David Jay as "Alexander"

[retzev]

Who the hell cast this toothless half-wit?

I want to know who is responsible!

 

[IluvBarnabas]

I thought the kid did a decent enough acting job....of course I couldn't stand Alexander, but that was the point, he wasn't supposed to be likable.

I hated both Alexander AND Michael, actually, but I thought the kids did a fine enough job acting-wise as it was.

[arashi]

Oh My God, Alexander. My sister, Mother and I have a ridiculously stupid amount of fun randomly popping out with "That's when my birfday is... Care-o-lynn's going to be theah."

[MagnusTrask]

It's a little problematic saying he acted the part well, when all the proto-Jebs and Jeb proper are so unpleasant that they're the villain you can't stand to see onscreen.    I can't blame the casting person (even if I knew the name I wouldn't out her/him here.... maybe quietly retired someplace trying to live down the decision) for seeing C Pennock and deciding he had "something"... he does.     Gabriel was the part for him... and he exudes unpredictability and danger, but Jeb as a supernatural menace was all wrong.    He was a street thug, not an atmospheric villain that set off your imagination in some way.     Actually, CP would have made more sense as a non-supernatural peripheral thug character.

Once you had CP as Jeb, then they had to go looking for the most unpleasant little boys they could find for Jeb the Early Days.    I can see them seeing kids, finding David Jay, and saying, "Get him the f out of here!    I can't stand to be in the same room with him!   He's perfect!!!"

The bad storyline set off a whole series of bad decisions that couldn't be avoided, I think.     Executive Producers should be prevented by law from meddling "creatively" in their own shows.    I'm just finishing Leviathans again, therefore I'm bitter.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Executive Producers should be prevented by law from meddling "creatively" in their own shows.

If only that had happened in DS' case. Just think of some of the things we might have been spared! Though chief among them might have been the seemingly 101 roles for RD which were essentially the same screaming, hair-touching, hands-all-over-his-female-costars character. 

[retzev]

I thought the kid did a decent enough acting job....of course I couldn't stand Alexander, but that was the point, he wasn't supposed to be likable.

I have to disagree. I can't properly dislike Alexander because I can't stomach David Jay.  I can't believe him as Alexander because he was completely incompetent and ruined every scene he was in. A good actor will make a dislikable character a pleasure to watch, something David Jay was incapable of.

I hated both Alexander AND Michael, actually, but I thought the kids did a fine enough job acting-wise as it was.

I've only seen Michael in a couple of episodes so far, and I can't tell you how relieved I was when he appeared. And he seems to be a pretty good actor.

[MagnusTrask]

 

Though chief among them might have been the seemingly 101 roles for RD which were essentially the same screaming, hair-touching, hands-all-over-his-female-costars character. 

I've recently seen enough RD to assess the hair-touching thing, and I think this refers to his grasping his head with both hands to express fear.    I've also noticed that Quentin and Willie do this too, sometimes.    Not the best way to convey fear admittedly, and Davis's attempts are more incoherent than the other actors', but someone was clearly telling these actors to do that.

I missed Ned Stuart entirely.  My tapes don't cover that period.  (And basically only 3 roles, right?)   But Bradford being as physical as he was with Victoria seemed somewhat touching (no pun intended) to me, despite RD's con reputation, and Bradford/Clark were respectable protagonists.    Tate was a credible agitated artist, this coming from someone who can understand the mentality a bit.    Tate: primo nutso centagenarian.     Mwaugh.   I just did that thing where you simulate a kiss out into the air to indicate artsy appreciation.

[retzev]

DAVID JAY's imdb.com entry: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0419583/

The dude has more credits under his belt than I expected.

And was he really only on 6 episodes? Seemed like at least twice that.

[Willie]

He was just too young to act.  I could never tell if he had some sort of accent or if he was talking baby-talk.  Not good when he's supposed to be menacing. 

[Gerard]

Maybe they could've gotten Cousin Oliver from The Brady Bunch to play Alexander.  Now that REALLY would've been horrifying.

Gerard

[MagnusTrask]

Everyone makes fun of the Brady Bunch, yet everyone seemed to watch it... why?    I didn't.     I don't have a lot of these shared experiences other people seem to have.

I just remembered a fourth R Davis role... I'm counting two of the roles as one... same person.

[BuzzH]

A good actor will make a dislikable character a pleasure to watch. 

I *totally* agree!  B-movie actor Richard Lynch mostly plays dispicable villains, but he's such a good actor you love to HATE his characters!  

[Mysterious Benefactor]

This is a topic about David Jay, so I'm loath to get too deeply into the obsession that is RD touching his hair (and also because it's a subject that's been covered so many times in so many other topics), BUT I do feel the need to point out that it's a very different thing for some DS actors to occasionally touch their hair from time to time and for RD to touch his hair to convey every range of emotion from sheer joy to intense anger. And, yes, a director might have instructed certain actors to occasionally touch their hair to get a point across or to heighten a moment, BUT there's such a thing as an actor's tick - something they do over and over (and over and over and over in RD's case). It's not something that happens occasionally, or simply because a director might want it, but because the actor can't reign themselves in.

It's a shame that many of our current members weren't around back in 2002-2003 when the forum actually kept a running tally at the top of the BoardIndex of the number of times RD touched his hair. For example, here's a sample capture that was taken somewhere around the end of 2002:

And here is a link to a topic from July 2002 that called attention to the very sad fact that in Ep #567 RD touched his hair 16 times!!!!

!! Hair Touching Alert !!

Any director that would specifically instruct his/her actor to touch their hair that many times in the course of 22 minutes of television would most definitely have to be sorely lacking in imagination and they should do the world a favor and resign from the Directors Guild pronto!!   Though in fact, they probably wouldn't even have to resign - the Directors Guild would probably expel them for sheer lack of talent!! 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

A good actor will make a dislikable character a pleasure to watch.

I *totally* agree!  B-movie actor Richard Lynch mostly plays dispicable villains, but he's such a good actor you love to HATE his characters!  

And just look at 1840/41's Virginia Vestoff. She was brilliant at making Samantha a first class, A #1 bitch!    The talent for that sort of thing doesn't come along every day. 

As for David Jay, my feeling is that it's a blessing Alexander was only in 6 episodes. If only Jeb had been in as few...

[arashi]

LOL! I had totally forgotten about that hair touching tally board!

I miss the tarot cards too, those were quite nicely done.

As for David Jay, I'm not sure but I think he may be incorrectly labeled on the imdb as the writer for the song "So Alive." I was doing a bit of research and it looks like that song was written by David J. from Bauhaus.