Meet Spencer Carney

Today we’d like to introduce you to Spencer Carney.

Hi Spencer, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I was raised and grew up in the Kansas City Metropolitan area. Despite being in the middle of the country, Kansas City, Missouri was a bit of a hub for local theatre of all kinds. I began singing and acting when I was ten years old in my school’s production of “Annie Jr.” the musical. It wasn’t long when at age 12, I obtained my first lead role as Rudy Pazinski in the City Theatre of Independence’s production of “Over the Tavern”. My parents were very supportive of my talents, despite not being in the entertainment industry at all. Quite the opposite, really, being in the finance and technology sectors. Besides, even if they wanted to be more involved, I saw performing as wholly mine. A world that I could explore that embraced all the unique things about me. In the world of theatre, you could be anyone, and I was surrounded by adults I thought of as adventurous pirates. Free from the conventions of society, and they often got to see the world in tours across the state, in playwrights festivals that got to go to other towns, or other countries. I was determined to be like them and to become what I felt they represented. Depositories of wisdom. Compassionate beings with a mission to understand those around them through different lenses, and to show the world how it COULD be, not always what it was.

I continued doing community theatre until I received my first union Equity ensemble role in the rock musical “The Who’s Tommy” at the Metropolitan Ensemble Theatre in downtown Kansas City, and I was one of two actors in that production who were 14 (I turned 15 during the production, but everyone else was an adult). After becoming an Equity Membership Candidate, I compiled quite the theatre resume, and of course by this point, I had an insatiable desire to learn. So I spent any money I could earn on acting classes. That resulted eventually in my becoming represented by Talent Unlimited in Film and commercials (there wasn’t much of a television industry in Missouri at that time). I came to understand that even though I had talent, that I needed to find a way to get out of Missouri if I wanted to live a full life as a professional actor…University was the answer. I would need a great academic record, and so I enrolled at age 15 in community college as well. I completed High school and my Associate’s degree at Blue River community college at the same time, Magna Cum Laude. I then studied until I hit (what I felt was the jackpot) admission into the B.A Theatre program at the University of Southern California School of Dramatic Arts. Getting into USC was a BIG DEAL. I quit my job in fast food, I canceled my last semester as an English major at the University of Columbia (I pulled a full Brad Pitt, who attended and dropped out of the same school in a similar major, haha). I felt so cool.

Once in LA, it wasn’t long before I was auditioning for big projects and meeting the people I only dreamt about. After a while of hitting the pavement (doing background work to get into SAG-AFTRA), researching everything and everyone, directing/writing/starring in my own acting reel, and hitting some dead ends at times I eventually met my talent manager Corey Ralston, who then introduced me to my current Theatrical/Commercial/Voiceover agents at The Library Agency. My manager Corey established Ingenuity Actors Studio where I am a mentor and Instructor of young actors in Film and Television acting as well as a private acting coach. Published my own book of poetry, “A Bird Between”, with Wordwraith Books, something I never thought I’d do in my twenties. Also along the way, I’ve always enjoyed grounding myself in activist efforts over the years whether it be for animal rights, gender issues, anti-gun violence, etc., and now currently find myself a part of the grassroots Queer organization “glendaleOUT” where this June we threw the first Pride festival in Glendale CA.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Oh gosh, no, haha! I knew at an early age, from auditioning anywhere and everywhere, that having strangers (especially older strangers) judge you on a regular basis whether it be on your looks, skill level, or intelligence level is not exactly a recipe for a clean bill of mental health! Now add being a young kid who hadn’t come to terms with their sexuality, and you have a whole cocktail for moments that needed to be processed in therapy. I had a film acting teacher in Kansas City at age 17 tell me in front of the whole class that I’d never be more than “a character actor”, which the class understood to mean that I wasn’t attractive enough to be the leading man. I’ve had my first agent in Los Angeles throw my head-shots in my face because he said I needed to “try harder” in them. I am no longer with this agent and, thankfully, I am past allowing such things to happen in my life, but I was younger then. I once had a casting director for a touring Broadway production lecture me for 8 minutes of my 10 minute time slot on the virtues of “never asking someone to repeat themselves” even tho’ I had heard him correctly and just wanted a, “yes, can confirm”, after repeating it back to him because I wanted to give a good audition.

