Stars Making a Social Impact: Why & How Joe Towne of The Performers Mindset Is Helping To Change Our World
An Interview With Edward Sylvan
Together, we have developed some curriculums that started in person and have been adapted for the virtual landscape we find ourselves in. It is remarkable to be able to go to work during the day and share insights that evening. Our company the Performers Mindset has a mission to help people learn from some of the world’s top performers — across various disciplines — with science-backed research as our guide. It is a joy to be able to share this work. It means so much to me that people entrust us to be a part of their journey. I love teaching and coaching and the people I get to work with inspire me and teach me in return.
As a part of our series about stars who are making an important social impact, I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing Joe Towne.
Born in upstate NY and raised on Long Island, Joe Towne’s professional journey as an actor and creator includes a storied career in theater, with roles in a Star Wars Trilogy recap featured on BBC Radio and performed for George Lucas at Skywalker Ranch, Mr. Pink in Edinburgh Fringe Fest’s highly rated production of Reservoir Dogs and opposite Rebel Wilson in the New Line feature film, Isn’t It Romantic.
In 2018, Towne launched The Performer’s Mindset to complement actors and creators of all types with proven mindset tools and techniques to take their work to the next level, while helping relieve stress and burnout. Through his mindset coaching, Joe hopes to encourage the next generation of actors, athletes, broadcasters, and corporate professionals to bring awareness and purpose to life’s biggest moments.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Can you share with us the “backstory” that led you to this career path?
I’ve wanted to be an actor ever since seeing the Wizard of Oz on my parents’ friends’ television. I ran up to the screen and said: I want to get in mommy, how do I get in? I was a bit of a ham in front of the camera growing up, but not in front of groups. Just in front of my parents. I had a lot of fun on my own doing Bugs Bunny/Mel Blank impressions to a record I had and telling jokes into a tape recorder. At five, I stood on stage at the East Side Comedy Club and told my first joke to a room filled with adults. What I didn’t know is that jokes had a structure (as in a clear beginning, middle and end.) So, I just made up a story. They chuckled and clapped when I was finished. I liked the clapping. I had no idea where I was so there was no “pressure” for me at that time.
At thirteen, I was too shy to audition for the school play. I was fortunate that a teacher saw something in me and invited me down to see what a rehearsal was like for the fall play: The Miracle Worker. I was offered (my first offer!) the role of a seven-year-old dead brother of Annie Sullivan (Helen Keller’s teacher.) And I was hooked. The biggest challenge I had was my nerves. I couldn’t get onto the stage without being in a bathroom stall doubled over in pain. I had ulcers at thirteen. The pre-show bathroom visit was every night of every performance for four years.
I had no confidence. And it was acting that helped me develop confidence, slowly but surely. I went off to an acting camp called Stagedoor Manor were a Broadway show (Lost in Yonkers) was conducting an open search. Three callbacks later, it was a kind word from the casting director (Jay Binder) who encouraged me that I could do this as a profession. So, I decided to go to college for acting and I was off to the races. (Only to discover how much I still had to learn.)
Can you share the funniest or most interesting story that occurred to you during your career? What was the lesson or take away that you took out of that story?
In 2003, I auditioned for the movie Garfield. It was a handful of characters, and it was fun to do. I liked Garfield growing up and this was a real studio feature. I felt like being in the room for an opportunity like this meant I was on the right path. I got a call from the casting office, and they asked me if I’d like to be the on-set voice of Garfield the cat. I wouldn’t be on-screen but I would get to read opposite the stars of the movie: Jennifer Love Hewitt and Breckin Meyer. I was there for almost a month and learned a lot by watching what was going on. Technically, I was walking between two worlds, I was acting but I was a member of the crew. I met some amazing people on that set. And not only did I end up getting to shoot a small role in that film on screen towards the end, but the director also came up to me at the wrap party to thank me and tell me some news. He said “Well Joe, we’ve found your replacement for your voice. Bill Murray is going to be the voice of Garfield in this film. I said if anyone was going to replace me, I would hope it would be Billy Murray.
After the movie went on to be a hit, Fox greenlit the sequel. I got a call from the AD I met on the original film to ask if I would come in again and be the on-set voice. This time not only of Garfield but also of his nemesis, Prince. On the first day, they asked me if I might also read the voices for all the animals (14) all with different accents. After the first take, the whole crew laughed and hollered, and they decided to record my voice as a scratch track for the editors. At the end of the film, I was invited to audition for the role of Bolero the Spanish bull. The booth director was very kind and suggested I could be a voice match for Antonio Banderas. I laughed. I couldn’t believe that I had just had my first animation audition for a feature film (I didn’t even have agents or a demo at that time) and even though I didn’t end up with that role, I got a call a bit later asking if I would come work on Alvin and the Chipmunks voicing Alvin, Simon and Theodore on set.
If I learned anything on that, it is that developing and maintaining relationships matter. Doing your best matters. And opportunities will open where there weren’t any before.
