“Monster in the Family” Star Brendan Taylor on Stepping Into Darkness, Staying Grounded, and Why This True Story Issues

The emotional toll was actual. Brendan credit a trusted set, clear boundaries, and craft muscle reminiscence for getting him by heavier sequences. For the movie’s climactic “truck scene,” he selected to remain within the character’s headspace between takes—headphones on, vitality contained—so he may leap straight again into heightened emotion the second cameras rolled. “The imagination can be just as powerful,” he says, “and the body doesn’t always know the difference.” Expertise taught him the right way to let that depth cross as soon as the day was achieved.

Past approach, the story’s themes of trauma, household dynamics and survival, gave the work urgency. Brendan speaks brazenly about family abuse and its lengthy tail, particularly on kids who adapt in very alternative ways simply to get by. What moved him most was the arc of Stacey herself, who finally turns into an advocate. “That’s the important part. We’re bringing light to what this does, and somehow she turns it into strength for others.”

Authenticity was a group effort. Brendan calls working with Elisha Cuthbert “delightful” and elevating—her on-set fluency raised everybody’s recreation. Serendipity helped, too: he shares a protracted historical past with a number of solid members, together with an actor who’d been his coach for years and a longtime theater collaborator. That in-built belief paid off within the movie’s most intimate moments, like when manufacturing arrange an actual, enclosed driving atmosphere for the truck sequence—no crew crammed within the cab, simply two actors operating the scene repeatedly and discovering new layers every cross. “That’s where the magic happens,” he says.

What does he hope audiences take away? Consciousness, first. These aren’t manufactured beats for melodrama; variations of this story occur on a regular basis. And if the movie reaches even one particular person sparking therapeutic, braveness, or accountability, that’s a win. Professionally, the challenge stretched him in methods the digicam doesn’t at all times permit. He loves the vary (sure, he nonetheless has enjoyable doing commercials) however was grateful that producers remembered his stage work and trusted him with one thing darker: “To be asked feels great—to be honored with a story that carries more weight.”

As for what’s subsequent, Brendan’s simply again from a pair of business shoots in Vancouver and Toronto, settling into Los Angeles, and leaping into class to maintain the instruments sharp. There are just a few irons within the hearth he can’t focus on but—“feelers out,” as he places it—however for now he’s centered on constructing group and staying prepared.

This dialog solely scratches the floor. Brendan goes deeper on craft, character, and the actual individuals behind the headlines within the full video. Watch the whole interview under for the uncut, emotionally wealthy model.