I think, specifically, a time period of struggle for me was actually my time as an English major at the University of Columbia. I was auditioning around the U.S to be in a B.F.A acting program (which usually only ever accepts 16 or fewer students) and so I spent a year in the town of Columbia, which might as well have been in the middle of nowhere (because it was), feeling like I might not ever generate the money or energy to be able to leave Missouri. Of course, I had a backup plan to move to Chicago and become a librarian to hopefully forgive any student loans I might incur studying acting again. It would have taken many, many more years, but the end game goal was always to be a professional actor in a big city no matter the cost, or sacrifice. Of course, that statement has always been tested of me, as I’ve said earlier, and I’ve even had my share of sleazy producers and casting people try to take advantage of their power over me, but just as I was determined to succeed I also would go to the nuclear option of being willing to throw it all away…because at the end of the day I’m in this to make my community better, to educate and heal others, and to give voice to those without one.

I fell into a depression, my dream felt further away than ever. I wasn’t even studying acting so much as dramatic literature. I was quite isolated in the dark halls of the stacks at the University of Columbia, and I told myself I would regret it if I didn’t apply to acting school one last time, even though I only had one more year left to get my B.A in English and Composition. I thought of sunny California, the opposite of cloudy Columbia in endless winter, and sent off the common app. This time to the B.A program. It was many months later when my brother called me on the phone and said, “You got accepted to Hogwarts”. It was definitely divine intervention that took me to Los Angeles, and I’ve lived here now for seven years.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I consider myself a “professional actor and singer, who dances”. That phrase always makes me laugh because we performers always are asked to be as specific as possible, or you’ll end up like me, at a special callback for pro dancers for a national tour that the casting director threw you into because they enjoyed your acting and singing audition, even though you told them you aren’t a professional dancer…only to make yourself look like a clown in front of 40 people! Give me a choreographer for a month, and we are good! That title has expanded to being a professional voiceover artist/audiobook narrator and professional acting coach.

However, what is it that I DO? Well, I get to explore other realities as well as the minds/experiences of others across time and space. Say I’m a boy kissing a girl, or another boy, for the first time…well, then, I am representing EVERY boy whoever kissed ANYONE for the first time, and that truly is such a gift and responsibility. There are other actors who like to think of themselves like sharks, here to make a buck and to move on, or who are in it for their own vanity. First of all, that isn’t fun at all, and, second of all, I don’t know HOW you contemplate the human condition without getting emotional and a bit spiritual. Willpower isn’t enough. This industry will beat you down until that willpower is gone. So what’s left? The people, and moments, along the way. So I guess that’s what sets me apart…I really love what it is actors are striving for and the people who help make it come true.

I’ve been very fortunate that I’ve gotten to have some of these conversations about the beauty and responsibility of acting with the next up and coming generation of actors at Ingenuity Actors Studio, an online acting studio with the aim of providing TV/Film training from working actors in Hollywood to young students in parts of the country who might not have access to such training…a lot like where I grew up. Currently, I am teaching a sitcom comedy class with four girls who love rainbows, unicorns, and Jojo Siwa. It is so fun seeing them work on all sorts of sitcom comedy from Disney, Nickelodeon, and all the way to Primetime! When I show up to teach a class, I get to have the opportunity to say everything I wish I had heard when I was that age. I get to build them up and support them with my lived experience, not rule over them with something that was learned in a book, like some of my former teachers. I get the opportunity to increase the shield of protection that they have against a world which is determined to subjugate artists like actors rather than work with and alongside them.

I also really have been enjoying being an activist for the Queer Community in Glendale, CA. As a part of the glendaleOUT team, a grass-roots Queer advocacy organization in Glendale, CA, I have had the opportunity to interview remotely (and the occasional socially distanced interview depending on the timeline and circumstances) different members of the Queer community in Glendale. For example, a Gay couple in their late 60’s who went back to art school in their 50’s so they would have something more in common with each other, all the way to, in a separate interview, young high school students just discovering their Queer identities. It has been about exploring the stories of others in a more direct, personal way, and that has been so rewarding. I’ve gotten to ask hard, deep questions of identity, marriage, and religion; all the way to the silly cute moments that become the cornerstones of one’s relationship, or coming out moment. I have the privilege, right now, of getting to be at the beginning of a Queer history in Glendale where this year we threw “Jewel City Pride 2021”, its first Pride festival. I got to be a part of drafting the first LGBTQ+ scholarship for some future young scholars in the many new Gay-Sexuality-Alliances that have come to flourish in Glendale’s high schools (even a few elementary schools!). glendaleOUT has been a life-changing experience for me, ever since they discovered me in 2020 protesting by myself in front of city hall for Pride month for Trans Black Lives. You should check them out, they do such lovely work! @glendaleout on Instagram and @glendale_pride on Twitter.

