Danny Wolohan has spent almost three decades working across stage and screen, from Broadway productions including West Side Story, To Kill a Mockingbird and Macbeth to his role as Brinkley in The Gilded Age. But his latest project, Union County, takes him into particularly personal territory.
The film explores addiction, recovery and the criminal justice system through an unusual blend of narrative filmmaking and real-life documentary footage, with Wolohan playing Jim alongside Will Poulter and Noah Centineo. For Wolohan, the subject hits close to home: he has been sober for 26 years and has seen members of his own family struggle with addiction.
What makes Union County particularly unusual is the access the filmmakers were given to the real drug court programme, allowing actors and real participants to share the same space and, in some cases, the same scenes.
Speaking to Over the Shoulder, Wolohan discusses the experience of playing Jim, meeting the real person behind the character, working alongside Will Poulter, the challenge of keeping his emotions in check during the film’s courtroom scenes, and his rather unexpected dream of finally stepping into the world of science fiction.
Let’s get started.
Can you tell us about your character Jim and also what was it about the script that made you want to be part of this project?
It’s a topic that’s near and dear to my heart. How addiction is handled globally is an important subject.
There’s a lot of people in my family that have struggled with addiction. I’ve been sober for 26 years, so when I read the script and saw that this movie was approaching this topic in such an original and humane way, I got really excited about it.
I had no idea how special a filming experience it was going to be because I hadn’t met the director Adam Meeks or Annette Deao, who’s both one of the stars and a coordinator on the movie. I just thought this a great part in a totally unique project.
I loved my audition scene. Although, as it turned out, the scene was just a transcript from one of the actual days in the drug court and didn’t end up being anything that I said in the movie. It was just Adam’s way to see how an actor would handle what was actually said in one of the court days by the guy that I was sort of replacing, not playing.
Because there’s a real Jim.
I won’t say his last name as he is a very private person.
Did you get to meet him?
Yes, and not only meet him, but watch him work!
It was fantastic. And it’s to his credit that he just wanted to do the actual work and didn’t want to have anything to do with show business and everything that goes with it.
I can completely understand his reluctance, but he was there for us, helping to authenticate the aim of combining documentary and narrative film.
This access was because of director Adam’s long-term sympathetic campaign of building trust and forming a relationship with Judge Bragg and Annette. He knew them and they knew how amazing he was and the type of relationship he wanted to have with the portrayal of the court programme.
We were allowed in to shoot on actual court days with real participants, who agreed to participate because they wanted the story of this programme to be told.
This meant we were there on their actual days in court. When they checked in, gave their progress update, asked for help if things were going wrong and then being helped and redirected in some way.
They wanted to be filmed.
Then Will Poulter’s and Noah Centineo’s story would be weaved into it.
Judge Kevin and Annette were so amazing and so experienced in the programme that they were able to just treat Will and Noah and the dialogue just as they would anything else.
I don’t know how many actors have ever experienced anything like this, where you’re watching real people heroically try and redirect the course of their lives.
My character is not supposed to be sentimental, but I swear every story makes you want to cry a little bit. Life is hard, even if you don’t have a problem with drugs and alcohol, but when you’re really in the throes of addiction battling to do the basic things and making the right choices is so difficult.
Watching people talking to the judge about trying to get a job or housing or whether they were going to get to see their kids again was so moving.
How did you prepare for playing Jim, and what was your approach to bringing him to life?
I watched him closely. At one point somebody was having a tough time, and things were getting close to violent and Jim restrained them in the most amazing way.
You see countless images on TV of law enforcement kind of going overboard with violence, but Jim put handcuffs on somebody, basically for their own protection because the person was out of control, without using one blow or punch.
He just used his strength and weight to stop them harming themselves or somebody else and the handcuffs were used so that he could focus on talking to them.
It was very powerful to watch.
In the movie I have to do a similar arrest for one of the people in the programme and I had Jim’s actions in my mind the whole time.
Was the audition process quite long?
Because of the nature of Indie films, the process wasn’t as long as it could have been. They were great though and flew me back and forth on my different shoot days or shoot weeks.
The key is that Adam had already made a short film about the subject matter and spent years meeting everybody and understanding exactly how it worked.
We had a foundation to make a movie that is sort of unprecedented. We were capturing what was happening in real life in addition to telling a story
You’ve worked in both theatre and film. Did your stage experience influence your performance as Jim?
From the beginning of my theatre training my best teachers always emphasised being present and listening as the strongest tools.
And there were a lot of situations where that was what was called upon.
Another part of doing theatre for coming up on 30 years is that everyone has a different process.
