Casting a Scam : Con Artists Victimize Aspiring Actors Yearning for Big Break

Jeff Turnbow, a 17-year-old aspiring actor from South Saltillo, Tenn., had been surviving on $10-an-hour modeling jobs for local department stores when he got the news from his agent that there was a part for him in--of all things--a Patrick Swayze movie.

This was it, Turnbow thought, a real film. A speaking part with three whole words. There was even talk of a fight scene.

“I was thinking that I was going to be moving to New York or Hollywood. I was hitting the big time,” Turnbow said. “I couldn’t believe it.”

As it turned out, it was too much to believe, according to the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office.

Investigators say Turnbow is one of possibly hundreds of victims of a nationwide scam that preys on aspiring actors by promising them a way to break into films--but first collects hundreds of dollars in phony union dues.

There have been no arrests so far, although the scam has been played out in such diverse cities as Boise, Chicago, Phoenix, San Diego, Louisville, Memphis, Sacramento, Toledo and Milwaukee.

“It’s been occurring weekly since November,” said Ron Santee, a senior investigator with the district attorney’s office.

Santee said it is the latest manifestation of an age-old con, updated with computerized telephone answering systems and electronic money transfer networks that allow perpetrators to operate behind a fog of electronic signals.

“They can do this from anywhere in the United States,” Santee said.

Turnbow’s experience illustrated the elaborate nature of the scheme.

Marilyn Foust, director of the John Casablancas Modeling School and Agency in Memphis, Tenn., said she got a call last week from a man who identified himself as a casting executive for a company called Patrick Swayze Productions.

The caller gave his name as Jack Lara and said he was looking for 14 actors to play football players in an upcoming Swayze film, “In Shadows.”

The movie would be filmed in Memphis and he needed the actors immediately.

“There was nothing that seemed unusual,” Foust said. “We get calls like that all the time.”

Foust contacted 14 of her clients, including Turnbow, and told them to call an executive named Tom Lisp, who supposedly worked for Patrick Swayze Productions in Los Angeles.

Turnbow, who had been modeling for a year, was flabbergasted at the opportunity. He called the number and got a recorded message telling him to leave his phone number.

He was contacted that evening by “Lisp,” who said Turnbow would earn $867 a day. But because the movie was a union production, and Turnbow had a speaking role, he would have to pay $690 to join the Screen Actors Guild.

Turnbow said he was a bit suspicious, so he decided to check with the union in Los Angeles--using a number Lisp provided. The person who answered reassured him he had, in fact, reached the union.

Turnbow was instructed to drive to Jackson, Tenn., that night so he could send a first payment of $300, all he could afford, via Western Union.

Lisp even made reservations for him at a Ramada Inn in Jackson, and apparently informed the hotel that he had won a part in a movie. When he arrived at the hotel, the staff congratulated him. Turnbow was floored.

But the next day, when Turnbow traveled on to Memphis for the supposed start of filming, Lisp never appeared. “I knew it was a scam,” Turnbow said.

The young actor contacted Foust, who then called Los Angeles police, the FBI and Western Union.

Santee said it is extremely difficult to trace the con men, who he suspects are based outside of California.

Using answering services for their fictitious companies, they can pick up messages from anywhere in the country.

In addition, the transfer of money through Western Union is done using a “test question and answer” system, Santee said. The sender provides a password, which is entered into the Western Union network. Anyone who provides the password can receive the money, regardless of their location.

The Screen Actors Guild has alerted its 21 offices around the country to the scam. Film officials in various states have issued bulletins on the con, listing an FBI telephone number in Sacramento.

There were several inaccuracies in the scam that could tip off an intended victim.

The initiation fee for the Screen Actors Guild is $862 and not $690. Actors actually pay the fee only after their first job. There also is no such thing as Patrick Swayze Productions.

Swayze’s publicist, Annett Wolf, said the actor “finds the entire scam appalling and upsetting. There is really nothing we can do but to work with the authorities.”

Turnbow said most beginning actors have difficulty checking such details, particularly on the weekends, when the scam is typically run.

And, as with most successful cons, the victims are desperate for the bait.

“It was going to be my first movie,” Turnbow noted wistfully. “Anyone who found out they could have a part in a Patrick Swayze movie would have done anything.”