Exclusive Interview: Pop Culturalist Chats with 100 Days to Live’s Gideon Emery

Award-winning actor Gideon Emery has quickly made a name for himself with the dynamic characters he’s brought to life in projects including Teen Wolf, Daredevil, Survivor Type, and dozens more.

His latest project, 100 Days to Live, is an edge-of-your-seat thriller. When a serial killer abducts a young woman’s fiancé, she must race against the clock to discover the identity of the killer, and more importantly – his motive.

Pop Culturalist was lucky enough to speak with Gideon about his career, 100 Days to Live, and more.

Career

PC: How did you discover your passion for the arts?
Gideon: Wow. That really is the beginning. For me, I always blame it, if you will, on being an only child. I distinctly remember keeping myself amused. Days when I wasn’t at school, I was coming up with voices and stuff like that. I had a gift for mimicry. I was the class clown. I loved doing voices.

This is going to date me, but I grew up in England and South Africa. We only moved to the States recently, but we used to hear Casey Kasem. I remember him being one of my first imitations: “Another long-distance dedication.” [laughs]

Towards the end of school, I started to think seriously about pursuing this as a career. It was a tossup between this and art, which I was also really into. I ended up going to drama school, and that was it.

PC: Who or what has had the biggest influence on your career?
Gideon: I’d say my mother was probably my biggest personal influence. She always championed me into doing something that I was passionate about, so I felt the confidence to pursue this. Look, there are more secure careers to pursue, right? But my mom has always been really supportive of me. My dad is my number one fan these days. I think once he saw I could support myself, he was like, “You convinced me.”

Professionally speaking, there are these larger-than-life actors in film, which I think a lot of male actors reach towards, like [Al] Pacino, [Robert] De Niro, and Christopher Walken. You imagine working with them one day or working with [Steven] Spielberg—that kind of thing. I haven’t worked with any of these people, but it doesn’t mean that it wouldn’t be incredible to do that at some stage. They were definitely influences.

I remember as a kid wanting to be the next James Bond. Then, as I started acting professionally, I realized I wasn’t the conventional good-looking guy, at least in Hollywood, which is where I worked for about sixteen years. I found myself being brought in for more villain-type roles because I have a little more character in the face, which typically speaking tends to be more interesting.

Another influence, which audiences outside of South Africa wouldn’t know, is a big-time actor in South Africa named Bill Flynn. He and his producing and acting buddy Paul Slabolepszy—who’s South Africa’s biggest playwright next to Athol Fugard, which I think people have heard of in the States—I got to work with them really early on in my career. Bill introduced me to my first agent. I was still at drama school and he very generously did that. Without his guiding hand, I certainly wouldn’t have had the success I had, at least before I moved to the States.

PC: Speaking of success, you’ve had tons of it throughout your career. When you look back, is there a moment that stands out?
Gideon: When I got to work with the two of them, Bill and Paul, who I know people are like, “Who are these people?” probably. But they were, they still are—Bill has passed, unfortunately—but Paul Slabolepszy is still an icon and an extraordinarily talented actor and playwright. Being able to work with them, appear with them on stage was incredible for me. I was really young, in my early twenties, when I got to do that.

Then out here, one of my larger film credits was called Takers. It’s a heist movie that had Paul Walker and Idris Elba. I was the villain in that.

I was living in a studio in Hollywood at the time. We had a whole sequence that was shot at the Roosevelt Hotel, or it was set there at least. We filmed some stuff there and interiors largely on sets at Sony in Culver City on the stage.

But I remember cycling to base camp, right across from this iconic Hollywood hotel. I was like, “Wow, I’d like to go into my trailer.” They were like, “Where did you park?” I was like, “No, no, no, I cycled here because I live like four blocks away.” They shut down Hollywood Boulevard for that sequence. That’s when I felt like, “Wow. I’m doing it.”

100 Days to Live

PC: Tell us about 100 Days to Live, your character. and what attracted you to this project.
Gideon: 100 Days to Live is a psychological thriller. It’s interesting. It was a thing that came through my agent, and I always like to read the full script. A lot of actors don’t—they’re sort of happy just to read the audition material or whatever it might be. I really want to know. The older I get, I really do want to know more about what I’m doing and less like, “Sure. Sure. Whatever it might be.”

What was interesting for me in this is that the evolution of this character was something I certainly hadn’t tackled before. It wasn’t something I had seen on screen either. It gave me something fresh to explore. I was also really impressed with what the writer, Ravin Gandhi, had created. This is his first time directing and writing. He comes from a completely unrelated career, but he created this.

I was like, “Wow. This is really quite something.” Ravin’s passion came through. Once we started corresponding, he really sold me on the fact that this could be something because it’s an independent film, and I’ve certainly done a few of those in my time. It’s great to have a passion project and do something, but it’s a miracle that anything gets done and sees the light of day. That’s just the nature of it, even if it has a decent sized budget.