What am I most proud of? So many things, but honestly one of the things I’m most proud of that first comes to mind was helping to direct a production of “The Vagina Monologues” at USC. I held a sign in the middle of the busiest intersection on campus that said “I love vaginas”, me, a gay man haha, to help raise money for our beneficiary charity, “A Window Between Worlds”, a resource for human service providers to use art to heal and process trauma-related experiences. Being around these powerful women fighting rape culture helped cast the last piece of the puzzle for me to fully accept myself for who I am. I had just come off playing a femme-presenting gay man for the first time on the Bing theatre stage at USC to much shock and outcry from the dramatic arts school. I was pretty rattled from holding my ground/staying strong with my director, Gigi Birmingham, so that we wouldn’t be censored.

I’m proud of my chapbook of poetry, “A Bird Between”, it came to me in a slow summer between my Junior and Senior year at USC but didn’t get published till after I graduated. It truly is a part of my soul in book form. I bore a part of my soul, talking about growing up, and I heard it even made my mom cry… (score! haha). It was something I knew I would do one day, perhaps when I was “very old”, but I had discovered that I was writing poetry weekly since I was in middle school as a pseudo diary. The material had been there all along. It was a refreshing break at the time from worrying about where my next audition would be coming from. Sometimes, you just have to do something for yourself and know that it is now out there in the world. Publishing this book has given me the confidence to want to write another. I hope to have a “sequel” of sorts very soon.

Oh, I’m definitely proud of my role in my first VR video game “Foreverse” I voiced the sentient A.I, Kevin. I was the VILLAIN. Gosh, that was so fun, I think villains are some of the most fun roles, and I don’t get cast as a villain often! Of course, his modus operandi was that you didn’t suspect that he WAS a villain, but I rest my case.

Where we are in life is often partly because of others. Who/what else deserves credit for how your story turned out?
It may sound a little cliche, but my parents have been my biggest cheerleaders. My mom and dad, together most times, drove me to every audition I got for myself before I could drive. They drove me to every acting class, singing lesson, and bizarre place my career took me. My mom was with me at age 16, in the room, when my first agent offered me representation (that agent was so shocked when I was the one running that interview instead of her or my mom, haha). My parents drove me around the country to audition for different acting schools and eventually drove me to LA for USC. They helped me carry my things up many flights of stairs into my first apartment. They have listened for hours about acting, film, and the industry from me, in person and on the phone (even though that isn’t their world). They have been there whenever I needed them for emotional support or to help me get out of a jam.

To this day, they still read with me on camera when I have self-tape auditions via webcam, as they live in Missouri. They encourage me to grab an ice cream after every hard audition and are always the most excited when I tell them about something happening in my life. I remember how scared I was to tell them I was Gay because I was afraid to have any arbitrary reason that might make them love me less, but they accepted me fully without any question. They are my best friends. Man, at this point I’m feeling pretty emotional! I just know how lucky I am. It wasn’t too long ago that my mom called me excited to see on a morning news show that a fantasy show we are fans of is getting remade, she asked me “so who do you need to call to be on THAT show?!” Haha, if only it were that easy, but I’m reminded when my parents say something like that, that they really believe that I can do anything if I put my mind to it, and that means everything to me. I wouldn’t be where I am today without them.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @spencer__carney
• Facebook: @spencermcarney
• Twitter: @spencer__carney

Image Credits:
Photo 2: Ft. Sierra Marshall phot0 3: @gvbriel.photo photo 7: Ft. acting students Andrew Olson and Samantha Desman photo 8: SafeBAE and Lancelot Media Inc. Production – “GAME ON”