Meet Don Jeanes

Today we’d like to introduce you to Don Jeanes.

Don, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
Well, I think I started the way most actors do in school. Lakeland elementary school was putting on a production and my teacher asked who wanted to be the lead… I raised my hand. I was hooked from then on. I was lucky enough to have a lot of great theater teachers at Humble middle and Humble high and they encouraged me to participate in UIL one act plays. Thats how I got a Theater scholarship to Kingwood Junior college. However, I was urged by my parents to get a marketing degree so I took three years off acting to attend Texas State University. After graduating with a marketing degree in 2003, I moved back to Houston and took a job in business to business sales. It was a good job but I was feeling too confined and acting started calling me again.

So I applied for and was castin in a film shooting in Houston called “Get Connected”. Well, that really got me hungry again and one of my best friends had moved to New York to pursue acting. He seemed to be having the time of his life and mentioned I should move there. Thats all the convincing I needed. I packed my bags six months later and hopped a flight. NYC was a whole different world to me and I had a great time there. I did some print modeling and soaps but mostly Off off broadway. It was a very formative time for me as an actor. But after two years the big city started to feel very claustrophobic and I began to consider Los Angeles….. well that and two casting directors told me “Listen kid, you don’t sing and you don’t dance, you’ve got blond hair and blue eyes, go to LA”.

So I did in 2006. The city of angels is where I really started to make money in entertainment. I was able to become a full-time actor in 2013. I spent a magical ten years in LA but by 2016 my grandfather’s health started to deteriorate very rapidly so I moved back to Houston to help with care and get the ranch in order. By 2017 things had settled enough for me to get back to auditioning and I was amazed to find out how much the entertainment industry had grown in Texas while I was away. I’m happy to say that I’m a full-time actor again and shoot a project 3 to 4 times a month.

Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
“If you love what you do you’ll never work a day in your life” … However, if you have to have a side job in order to pay your bills while you do what you love for free at night…. well that’s work haha. Thats the real struggle as an up and coming actor. My day to day in NYC was audition during the day, going to rehearsal in the evening and bartend at night. On my days off, I would perform or have another rehearsal.

Los Angeles was a different story. I decided to focus on TV and film when I got there so I didn’t have to spend so much time at rehearsal but let’s talk about trying to get to 5 auditions a day in LA traffic. I bought a motorcycle my second year there so I could split lanes just to get to auditions on time!

Other than those day to day challenges I have a lot of stories like having 200 gallons of freezing water dumped on me 12 times for a Long John silvers commercial or crashing my motorcycle on a mountainside while on the way to a shoot and still shooting my scene anyway but that would be a novel and secretly I loved every second of it.

The only downside to being an actor in Texas is that you are going to have to drive… ALLOT. I make the round trip to Austin at least once a week sometimes two or three. I’ve driven fro Austin, Dallas and back to Houston in one day several times. Luckily I’m an avid audio learner so it makes the time go by a little quicker.

Lastly, like all entrepreneurs you will feel self-doubt at some time or another and in the beginning it really got to me: “Am I any good?” “Can I really have a good career?” “Why didn’t I book that?”. It’s just the nature of this business. I’ve learned to practice mindfulness over the last few years by meditating every morning, going over a gratitude list, positive self attribute list and positively visualizing my day and auditions. It has made a huge difference in my wellbeing.

We’d love to hear more about your work and what you are currently focused on. What else should we know?
Currently, I’m represented by Page Parkes Talent agency and I couldn’t be happier with them. Addie Eckert is a wonderful agent and really keeps me working.

I have worked in every aspect of acting, from print modeling to runway, commercials, TV and film but I guess I’m most well known for playing Neil Armstrong in Transformers Dark of the Moon and as being the rancher in the 2013 through 2015 Budweiser Clydesdale Super Bowl commercials. It was a great series and we won best super bowl commercial of all time.

I’d like to say I specialize in a certain area but again I work in everything. As I write this, I have two movies in post-production, “One Hand Clapping” & “Fustercluck” and one in pre-production called “Spa-getty West”. Commercially, I have a shoot this week for Cincinnati Insurance and currently have three regional commercials for Sentry Insurance, Policy Pro, Academy and one national commercial for Ram Trucks running with a print campaign for Fedex to be released.

I think the thing that makes me the most proud is when people tell me “You made me cry” “You made me laugh”, because to me an emotional response is the highest compliment I can get as an actor. That is what we strive for; to entertain, to give people a break from reality, to change someone’s perception of the world just a little. It’s incredibly rewarding.

Any shoutouts? Who else deserves credit in this story – who has played a meaningful role?
Well, let’s start from the start. I have to mention my high school drama teacher Scott Allen. Scott was and still is very passionate about the performing arts and encouraged me to get involved. I would be on a different path today without his guidance at that early stage. He is now the principle of Kinder HSPVA right here in Houston.

Next is the Upright Citizens Brigade. I studies with them in New York and Los Angeles. The first thing I tell people who ask me how to book commercials is to get into an improv classes. Knowing the rules of improv are invaluable today because it’s basically all you do in commercial auditions.

Then there was Sarah Simmons in Los Angeles. Sarah studied under Peggy Feury who worked with Lee Strasberg so needless to say the class was very “Method”. She would give us sides and we had 5 minutes to come back with a substitution and an objective. We would do that 5 to 6 times a class. It was a crash course in the Method technique.

After a year with Sarah, I moved on to Ivanna Chubbuck also in Los Angeles. She breaks the Method technique down into 12 steps and I really honed my skills in her class. I use those twelve steps on all of my dramatic roles.

I’m currently studying with Deke Anderson here in Houston. Deke is a great coach with a simple approach to acting and is helping me stay sharp.

Lastly, of course, I’ll mention the great team at Page Parkes again. I can’t say how grateful I am for all the hard work they do on my behalf.

Contact Info:

• Email: addie@pageparkes.com
• Instagram: don_Jeanes
• Facebook: Don Jeanes

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