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hi — i'm jeff essex, a talented and versatile performer and artist, with credits in film and television, voiceover work, and stage (from regional theatre to off-broadway). i've been a performer and head writer in a fantastic sketch comedy group, and i've played roles ranging from the insanely murderous scottish king, macbeth, to the insanely funny vaudeville comic, harpo marx. i also do a decent job of portraying the occasional sane character.
besides acting, i'm also a musician, a singer and songwriter, a writer and an artist — as one of those proverbial jacks of all trades, creatively speaking, i can incorporate my other talents into my acting wherever they might work.
feel free to poke around the site and find what interests you. any questions, comments, or funny stories? just tag me with a quick submission form.
what's exciting right now?
best of all possible anything — i'll be playing harpo marx again! this time, it's in a night at the kremlin, an original musical by bernard besserglik, directed by cosmin chivu. the story features harpo going solo on his tour of russia...while stalin is hard at work establishing the soviet union. the interweaving of history and comedy is damn clever. i'm really looking forward to playing my hero again!
i'm doing a staged reading of luck!, an original musical written by brad ross (who composed the tales of custard the dragon musical i was in) and mark waldrop, and starring faith prince. man, i saw her in guys 'n' dolls shortly after i did it myself in high school. i'll refrain from mentioning that, just in case she worries about silly things like numbers of years.
wrapped up a fun voiceover project as the "handler" for a...well, let's call him a spy, in a commercial spot for the downtown area of syracuse, new york. good production team, very neat spot! it's up on my demo page, and you can also track it down on youtube. of course, if you live in or near syracuse, you can probably just wait for it to pop up on television.
i managed to get into mike pettry's studio to record a demo for the time travelers convention, a musical by mike and his writing partner heidi heilig. great music, and an awesomely brilliant concept — what if you throw a party, and everyone from the future is invited? will anybody show up? dude, i'm so there. mike was kind enough to ship over the demo, which is now up on my demo page.
for a company called collaborative health, which aims to help us all get a little more healthy (without the silly fads — they've got my vote!), i did some really fun voiceover work in a series of hysterical spots done by a very creative production team. i've got two clips up on my demo page for you to check out.
if you think you recognize me, but have trouble picturing me without the spiky hair, goggles, blue jumpsuit, vinyl apron and incredibly goofy look on my face, then you might have seen me improvising my ass off at the jekyll & hyde club, as crazy inventor and adventurer brewster device. it's a great opportunity to keep people laughing, though i haven't got much time to put in shifts what with all the other work coming in lately. just don't tell the management the full story of the crayon-eating incident. thanks. (incidentally, if any fans have any photos of me as brewster available, i'd love to get my hands on some.)
cartoon network was a bit slow on their exclusivity clause, so the upstate four is being shopped around at the moment (though cartoon network can still make an offer). it's an animated pilot i co-starred in, playing sam, the sweet and silly rabbit, who has fun and ludicrous adventures with his friends david, kevin, and mary. i've got a few clips on my demo page for you to see — they're fun and delicious. upstate four has won a bunch of awards already, including an excellence in animation award at the asifa east animation festival and the top prize in the "tv for children" category at the ottawa animation festival. fran and will krause are really incredible animators — i hope this series gets picked up!
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