What would you advise a young person who wants to emulate your success? There is a quote that comes to mind when I think about trying to emulate someone else’s success:
“Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise; seek what they sought. Seek the meaning behind their footsteps, and not upon the steps themselves.
-Matsuo Bashō, a 17th Century Japanese poet
I think that the comparative mind is laden with traps for us. Whether we are comparing ourselves to someone else or comparing ourselves to how we were at another time or even when we compare ourselves to the idea we had in our head.
Every path is different. And even if things look similar, we can never step into the same river twice.
Is there a person that made a profound impact on your life? Can you share a story?
I moved back to New York City directly after graduating from college at USC. I didn’t know exactly why I wanted to move back. I graduated six months early (partially at the request of my grandparents who were helping me with college) and I had just been offered a producing track at a production company at 20th Century Fox. My closest friends were in Los Angeles at this point, and I had never lived in Manhattan before. But I felt a pull. While doing theatre at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in the summer, I got a call from my mother who informed me that she had gotten some news. They had found a tumor and she was undergoing some treatment. Her deepest wish was to go to India on a pilgrimage. She had this dream of going for over 20 years and she wanted me to take her there. So, we went.
Within three months of returning my mother had brain surgery to remove a tumor the size of a golf ball — and survived it. But the cancer was too far progressed, and she died shortly thereafter. I put on a brave face for a while. Eventually, I started to get numb. I found that I had started to say no to life. I couldn’t have articulated it, but about one year after my mom passed away, I met Gary Austin, the founder and creator of the Groundlings. I took one of his classes and something in me work up. In order to improvise well, I had to say yes to things. Gary taught me the rules of the art of improvisation, and it not only gave me a skill, but it also turned my life around. Gary became a close friend, a mentor. I traveled to take classes with him in Los Angeles, Seattle, the Catskills. He introduced me to my first theatrical agents and after they signed me I moved back to Los Angeles. Gary and his wife Wendy allowed me to sleep on their couch with their dogs while I got settled. Gary helped me get a car (a BMW 2002 that was Kermit the Frog green.) I became Gary’s assistant so I could continue to take classes. Gary helped me fall back in love with acting after that profound heartbreak. I am forever grateful to him.
How are you using your success to bring goodness to the world? Can you share with us the meaningful or exciting causes you are working on right now?
I believe that my life is about creating art and helping others be better versions of themselves. I am very fortunate to have met some incredible artists who also coach and teach and are still performing themselves. Together, we have developed some curriculums that started in person and have been adapted for the virtual landscape we find ourselves in. It is remarkable to be able to go to work during the day and share insights that evening. Our company the Performers Mindset has a mission to help people learn from some of the world’s top performers — across various disciplines — with science-backed research as our guide.
It is a joy to be able to share this work. It means so much to me that people entrust us to be a part of their journey. I love teaching and coaching and the people I get to work with inspire me and teach me in return.
Can you share with us the story behind why you chose to take up this cause?
For me something was missing. Why was it that people who had talent, had trained their craft and prepared…would sometimes fall apart right before they started working? What was it about their mind, or the habits that was causing them to unravel all their preparation instead of bringing it all to life? I started to research sports psychology and sports science about what elite athletes were doing to navigate pressure and nerves, how to develop and train confidence and understand what they had come to understand could teach the rest of us. It was this curiosity that launched our very first program that I developed with an amazing actress and coach Hillary Tuck. And soon we had other teachers who joined us as we started to expand and travel to other cities.
Can you share with us a story about a person who was impacted by your cause?
Sure! There was an actress who had stepped away from acting to have her baby. She had worked for years, was immensely talented and came into a coaching session very well prepared. At the end of our session, she was excited, and brimming with confidence…until she mentioned the casting office that she was going to. This office has a pretty strong reputation, and she was nervous to go in due to the pressure. I walked her out of the building and, quoting a podcast I had just heard, offered her a simple tool. I suggested a practice when she drove when we landed and just before she went into the room. It was super simple, and I asked her to call me when she was done. I was curious if she would take me up on it and if it would help.
About forty minutes later I got a call that said: “Joe, that sh!# is magic and you need to tell everyone about it. I offered some tools to some of my other coaching clients, and it seemed to be the missing ingredient for them and they didn’t understand why they didn’t have these tools sooner.
Are there three things that individuals, society or the government can do to support you in this effort?
Yes. Encourage space to decompress, reflect and recover. Build these into our processes and cultures across schools and businesses and families. Value and respect time off for well-being. Don’t treat people like batteries that are replaceable and simply there to keep our machines moving in perpetual motion. Build in time for micro-recovery and re-setting across all crafts. Perhaps we can cultivate a well-being break as an alternative to the smoke break.
What are your “5 things I wish someone told me when I first started” and WHY.
