Whaley Had Long Apprenticeship Before ‘Opportunities’ Knocked

Up to now, short but swift Frank Whaley has hidden his gift for snappy repartee behind a super-serious filmography: “Field of Dreams,” “Born on the Fourth of July” and “The Doors.”

Whaley, 28, put in a long apprenticeship playing “little roles in big films” before getting his chance to play a comic truth-stretcher in John Hughes’ current “Career Opportunities.”

“I’m a little akin to Ferris Bueller,” Whaley says of “Career Opportunities.” “I have a hard time telling the truth. I’m in this store where I work with this girl who’s locked in, and we deal with two thieves. It may sound a little familiar,” Whaley concludes dryly, referring to Hughes’ similarly themed “Home Alone.”

Whaley grew up fatherless with three siblings in Syracuse, N.Y. “There was a time when my older brother and I weren’t the best boys on the block.” He survived and went on to college (Albany State), appearing in 40 plays on campus and off before taking his chances in New York. He worked a switchboard and sold sperm among other jobs before breaking through as the young Jack Nicholson in “Ironweed.” In “Field of Dreams,” he was the young Burt Lancaster, in “Fourth of July” Tom Cruise’s heroin-addict buddy and in “The Doors” Jim Morrison’s guitarist.

Whaley has two other movies coming up, “Back in the USSR” and “A Midnight Clear.” Now that he’s playing leads instead of having to “grab every moment of screen time you can,” he can joke about his checkered upbringing: “I remember Mass on Sundays and those Communion wafers. I was always really hungry. I was always wishing I could sneak up for seconds.”