In The Public Domain: Past, Present, Future with Patrick Coyle

Like most actors, SAG-AFTRA Twin Cities Local member Patrick Coyle has played a variety of roles over his lifetime, on and off both stage and screen, including student, actor, writer, director, singer, teacher, husband and father. I recently sat down with him over coffee to talk about many of those “roles” — how it all began for him, and where he’s going next. 

When and Where it All Began
Coyle grew up in Omaha, Neb. as one of two brothers in an Irish Catholic family that also included six sisters. After graduating from high school, he enrolled at the University of Nebraska, Omaha, as an English literature major and eventually earned his bachelor’s degree in that discipline. In his junior year at UNO he became friends with a young man who was interested in theater and who began to regularly audition for plays in the Theater Department. Even though he had never felt an urge to participate in any aspect of theater, Coyle, being a supportive and loyal friend, accompanied his friend to some of these auditions. Eventually, the theater director running the auditions told Coyle that if he wanted to stay and watch, he had to audition as well. Since he felt he had nothing to lose, Coyle went ahead and read for the play … and was cast in his first stage production, Night Watch, a murder mystery. After that show, he auditioned for The Glass Menagerie and was cast in the role of Tom. Those experiences got him officially “hooked,” so he refocused his class schedule to include theater classes. He even participated in a one-year playwriting intensive through the University of Nebraska Writers’ Workshop.

After graduation, Coyle acted locally at the Omaha Playhouse and then honed his acting skills by working in a variety of regional and dinner theater productions. He earned his AEA card while working on a professional production at Omaha’s Firehouse Theatre. 

In the mid-1980s, Coyle decided to move north to Minneapolis to take advantage of the many theater and film opportunities that were abundant in the Twin Cities at the time. In between acting jobs, Coyle worked as a waiter, a bartender and as a freelance writer, crafting reviews and other pieces for publications like the Skyway News. Also during this time period, Coyle met a beguiling young Minnesota-born woman by the name of Lily. This meeting (happily) sealed Coyle’s fate and ensured he would stay in Minneapolis with his soon-to-be wife and an eventual growing family.

Patrick Coyle and his daughter Clara

From Stage to Screen
Coyle’s initial stage work in the Twin Cities including working at Dudley Riggs’ West Bank theater, which not only provided him with more regular pay and steady acting work, but also needed experience and exposure. While working with Dudley Riggs, he was asked to audition for his first commercial voiceover job, which led to more of the same, and then finally, to an on-camera union commercial for a gas company. Coyle told me that he would always remember the experience of that job: The shoot was on location in Des Moines and he was “treated so well” that he was amazed. All of his prior non-union jobs paled in comparison. He realized that the union job was a “real step up.” At that point, offered the chance to join the union, he pounced on the opportunity and “never looked back” (Patrick joined Twin Cities AFTRA in 1985 and joined SAG in 1998). According to Patrick:

It was not easy to qualify for the union and tougher still to work enough to make it worthwhile, but I felt I had arrived as a professional when I joined the union, that I had credibility from coast to coast. I still believe that. I realized there is a ceiling I would hit as a non-union actor. I am proud to be a union actor and have not looked back on my decision to join.

Over the course of his commercials career, Coyle has provided voiceovers for a variety of products, including, among others, H&R Block, Hamburger Helper (he was the voice of the “comeback” Helper Hand) and Air Touch Cellular, for which he acted as spokesman for a year but was eventually replaced — by James Earl Jones! He has also appeared onstage locally in productions at several theaters, including Torch Theatre Company, The Jungle Theater, Eye of the Storm and The Cricket Theater. Coyle’s on-screen credits include appearances in the film Sweet Land (20th Century Fox), A Chance of Snow (Lifetime Original Films) and The Death of Tommy Grimes (PBS Films), among others. And during his spare time, he has also gigged as lead singer with a popular local jazz band, performing on stage and at weddings (in fact, that jazz band will be playing a gig in Minneapolis in early May to kick off Coyle’s current film project, The Public Domain, discussed below).

