SLIFF 2016 Interview: Evan Ferrante – Tom Cruise Impersonator and Star of TOP SON

TOP SON screens at the Narrative Shorts: Comedy program Friday, Nov. 4 at 9:45pm at The Tivoli Theater as part of this year’s St. Louis International Film Festival. Ticket information can be found HERE. 

TOP SON stars Evan Ferrante as Mike Giavotella, a 30 year old Tom Cruise impersonator who still lives at home in his parents basement. When he learns of a local talent competition, he sees it as his opportunity to hit the big stage. More information about Top Son can be found at the film’s site HERE http://topsonmovie.com/

Evan Ferrante took the time to talk to We Are Movie Geeks about TOP SON

Interview conducted by Tom Stockman October 21st, 2016

Tom Stockman: Your film TOP SON is playing at the St. Louis International Film Festival on November 4. Are you going to be here for that?

Evan Ferrante: Absolutely.

TS: TOP SON was shot here, wasn’t it?

EF: It was. It was shot in St. Charles. It was a blast. My friend Abby Wathen, who I’ve known her for 20 years, plays my sister in that short. It was just a total coincidence that we both know each other because the filmmaker, Joe Puleo, wrote a script about a Tom Cruise impersonator who lives in his parent’s basement and dreams of fame and fortune and leaving his parents basement. He’s in his early 30s and should not be there any longer. Joe needed the best Tom Cruise impersonator out there and Abby told him that she knew me and that’s how I got the role.

TS: So, he wrote the film first? I almost assumed that he met you, then wrote the film around you.

EF: No, he happens to be a very committed Tom Cruise fan and he also loves those great Christopher Guest films. It was very savvy of him as a producer, but he was trying to create a film for very little money that had a lot of substance to it and he came up with that concept. Like the Christopher Guest films or The Office, it is shot in a talking -heads doc style. And he really knows all about Tom Cruise, so you write what you know, so that’s what he wrote.

TS: Was there a lot of improvising during shooting or did you guys stick pretty much to the script?

EF: We stuck to the script for the most part but there was some spontaneity. There are some great outtakes that we did, but we tried to keep it as tight as possible so we decided to mostly go by the script.

TS: I first saw TOP SON when it played at the St. Louis filmmakers showcase where you want to ‘Best Actor in a Short Film’ so congrats on that.

EF: Thanks, yes that was a surprise. The crew and the rest of the cast of TOP SON were all from St. Louis. Everyone except myself.

TS: Are you guys talking about doing a feature length film version of TOP SON?

EF: Yes, Joe the writer and director, and his friend Steve the producer are currently cowriting it together. They made a great short so when anyone asks them about their prospective feature they have that to show. It’s a smart approach. I’ve never met such motivated people. Out here in Hollywood, people move a lot slower.  They kind of coast through life. Joe is currently on the second draft of the feature’s screenplay. It will be low budget, probably under $1 million, but we hope to sprinkle some cameos in there from some name actors and comedic actors. I think it’s going to be great. It’s ripe for future adaptation. It gets into the family more and the Tom Cruise moments and the third act is going to go into a very exciting, Mission impossible, Jack Reacher direction, all running parallel to the story of him winning this local contest, Just like LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE. I think it has a lot of potential. Me too.

TS: How much is Mike Giavotella, the character you play in TOP SON, like you?

EF: Well, I don’t live in my parent’s basement, but I did after college, like many people of my generation, for three or four years. I absolutely do a Tom Cruise impersonation. I think I do it a little more professionally than him because I have something of a semblance of a career. But yes, we’re very similar. Joe wrote a close characterization.

TS: What do your real parents think of your Tom Cruise impersonating?

EF: They’ve been very supportive, but they go back-and-forth, wondering maybe if I should pursue something else or find something else to work on. Maybe another character. But it’s a side thing that I do. Maybe 30% of my life and income right now comes from my Tom Cruise stuff and the rest is from producing with my own production company.

TS: Have you met Tom Cruise?