But I felt, with Ravin’s success, I figured this was going to have as good as a shot as any to go places because he was so determined. I was excited to hop on and I was also excited to work in Chicago, which I have only done briefly before.

PC: The film tackles a lot of really heavy topics, including suicide and mental health. Does that bring a different weight to the project?
Gideon: I think it does bring a different weight. One needs to be a little delicate approaching these topics and how they’re addressed. There are certain characters that I don’t want to play unless there’s something in the story which justifies a character’s actions.

I played a white supremacist on an episode of S.W.A.T., and that’s not something that I want to represent. I’m a White person and I grew up with White privilege. The last thing I want to do is represent this thing that I think we’re trying to address and combat globally. But the storyline moved in such a way where it wasn’t glorifying this role, so I was like, “I can make peace with doing this. It serves the story and is not just for the sake of it.”

Similarly, with the suicide element in 100 Days to Live, although it’s thematic, it’s addressed in quite an authentic way. I know Ravin did research. Heidi Johanningmeier, who is the lead actress playing Rebecca, she brings a tenderness, an emotional vulnerability, and a strength that really brings justice to the role. It addresses these issues in a way that isn’t exploitative.

PC: That’s the perfect segue to this next question. Over the course of the film, we learn what leads Victor to where he is today. How did you prepare to tackle his journey and the duality of your character?
Gideon: I think the characters that I enjoy playing the most are a little outside of the norm, and not your “good guys”. They’re the ones where you see a journey, an arc, and evolution. What’s interesting here is you see how Victor arrived at this point. Oftentimes with troubled characters, we just meet them; that’s where they are. For me, tackling this, what I feel like I managed to bring was a kind of empathy that this character used to have and his desperation to fix things.

I know in my own life, it can be an amiable quality that you want to fix things. You want to make things right, but it’s not your job to fix everybody. It’s that old adage: happiness is an inside job. I can’t, and it’s not my task. I’ve tried that in personal relationships. It’s not my job to fix my partner any more than it’s their job to fix me.

I think it’s bringing some of that conflict with trying to make other people whole, but also, how do you guide and support them? Victor, for his sins, can’t help but personally inject himself into other people’s lives where he feels that he can make a difference.

PC: Great answer. You’ve worked on projects of all sizes. What is it about independent filmmaking that excites you?
Gideon: Independent filmmaking is exciting because number one, you’re shooting for a shorter period of time. Why that is exciting is because it means that you have lightning in a bottle. When you’re constrained by a budget, it means you’re constrained by time. It means if you cast well, you crew up well, and you have a great script to begin with, then you can really use those things to create something great. It means you get to ideally play a bit more. You can make bigger, bolder choices, and then move on.

With larger scale productions, there is usually a lot of sitting around or time between filming days. You don’t have that on independent films; you’re in it. Day in, day out for a handful of weeks. There’s something exciting about that for the same reason that theater, live performance on stage is exciting.

Independent film tends to have risk takers because there’s a lot of self-financing. There’s an element of danger and risk-taking in independent film, which is also exciting.

PC: The film has made its way around the festival circuit and it’s been incredibly well received. What do you think is resonating most with audiences? What do you hope they take away after seeing the film?
Gideon: That’s a good question. I think people are surprised with where the story goes. It has some fun twists and turns. The characters are engaging, so you stay with them for the ride. My hope for this would be that people enjoy it for the simple escapist piece of entertainment, but also come away thinking a little bit more about the issues of mental health and suicide. I do think it doesn’t have to be a big message movie, but I do think that if you can take something away when you leave, well, when you finish streaming and you leave your living room, that you have a discussion and think about these issues.

There are millions of people who do deal with issues of mental health—especially now, where I feel like these numbers have risen and risen over the years. In the pandemic, when it’s genuinely harder to reach out sometimes, we can feel a little more isolated and alone on our little islands. I know for my wife and I, we were talking about how there are days when we feel really alone. We have each other, but it’s tough on everybody.

There’s so much negative chatter and comparison on the internet. What frustrates me is so many people do it anonymously. They say such awful stuff. It’s like, well, put your name behind that if you’re going to do that. I’ll sift through some awful stuff on my feed and I have my face and real name there. People will say some extraordinary things to me. I’m like, “What’s your name?” It’s offensive to do that kind of stuff. It’s also a challenge for me to not get engaged in that. I know I’ve gone off topic here, but people need to lead with positivity and not engage with stuff where there isn’t going to be a positive outcome for either of us.

If people come away thinking, “Wow. That was a hell of a ride. It got me thinking about something,” then we’ve done our job.

To keep up with Gideon, follow him on Twitter and Instagram. Watch 100 Days to Live wherever you stream movies.

Photo Credit: FaheyFoto