Interview: Kam Heskin from Coastal Dreams

“Coastal Dreams” is a 24 episode series produced by NBC.com, which will feature interactive events (users will receive mobile text messages, phone calls and/or emails from characters) throughout the season.

Set in the idyllic town of Pacific Shores, “Coastal Dreams” follows two twenty-something friends who hoped to escape the doldrums of their everyday lives, but soon realize their lives are at stake. Zoe and Stacey have been friends since high school and travel to Pacific Shores for a relaxing summer of beach-going and boy-watching. Zoe soon discovers a dark family secret and receives a visit from someone in her past that may end the summer on a deadly note. The series stars Danica Stewart (NBC’s “Passions”), Tanee McCall (“Hairspray,” “Starsky & Hutch”), Elena Campbell-Martinez (“Passions”), Kam Heskin (“Passions,” “Catch Me If You Can”), Charlie Koznick (NBC’s “Las Vegas”), Ken Luckey (“Las Vegas”, NBC’s “E-Ring”), and Noah Schuffman.

Can you tell me a little bit about Coastal Dreams and the character you play?

Kam: For me, Coastal Dreams is an exciting mystery. I think it differs from other soaps in the sense that the stakes are a little bit higher, it moves faster, and we’re not rehashing old storylines. People can watch the episodes and get themselves caught up, so we’re just moving along full force.

The series is about my cousin, Zoe, who comes to stay with me for the summer, and this whole sort of mystery starts to ensue around them. My character, April, is a lot of fun to play. She’s a little crazy. I’m usually playing straight good girls, so playing April was a lot of fun to do.

What’s your opinion about the episodes, because they’re very short? Do you think that’s a good format for the web? Maybe next time they’ll be longer?

Kam: I think it was the first time out. Everything is a learning process. Of course as an actor, I enjoy things that are longer. I think if it works, then I definitely think there’s the opportunity to make it longer. I think making it longer would give us a chance to involve the audience more. But it’s all trial kind of thing. It is what it is, if people want it longer, that’s great, because it means they like what they’re seeing. If they like what they’re seeing then it definitely should be longer, so that the audience can enjoy it more.

You’ve had experience before working on television with Sunset Beach, is doing this series for the web any different in the filming process?

Kam: I think shooting a web series is very similar to shooting an independent movie, at least the one we did. You shoot a lot of it out of order, and you have many different set ups. Like with a traditional soap, you have many cameras there getting all the different angles in a scene. We also shot on location, which is great being able to be surrounded by your set. So I loved doing it, I hope we get to do more.

Where did you guys shoot at?

Kam: We shot a 14 million dollar house on the beach in Santa Monica. It was incredible. I had never been in a house like that.

Do you think that these interactive features to tie the audiences in are going to become more of normal thing, an even a must, for television series at some point?

Kam: I think it should. I think it’s all going in that direction. It’s good for the audience, they can participate more if they want to and find out more information. So I think it’s really clever, those that want to do more can and those that just want to watch the show can do that. It’s really great to have both options there. And I think if you are computer savvy and watching shows on the web, this kind of gives users another way to utilize that.

Has there been any talk of doing a second season?

Kam: I actually have no idea. I haven’t spoken to anyone about it.

What time of year did you guys film the series?

Kam: We shot it all around the mid of August this year.

Oh wow, they got that all together pretty quickly then!

Kam: Yeah they did!

Were there any funny stories from set?

Kam: Um, we all bonded pretty quickly. The five of us were all on location at this beautiful house the whole time and we depended on each other a lot with the intensive shooting schedule. But there was nothing really crazy that happened. I mean give us another week and I’m sure we would have came up with something!

Now you have a Political Science degree, how did you go from college graduate into the world of acting?

Kam: It was literally the day I graduated. I got a job offer to be a copywriter in Bismarck, North Dakota, and I also met a modeling agent from Chicago at the mall. So I had these two different offers, and I thought ‘you know I can move to Chicago, try out this out for a couple months, if it doesn’t work, I can move to Bismarck and be a copywriter.’

So I moved to Chicago and ended up staying there for nine months, and then I actually moved to New York. I kept doing the modeling thing there, and then I started acting and fell in love with it. And I’ve been doing it ever since. I’ve been working on a pretty steady basis, so I feel very fortunate.

I interviewed your cast mate Charlie Koznick, and it was basically the same thing for him, right place right time kind of thing.

Kam: Yeah, it was. I mean I definitely think you have to have that desire in you to do it, but luck definitely plays a huge role. If I’d never had any luck with it, I would probably be doing something else. But I think if you want it bad enough, you find a way to make it happen.

Now was acting something you wanted to do as a child?

Kam: You know coming from the Midwest, I didn’t see that as something you do, a career. I don’t know who I thought those people were that did it, but it just didn’t seem like an option. And no one was doing that near me, there weren’t actors living in my home town.

You really have to be an urban setting to make it happen, and… you really have to be in New York or LA.

Do you have any projects coming up that you can tell us about?

Kam: I actually have 3 movies coming up. A movie called “Glimpses”, a movie called “Howl”, and a sequel to a movie I did and that one is called “The Prince & Me 3”.

And I’ve also been playing a character on CSI: NY.

Are you done filming all of that?

Kam: I have one episode left to film in November with CSI.

Interview By: Emma Loggins

– Coastal Dreams Official Site
– Coastal Dreams Gallery

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