when it’s a group of creatives who may have very different visions or agendas.  The only thing that was strange on this day was how quickly we settled in with eachother; it was an insta-friend event, which can probably be attributed to the Rab group.  When a project is headed by people who have the self-assurance that comes from knowledge, talent, commitment and then plain old friendliness, it seems that magic can occur.  My first impressions: Ted is laid-back and easy to work with while also being very serious about the casting, the script and the film; Allison is immediately available to the cast, open and uber-efficient, and not the least bit chaotic with everything she’s juggling; Rob is gracious and  so darn pleasant while also being one of those humble artist types who carries some kind of major air of cool, and who is obviously dedicated to his craft.  Maybe he’s a genius; I’ll get back to you on that.  Dan was in and out early, running off to his job as a nurse but managing to be a solid presence for the production end of their film. 

Many, many indie film projects in the New England area have a lot of promise but fail somewhere along the way in the coordination of vision-into-finished-product. Usually the signs are there early-on, the dysfunction showing up in areas of organization or the selling-out on quality of talent, or writing, etc. Rab Studios seems to have figured out how to be a strong family for the conception and raising of their dreams—you just couldn’t see any corner being cut, any compromise being made. The cast was incredible by the way (and I DO remember all of your names, which is crazy). This one read-through proved how each was able to handle fast-paced dialogue in quick-moving scenes. Davidson, as Dan the lead, was really quite perfect. Even people with very few lines delivered them surprisingly “right.” It was a little bizarre, and I just kept marveling as I listened. Hopefully the “rightness” will only be heightened as we add action during the shoots. It’s scary as hell, but the adrenaline (or something, not sure what) keeps you coming back for more.

So hooray to Rab Studios and the crew and cast of Workaholics Anonymous—I’m looking forward to more. And, by the way, there are some unbelievable real-life workaholics in this group—hard to believe any of them had time to sit and read a script forgodsake.

-Alene Sibley