body of work
JULIE CARMEN
Actress... and so much more. by Hali Simons
Longtime Malibu resident Julie Carmen opens up about her acting career and life transitions that have given her a wealth of new opportunities for abundant personal and professional growth. Julie Carmen, an actress for more than three decades, has starred in films for directors Robert Redford, John Cassavetes, John Carpenter and Michael Mann. She studied extensively with Sanford Meisner at Neighborhood Playhouse, Uta Hagen at HB Studio and most recently with Patsy Rodenburg of Guildhall. But once she moved to Malibu, her focus turned toward her children turning a yoga teacher’s training program into quality family time. Julie has since taught at Malibu Yoga, Passages, Exhale. During this time, Carmen also completed a Masters degree in Clinical Psychology. She is now a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in private practice and is the Associate Director of Mental Health at Loyola Marymount University Yoga Therapy certificate program. Now an empty nester, Julie recently jumped back into the Hollywood game, starring in a hot new indie surf film, Dawn Patrol, directed by Daniel Petrie, Jr. opposite Scott Eastwood and Rita Wilson, scheduled for a Fall release. Julie states, “we are living longer lives and most people I know are passionately juggling more than one career. With the right combo, the professions inform each other. The traits of intuition, analysis and empathic immersion are necessary for an actor and for a psychotherapist. Balance is the perpetual gift of yoga. ” Julie’s fascination with mental health started to morph with Hollywood when she was asked to play the mother of a man with a very low IQ in King of the Jungle opposite John Leguizamo. “I like to be aged on screen. It’s easy to play older and it broadens ones options. The oldest I’ve played is 2000,” referring to vampire Regine Dandridge in the original campy cult classic FRIGHT NIGHT PART TWO. The conflict that many women, who work far from home feel, really surfaced during one of the big Malibu fires. “I was away in Austin, playing Angelina Jolie’s mom in the mini series, True Women, but when I called home my young kids said, ‘Daddy’s video taping the stuff in the house! We’re evacuating.’ Those were hard times to be away from family.” Julie remembers her film roots, “John Cassavetes and Gena Rowlands set the bar for me, a truth barometer that forever haunts me to dig deeper.” John rehearsed with us for two weeks and let us block the scene organically and did not let the cinematographer dialogue with the actors. He wanted to vigilantly protect the internal life of the characters. Due to time constraints, it’s done differently today but it was a luxury working from the inside out so purely. Gloria has been Julie’s lucky card. “There have been many angels in my quirky career and I remember them all. In retrospect, life can give us one or two extraordinary breaks but those are just launching pads, the rest is detailed work.”
Julie’s website: yogatalks.com Follow Julie Carmen: instagram: @juliecarmen3 Twitter: @julliecarmen3 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JulieCarmenActress