Today we’d like to introduce you to Danny Irizarry.
Danny, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
I was born in Quito Ecuador to missionary parents Joseph and Alice Irizarry. I have very few memories of my time there other than our cat Gypsy and our many guinea pigs.
When I was five years old, my family moved back to our hometown of Illinois and finally settled down in a small home in Lyons after a couple of years of jumping from Chicago suburb to Chicago suburb. I was homeschooled my whole life so I often found my group of peers at church or sporting events. As a gymnast and martial artist, my friends and I would spend much of our time having nerf battles, wrestling, and coming up with half baked dreams of building a humungous tree-house in my friend’s back yard.
My very first taste of acting was as an eleven years old at a camp in Wisconsin. In 2011, family friend and Biola film student Elisa Logan offered me a part in her student film Moved by Love and from that day on, I knew acting was my passion. Elisa went on to work on several more projects, the first of which (The Cure) brought me to Los Angeles for the very first time in 2013, and she also now works with Zach King and was part of the production of La La Land.
But now, as a thirteen years old who had gotten his first taste of Hollywood, I began making short films and small projects with two of my closest Chicago friends Adrian VanStee and Grant McKenzie. We started a magic tutorial YouTube channel and would write, shoot, act in, and edit our own films, first with our parent’s camcorders, and later with gear we bought with our own money.
In 2014, I began to consider pursuing filmmaking as a full-time career and started auditioning for independent projects and student films. After shooting several shorts with students from Colombia College and DePaul University and cutting my teeth on the sets of Knuckleball, The Florist, Claw, and Exhale, and expanding my experience with small roles in Chicago PD and business commercials, I was cast as the lead in my first feature film, Don’t Run by director Ben Rood.
After taking more than a year to film and longer in post-production, Don’t Run began to collect awards in festivals across the country including best picture, best actor, best cinematography, and best director.
With these projects finally under my belt, I finally felt ready to move to Los Angeles. So, with the help of many of the accountancies I made both from the sets I had been on and acting programs I had attended such as Chicago’s Second City and AMTC (Actors, Models, and Talent for Christ) I made the move to Burbank California as a starry-eyed eighteen years old.
Now having lived in California for over two and a half years, I look back at the truly phenomenal people I’ve met and the outstanding opportunities I’ve had along the way. After only a month of attending Deborah Lemen’s Acting class, I met my best friends Reid Miller and Eric Grooms, and have had the distinct honor of creating projects like FLIKKER, Evil Woman, and Jaeger with them. I’m also thrilled to have had a chance to perform in several students and independent films here in LA like Biola films Wrapped and Sunsprite, and USC film The Taste of Morning.
I look forward to the future as I continue to work behind and in front of the camera on projects like The Other Way Around (Derrick Dymalski) and my own upcoming short film Clay.
There are great things on the horizon and this is certainly not the last time you’ll be hearing of Danny Irizarry, Reid Miller, or Eric Grooms.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I am very thankful that my path has been much more smooth than many people I have hear of and personally know. I’m very blessed to have a supportive family, creative friends, and a dream that I have been working toward since I was a child.
I have, however, still made many mistakes along the way. I’ve lost touch with people I would have loved to work with again. I have argued and burned some irreparable bridges with my best friends. I’ve lost equipment and made a fool of myself on camera. But one can always learn from mistakes and hurdles.
When I first moved to SoCal, I had no friends, no family, and no idea what I was getting myself into. I was in an apartment with six other people and would frequently skip meals to save money. I was working as an extra with Central Casting and living paycheck to paycheck. But in my spare time, I was always learning. Almost any free moment I had was spent listing to commentaries, watching great films, practicing special effects, and analyzing shot composition.
I knew that I didn’t want to stay where I was for long so used my time to become as good as I could be at what I wanted to do.
Alright – so let’s talk business. Tell us about Skull Point – what should we know?
My production company Skull Point provides equipment and media that is hard for low budget productions to find affordably. Primarily specializing in cinematography and photography, you can also find editing, special effects and graphic design services through my company.
I am most proud of my work on Flikker (Available on Amazon Prime) and Jaeger, as well as the upcoming short film Destination Unknown.
Skul Point is particularly unique because it holds the importance of story above anything else. Whether it’s in the photos taken, the shots filmed, or the frames shaved off of the final edit, I believe that a story can be told and must be told right because story is the basis of human connection, communication, and understanding.
Is there a characteristic or quality that you feel is essential to success?
Equality.
I firmly believe that I can learn something from everyone and that everyone has a valuable insight to offer. It’s hard to have a voice in this industry, and if I have the opportunity to not only empower or validate someone else’s opinion but to learn from it, then I can be confident that progress is being made.
Pricing:
- Cinematography Rate: $30 an hour
- Headshots Rate: $150 for 3 looks
- Editing Rate: $35 an hour
Contact Info:
- Address: 2219 W. Olive Ave. Ste# 229, Burbank, CA, 91506
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/skuyllpointproductions/
Image Credit:
Danny Irizarry, Nicholas Duvernay, Patrick Hyatt
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