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Who is Bill Marles?
I’ve always been a communicator, from the time I wrote Hardy Boys imitations and acted in the junior high school play as the puppetmaster. The other kids loved my comedic take on my lines and communicated their approval.
Years later, in Deck The Halls, I was picked out of several hundred background performers to work in front of the camera with Danny DeVito (Buddy Hall) and Matthew Broderick (Steve Finch) as the Wheelchair Pusher. Steve, a man of influence and position in the town, had come confidently racing out onto the street to confront the flashy, newcomer Buddy who was conducting what appeared to be an unethical and illegal lottery.
I wheeled the character Hughie onto the set to nudge Steve. Between coughing and wheezing, Hughie revealed that Buddy was merely raising money to provide him with a much needed lung transplant.
Buddy won that round in his ongoing feud with Steve.
Months later, I came to the local megaplex full of anticipation at seeing myself on the big screen, even if the camera only panned me. I turned out that the joke was on me. Both Hughie and I were cut out, obviously deemed unessential to the story. That’s show biz for you!
After numerous unsuccessful auditions, I was rewarded with a role as the antagonist in a short film called In Black and White produced by students in the television program at the British Columbia Institute of Technology. I was the Laughing Bum, who was created to cause havoc in the main character’s life . This film has become something of a school classic, often screened to new generations of BCIT students.
This success had led to parts in four other BCIT productions, including one takeoff role as the “laughing” mad scientist, Dr. Finschtein, in Pants!. I was supposed to get 30 seconds screen time. I wound up being in the limelight for a minute and a half.
I also played the Troll in that institution’s commercial for 32 Books, a North Vancouver institution. I believe a pattern has been established. I’m perfect for different, outlandish character roles.
I’m also proud of my lead role as Wells in a science fiction drama, called It Wasn’t Us. That film presents a gloomy view of the future of our world. It won first prize in the “Get Evolved Film and Art Festival” at the University of British Columbia.
On the music video front, I was the homeless person in Beautiful, a song written and performed by the host of the television program, Ghost Trackers, Joe MacLeod. To date, it has 7,000 hits on YouTube.
In all, I have acted in more than 25 productions. I’m not sure of the exact number. I’m starting to lose track. Some of these have been quick and dirty, but more and more of them are professional quality.
In the field of writing, I have been chosen one of the winners of Richmond Gateway Theatre’s Sea of Stories contest. I am working with a dramaturge/ director and “The Days of Cora Brown” should be on stage in October of 2009.
What’s ahead? Bigger and better, I hope.
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