EF: I did. I met him a few years back. It was a totally magical night, totally unexpected. I was at a restaurant in LA eating dessert, and the guy I was with heard a rumor that Tom Cruise was there that night. I couldn’t believe it. This was going to be the night that I came in contact with him! I was very excited about that. My friends I was with were egging me on to make it happen. I was looking for him but didn’t see him. I thought maybe he had left the building and it wasn’t going to happen. Then suddenly I felt his energy near me. He was sitting about 15 feet away from me at a dinner table with a group. I called the waiter over and wanted to send him an expensive bottle of champagne. The waiter stopped me dead in my tracks and told me if I did that, I would be banned from the restaurant and he would lose his job. The restaurant was the Château Marmont, a very exclusive place where a lot of celebrities go to and they don’t like to be bothered, so there are strict rules. I didn’t feel like I would be bothering him, since I had been impersonating him for eight years but I was just happy to be in the same vicinity as him. So, I just kept drinking and having a good time with my friends. My girlfriend, who was there said there was no way I was going through the evening without meeting him. Everyone cleared out of the restaurant except for his group and mine. He finally left and it was just me and my friends in the restaurant’s garden. My girlfriend excuse herself to go to the restroom.  It was two in the morning. My friend’s phone rang and he picked it up, then said to me “Tom Cruise wants to meet you in the lobby”. I couldn’t believe it. I raced to the lobby and he was there. We hugged each other. It was a beautiful moment in my life.

TS: Did Tom Cruise know who you were?

EF: Yes. Eight years ago, when I was starting out, I won an award for best Tom Cruise impersonator on that Mario Lopez show Extra! When I won, Tom Cruise was on the show with Mario watching my videos and laughing about them and saying how uncanny my impersonation is. I wasn’t invited to that show, so I never got a chance to meet him, But I won the contest.

TS: How did you get into this? When did you start imitating Tom Cruise?

EF: I was in college in 1998, right after JERRY MAGUIRE came out. My friend Alex and I were freshmen. He’s now a director. We lived in a very anti-social dormitory. It was actually a Howard Johnson’s hotel converted to a dorm. It wasn’t conducive to socializing, so we would make an extra effort to get to know the people living in the dorm on our level. The rest of the levels were actually for hotel guests. Alex came up with the idea because he thought I sounded just like Tom Cruise and had his personality and affectation. So, I learned some lines from JERRY MAGUIRE and some lines from RISKY BUSINESS. Alex happen to do a really good John Claude Van Damme impression, which is hilarious. So together we tag teamed and we knocked on dorm rooms and met women. Then I would do it at parties. Alex would always make me do it. It became like a very popular little parlor trick. I never had any aspirations of doing it professionally even though I am an actor. I have been a child actor from the age of eight to my late teens professionally in New York City. I never thought I would take this Tom Cruise show on the road and make money with. Years later, YouTube came out and I put up a video just for the heck of it. I was moving into producing at the time and had  really given up being an actor. But the YouTube videos had hundreds of thousands of views. It did well enough that I got a lot of work out of it.  I got work through Disney and other big studios and feature film work and corporate work. I’ve flown to New Zealand and London with it. I’ve done jobs all over the world. It’s been great.

TS: How has TOP SON been received at film festivals?

EF: We are all very close to it, but I don’t think any of us expected it to receive such a warm reception in St. Louis, but we were thrilled. We hope more people have the same reaction to it and we can do something bigger with it.

TS: What’s your next project?

EF: I’m producing a number of music docu-style interview series for Verizon Go90 platform.  Those are with my producer partner Adrian Grenier for a company called Wreckroom which is a subsidiary of Reckless Productions. With Reckless we do a lot of socially-minded documentaries and with Wreckroom it’s all music-based. I’m also trying to build a portfolio for a film fund or a TV fund around technology-centric stories, Things like Mr. Robot or EX-MACHINA. Anything to do with technology and its consequences. I did my first appearance on the Tonight Show a few weeks ago with Jimmy Fallon and that was very exciting,. I did a A FEW GOOD MEN sketch with a Jack Nicholson impersonator. I’m hoping that opens up some more doors and opportunities down the road.

TS: Well good luck with everything going on in your career and with the TOP SON feature and we’ll see you here in St. Louis in a couple of weeks.

EF: Thanks a lot!

Evan’s NOT: TOM CRUISE site can be found HERE nottomcruise.com