I’m always really interested in watching and learning from other people.
I thought that both Will Poulter and Noah Centineo had such a beautiful mix of staying in character in ways that helped them, but critically in ways that did not interfere with anyone else’s day or job.
I thought that was really beautiful.
Will is naturally gregarious and loves to chat and listen to people’s stories. Yet his character is a little shyer and more traumatised, so he had to pull back on that a little bit, but it was just wonderful to watch.
Without giving away any spoilers, what was the most challenging scene for you to film?
For me, it is when the cameras on me in the court scenes where I had to listen without showing emotion.
I almost couldn’t do it as every single day I never knew what was coming from the real participants and the things they said would affect me.
For example, there was this woman who had not only gotten sober and housing but was now working with heavy machinery, like tractors, and she was so proud and thrilled.
I wanted to cry with joy but that wasn’t my character’s reaction so that was hard.
Even though i didn’t have any lines or movement I wished the camera wasn’t on me.
I wonder how many times they had to edit a shot they wanted to have of Annette and me because I was like either tearing up or sort of looking at somebody with love and awe.
Those courtroom scenes where they were telling their real stories i think I probably failed at my simple task 50% of the time.
You share the screen with Will Poulter. How was it working with him, you seemed to have great chemistry together?
I’ve been so lucky with the people who are “number one on the call sheet” in plays and movies.
Will was a producer on the movie, he understood what it was about and what the stakes were.
He has no visible ego; he just is somebody who shows up even though he has a lot of work to do and it’s not easy work either. He is more interested if everyone else is okay, having a good time, has everything that they need.
Its inspirational how hard he works while trying to make sure that he’s a good citizen in the company.
It was wonderful working with him.
I remember when Will and I first met, we were in character going to shoot a court scene. We didn’t chat, like where we were from or who we were. He was Cody and I was Jim and that just worked for us particularly on shoot days.
When we had days off and we got to hang out, you couldn’t shut us up and we were having so much fun.
If you could describe Union County in three words, what would they be?
Annette. Deao. Star. Annette is both administrator and social worker in real life; there’s not enough words to describe her role in the programme.
But she’s also so beautiful as a performer in the movie, and I hope she gets lots more acting work if she wants it, because there’s something that you get for free with her that is so much about integrity and love.
She has so much history.
You know, she’s been in an office where somebody came in with a weapon and locked themselves in with her, and by the end of the standoff, rather than cops breaking in the door, she had turned the situation around and helped that person.
I hope everybody finds out more about her and the work that she is doing, both as an actor and in her nine-to-five job saving people’s lives and not asking for a lot of attention, thanks or money for it.
Is there a role or genre you’ve yet to explore that you’d love to take on?
I have always been involved with new work, new writing, new plays.
I worked with an amazing up and coming young filmmaker named Jordan Axelrod on a short called Szypliszki that won some festivals.
I’m so thrilled about what’s coming next from him because he’s such a special filmmaker. I’m always looking for the next original thing.
My very good friend Nat DeWolf s an actor and a dream of ours is to be on a science fiction show along the lines of a Doctor Who or something like that.
We just love science fiction and neither one of us ever gets to do it.
Our dream is to be in a scene with a strange monster, or maybe we’re the strange monster in the world of science fiction at least once in our lives.
That’s a dream.
Finally, what’s next for you? Are there any upcoming projects you can share?
There’s the will they, won’t they speculation regarding another season of Gilded Age, so if that happens, that’ll be great.
I’m going to do a play in the fall at Second Stage in New York, called The Visitors.
I just got offered that job, I read the script and loved it, and the rehearsals start. September 22nd.
For Danny Wolohan, Union County appears to represent far more than another acting credit. His personal connection to the subject, combined with the unusual experience of working alongside real participants in an actual drug court programme, gave the project a significance that clearly went beyond the role itself.
His admiration for the people behind the programme particularly Annette and the real Jim comes through throughout the conversation, as does his respect for director Adam Meeks and co-star Will Poulter.
Perhaps most importantly, Wolohan’s description of the film as showing “a different path” captures what makes Union County so compelling: it asks audiences to consider what can happen when people struggling with addiction are offered the opportunity to rebuild their lives rather than simply being punished for their circumstances.
With The Visitors coming to the stage in New York and the possibility of another season of The Gilded Age still on the table, Wolohan certainly isn’t slowing down. If he gets his way, somewhere down the line there may even be a strange monster, a set of prosthetics and a science-fiction adventure waiting for him.
For now, though, Union County offers Wolohan a role that feels particularly close to home and a story he clearly hopes audiences will take the time to see.