Coyle’s Second Stage – Writer/Director/Filmmaker
Even while working on his stage/screen acting career, Coyle continued to write. Since he loved theater and enjoyed writing, he wrote a play titled Detective Fiction, which, after a major setback, eventually became Coyle’s first full-length feature film. That first film was selected to appear in the 2003 Sundance Film Festival. Coyle shared some details of this unique journey: 

I love movies; they are why I entered the acting/writing/directing profession. I wrote a play — Detective Fiction — that was optioned by a Hollywood director who said, “We are going to make this movie!” He held the rights for five years. Then he called me and said “I am retiring; we are not going to make this movie!” So I was disappointed for about five minutes, then I went to work on doing it myself. Because of my visionary executive producer, Michael McHugh, a man from the business world who loves the arts and who believed in me, two years later I made Detective Fiction and it went to Sundance, launching the writer/director chapter of my career. I learn so much from every film I make, I can’t wait to get to the next one to apply what I know. But I am most acutely aware of the fact that I am only as good as my actors. That is why I would never try to make a film without union talent. 

In 2002, when Coyle began production on Detective Fiction, he formed Ten Ten Films, and has continued to write and produce, with assistance from what he terms his “invaluable” team, which includes, in addition to Executive Producer McHugh, Producer Ann Luster, Executive Producers Elizabeth and Charles Mooty, and legal counsel Michelle Culligan. He feels that his film projects are a “gift,” so when he gets a chance to do a new film, he strives to make it a “step up” from the last project. He clearly succeeded with his second locally shot union film, Into Temptation (produced with financial assistance that also included a 2006 McKnight Screenwriting Fellowship). Not only was Into Temptation screened more widely than Detective Fiction, it was also declared the 2009 winner of the prestigious Newport Beach Film Festival.

In addition to working on his own film and television projects, Coyle also continues to write scripts — at the request of his Hollywood contacts — and has now crafted more than a dozen screenplays, of which two are in development and one is currently in production. He and his local team are currently focused on preproduction for his third screenplay, The Public Domain. This film focuses on four fictional individuals whose lives are forever altered due to the August 2007 35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis, and who are then drawn together five years later at a local “nordeast” bar dubbed The Public Domain. In yet another confirmation of his talent and growing reputation, Coyle was one of three local filmmakers recently awarded a state-funded Legacy Arts and Cultural Heritage Production Reimbursement Award, which he will use toward production costs for this new film. With the guidelines of that award in mind, Coyle tells me that he will need to start filming locally in the next several months, and looks forward to again working with our “extraordinary” pool of local union talent. 

Merger on our Minds
Although, as we all know, the commercial and film production landscape has changed dramatically in Minnesota in recent years, both Coyle and I believe that the merger of SAG-AFTRA will have a positive impact on that landscape — both nationally and locally — but it may take some time. Coyle told me that he feels strongly that the “bar lowers in every facet of a production” if union actors/production staff aren’t utilized. When I asked Coyle for his take on the merger, he noted, “The merger can only make us stronger. It was a long time coming. I am thrilled we are one union, and I think as the economy continues to improve, it is just a matter of time before actors who truly want to call themselves professionals will realize that the way to go is union.” 

A Day in the Life …
Since I hoped to end our interview on a light note, I asked Coyle to share a memorable story from one of his many “roles” and he related the following incident from the set of In Temptation, involving one of his stars, Kristin Chenoweth:

Kristin’s first day on the set of Into Temptation was terrifying. Her very first scene was to walk up a flight of steps and enter a church. A crowd of 100 bystanders had heard a “star” was on the set. They were all watching. As Kristin (all 4-feet-10-inch and 90 pounds of her) entered the church, I yelled “cut,” she came out, and tripped on the first big step down. She dropped, rolled, hopped up and teetered on a steep flight of steps before getting her balance and yelling “I’m okay,” like the tough Broadway crooner/hoofer she is! The audience burst into applause; I thanked God and started breathing again … eventually.

Final Thoughts
As we ended our time together, I thanked Coyle for sharing so much of his journey (and thanked his very patient daughter who had accompanied him to the coffee shop). While his may be a unique experience in Minnesota, it is also a testament to the success that having real passion for your profession — along with hard work, people who believe in you, and, of course, a bit of the “luck of the Irish” — can bring, no matter where you live! Coyle summed it up nicely when he said: “Detective Fiction got me to Into Temptation, which is getting me to The Public Domain which, with the help of all the great talent we have here, will rock — in my biased opinion!”

Coyle's band, Brass Menagerie

This appeared in the local Twin Cities News & Views.