- When I was first acting, I believed that there was a perfect take on a story or a scene. I felt that if I could just work long enough and hard enough, I could uncover that take. I had heard of artists I respected doing 70 takes on set sometimes. I felt like my job was to be like Michaelangelo carving the statue of David. To keep eliminating mistakes until David emerged. To get it perfect. It wasn’t until I directed my first few films and spent time in the editing room that I realized how useful it was to have different options. Different colors and flavors and pace and emphasis. Different ways of playing with the same material. I started to value playing with my performance and started to dissolve the idea of perfect vs flawed.
- My next insight was around mistakes. My practice for years was to walk out of a room and flog myself for the mistakes that I made. Much of this had to do with getting my lines right and perfect. It felt like most of my work was like the second serve in tennis. Good enough to keep the ball in play. But I wasn’t trying to do the first serve and really go for it. It felt too risky. The insight came from listening to a conversation between Rich Roll and Dr Michael Gervais. I listened to their conversation dozens of times. And their wisdom helped me reframe my relationship to failure. To me, failure was no longer making a mistake. It was not going for it.
- I grew up as a people pleaser. I think a lot of it had to do with my feelings around safety. I felt like if I did as I was told and if I pleased the adults in my life then I would be safe in the world. This spilled over into my auditioning life. My goal was to come in, have them like me and have them think I did a good job. I often came into the room wanting something from them. Their approval. The job. Feedback. And all those things are lovely. They feel amazing! But I can’t control any of that. I can only influence that and part of how I can do it is indirect. Instead of trying to PLEASE them and GET something and DO a good job…I needed to get clear on what my job is in the room. My job is to OFFER them my take on the material. The version that brings THEIR story to life while lighting my SOUL on fire. If I can do that, I will feel good about what I did, even if the job doesn’t go my way. There are simply too many reasons behind the scenes why we don’t get jobs and my obsession with other people’s opinions and what I thought they *might* be thinking about me was creating head noise. Which led to more anxiousness. So flipping this around has led to a more enjoyable process. And I’ve found that when the process is fun (and challenging) then the results start to take care of themselves.
- I also used to believe that our jobs ended when we finished the last line of our audition or song or pitch in the room. The moment when the work officially ended. But that isn’t the end. We are often still in the room and there is a little bit of time left afterwards where we form the last impression for our collaborators. And once we leave the room our job isn’t over. We can’t just flip the switch back on and go back to our lives. We have been doing hard, focused, creative work and there is a real deal impact to that. Often, we are depleted, we may still be amped up, we may need to process what happened and we probably need a pee, a snack and some quiet time…or all of the above. So our job is part of the bigger picture, the long game which is finding a way to sustain. Not just through today’s work but through a lifetime of our passion and our craft.
- A lot of well-intentioned people offer some well-intentioned advice. Sometimes one of our friends, or teachers, or our reps or our significant other will say something like “just relax” or “you’ll get the next one.” And these general thoughts are helpful, generally speaking, but I wonder how many people out there feel like when they are having some feelings about something or someone they care about…to hear the words just relax can be infuriating. Because now I am not only wrestling with whatever demon has shown its face to me, but I am also failing at being able to instantly relax. Do I have concrete tools to relax? Can I reach for it when I’m triggered? Can I trust it? Sometimes the tools we need are simple. But often we haven’t done the lonely work to know what works for us — especially in choppy waters and stormy seas. And you’ll get the next one is a sweet thought too. It’s trying to help us detach and let go of thinking about the one we wanted. But disappointment can’t be just ignored repeatedly. At some point we must be with it. We need to process it. We need to understand how long it takes and what our body is doing and recognize that bypassing the feelings will come with a price tag down the road.
You are a person of enormous influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
I would love to start a movement where we pause and check-in — just before we do whatever it is that we are about to do: To pause before we work. Pause before we respond. Pause before we cross a threshold. Paise before we take a bit of food. Pause before we move on to the next thing. Pause before we start and end our day. We can fill this pause with practices and purpose. So that may take time to play around with. But the power is in the pause. And the same goes for when we finish working, taking a bite of food, talking. Pausing to check-in, to savor what happened and let that inspire what comes next. This is a movement I would love to help start.
Can you explain how that was relevant in your life?
My current favorite life lesson is don’t talk about it, be about it. I heard it from an incredible speaker and author (and now friend), Kevin Carroll. He embodies this in the way he does relationships and has done so his whole life. It’s something that is top of mind when I find myself talking too much about something but haven’t started taking action.
We are blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Politics, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why?
He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂
Marshawn Lynch. He is my all-time favorite athlete and I love how he shows up in the world.
He’s got a badass nickname (BeastMode), he is authentically himself no matter the outcome and what other people think. He seems to value what is real in the world and he shows up for his community. I want to meet him. Eat something delicious. Laugh our asses off and figure out how I can help support his vision and efforts of taking care of his Oakland family. Also, our birthdays are two days apart. His is April 22nd. My birthdate is his jersey number 24.
This was very meaningful, thank you so much. We wish you only continued success on your great work!
Stars Making a Social Impact: Why & How Joe Towne of The Performers Mindset Is Helping To Change… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.