Superstar Actress Ava Cantrell Chats Acting, Philanthropy & more!

 

I start­ed my career real­ly ear­ly and I took on chal­leng­ing the­atri­cal short films. It did­n’t mat­ter to my fam­i­ly if I got paid or not, I was able to take on roles that would help me grow as an actress. I start­ed my career before social media and some of things that younger peo­ple now have and I am so grate­ful for that. When you are not wor­ried about a like count or even know­ing if your work will get seen, then you are work­ing for the sheer pas­sion of the art. It is my job as an actress to love the audi­tion process because for a short time that role belongs to every­one. It gives us all a chance to read the script, do the work and learn. My suc­cess is due to all the hours that I have put in and that includes class­es, audi­tions, coach­ing, the skill of mem­o­riz­ing, as well as all the audi­tions and roles that I haven’t got. The roles that I have got are the icing on the cake. I take every moment of the process in and learn from every sin­gle per­son I meet on set. After all of that if I win an award, like “Le Femme Inter­na­tion­al Ris­ing Star” then it is just cel­e­brat­ing my small vic­to­ries and be real­ly hap­py that peo­ple love my work. 

 

 

I have been asked this many times and it is inter­est­ing because it always changes. Each role from Pene­lope Pritchard on Nick­elodeon, to Teen Diana on Lights Out, to play­ing a girl with ter­mi­nal can­cer, to being able to work with the best of the best on “Young Shel­don” has been equal­ly yet dif­fer­ent­ly reward­ing and that is this weeks answer! 

 

 

My Dad and his friend Pete came up with the con­cept of Deten­tion Boys. They were two Dad’s past the par­ty days. Way past lol, and Pete was in a band him­self. They thought how hilar­i­ous it would be to have mid­dle aged guys want to do try to be boy ban­ders again. I loved the script in mock­u­men­tary style and thought it was the per­fect first project to take on. I got sup­port from a San Diego film pro­duc­tion com­pa­ny Fer­rari Pro­duc­tions which was real­ly amaz­ing. I loved direct­ing and real­ly learned a lot. I am super excit­ed to start pre-pro­duc­tion on my next short film The Tire Tree, which is what hap­pens when a boy is bul­lied and told to meet at the place every­one gets beat up at. I am in talks with some of my Dis­ney and Nick­elodeon younger kid friends to play some of the roles. I want it set in the 80’s and I want music incor­po­rat­ed in it and I am a huge music fan. I would like it to be fun with some deep­er under­ly­ing tones as well as have sort of a Rocky Bal­boa feel. I am thank­ful for my first direct­ing project and I feel real­ly con­fi­dent about the next. 

 

 

I love giv­ing back. It is real­ly our duty to give back and if every­one just did a lit­tle bit more then think of what a bet­ter place our world would be. I was taught from a young age to hand peo­ple mon­ey on the street, to spend­ing my time giv­ing back. I love Paw Works and how many shel­ter pets they save and the dif­fer­ence they make from help­ing low­er income fam­i­lies spay and neuter to help­ing make a whole coun­ty no kill, which is Ven­tu­ra. There are so many great breed dogs as well as pup­pies in the shel­ter that need homes. We need to con­sid­er those ani­mals first when look­ing for a pet. I firm­ly believe that. The Rose Bear gave part of pro­ceeds to Chil­dren’s Hos­pi­tal LA and recent­ly I worked direct­ly with Starlight Chil­dren’s Foun­da­tion and UCLA Mat­tel Chil­dren’s Hos­pi­tal. As their ambas­sador I spent the day at the hos­pi­tal play­ing vir­tu­al games with the kids. It is incred­i­ble how much joy gam­ing in hos­pi­tal bring seri­ous­ly ill kids. I cre­at­ed a cam­paign on Tilti­fy to raise mon­ey and I have more plans with Starlight Chil­dren’s Foun­da­tion that I hope brings more aware­ness and fun for the kids that real­ly need that. 

 

5.While work­ing as an actress and a direc­tor, what is your dai­ly rou­tine? Do you start your day with any type of grat­i­tude? What is “Ava” time like? Movies, the beach? 

 

When I am on set work­ing my mind is 200% on the work. It starts the night before with prep work and get­ting enough sleep. When I am act­ing or direct­ing, I stay ful­ly in the process. I am not a method actor, for me it is more about stay­ing present in each moment. There is no per­son­al sit­u­a­tion or real­ly any­thing that can dis­tract me. My dai­ly rou­tine now that I am in col­lege part time, involves get­ting ready for school and all that comes with it. I am in episod­ic sea­son which is keep­ing me insane­ly busy. So real­ly right now that is all I am doing and in any off moments I am at the beach catch­ing waves and try­ing refu­el. I have so many movies and TV shows to catch up on. I don’t real­ly have the time but now that fall is here I know I will be curl­ing up on the couch and catch­ing up. 

 

 

I am the lead of a fea­ture film called Abi­gail in the title role. I can’t wait to film that indie fea­ture and we are get­ting close to being fund­ed. We are hop­ing for a tril­o­gy. The script is a hor­ror that have some seri­ous Bon­nie and Clyde vibes. I am Clyde. It is set in the 70’s. It is going to be such a blast to film and I am work­ing with Shon­drel­la Avery on this. She is an exec pro­duc­er as well and I am learn­ing a lot from her before we have even start­ed film­ing. So thank­ful to get to work with true female boss women. I am work­ing on a series with Bran­don TV called Crest­more in a lead role. That project is with Awe­some TV and Via­com. It is Will and Grace meets Riverdale. My boyfriend in the show Bran­don Stew­art is real­iz­ing he is gay at a very try­ing time in his life. We all know how com­pli­cat­ed those teen years are. We have an inter­est­ing and com­plex rela­tion­ship and I think its an impor­tant sto­ry to tell. I will be direct­ing The Tire Tree which I men­tioned. I am work­ing on episode two of my com­ic Amult of Lilith that is cur­rent­ly sell­ing on Comixol­o­gy and I have a cou­ple net­work things in the mix that I am cross­ing fin­gers on. It is a real­ly excit­ing time full of pos­si­bil­i­ty and I am super pumped.