EMMY WINNERS
Death Do Us Part Why Atlanta’s Mitchell Anderson says Amazon’s ‘After Forever’ is the story we need today By Mi chae l J . Pa l l e r i no
T he scene was all too real for Mitchell Anderson ( Doogie Howser, Party of Five ). During the heart wrenching death scene that sits at the heart of Amazon’s After Forever micro-series, Anderson’s Jason Addams character faces his mortality on a hospital bed with his longtime partner Brian Stone, played by series co-writer Kevin Spirtas ( Days of Our Lives, The Boy from Oz ), by his side. The Emmy Award winning eight-episode series, heading into Season 2, follows the life of a 50-ish New York City gay couple as they come to grips with personal tragedy. Told in a flashback/flash forward style in roughly 10-minute episodes, the series covers the final days of Jason’s terminal cancer prognosis and the early days of Brian’s life thereafter. In the aforementioned scene, the couple’s final moments together struck a personal tone for Anderson.
Mitchell Anderson
Told in a f lashback/f lash forward style in roughly 10-minute episodes, the series covers the final days of Jason’s terminal cancer prognosis and the early days of Brian’s life thereafter.
Photo courtesy Richie Arpino
“The most striking experience in my life helped me play Jason,” Anderson says. “I 100% channeled the experience of that final scene from when my father died. There was a distinct breath sound and an inability to focus that I tried to recreate. It was a difficult scene.” Anderson could not have asked for a more remarkable role to usher in his return to acting. After a near 15-year absence to help run the award-winning MetroFresh restaurant in Atlanta with his partner, Richie Arpino, Anderson embraced the part of Adams, a successful literary agent having to deal with love, loss, and the acceptance of death. “It’s heart wrenching to watch Jason go from diagnosis to death,” Anderson says. “But he faces his fate with humor, love, and a sense of completion. I think his acceptance and courage are both admirable and instructive to all of us. The only thing we can hope for at the end of life, whenever that happens, is that we have known love and happiness. Love is life’s great equalizing force. We all look for it, hope for it, and when we find it, we want to feel safe in it. We’ll all lose someone we love — it’s 100% universal.”
some local stage work), he has been running the award- winning restaurant MetroFresh with his partner, Richie Arpino. “I don’t consider myself an actor,” Anderson says. “I am a chef and restaurateur. That’s how I make my living. Venturing back into show business recharges my creative batteries. When I took this role, there was nothing hanging over it. I didn’t need anything except the experience. Years ago, before I opened the restaurant, I needed something from each job. It was never just about the work. This experience has been incredibly freeing.” When shooting ends, Anderson relishes in his return to what he calls his No. 1 job. And with the recently opened MetroFresh Uptown in the Midtown Plaza, his focus lies there. “The hard work in the restaurant business never ends. When After Forever ends, I will look forward to what lies ahead.”
Anderson says that theme of After Forever is a grown-up story for today’s LGBTQ community. “Just a decade ago, if we were telling stories about loss it was always about HIV/AIDS. And while that story is far from over, it’s important to realize that we are, in fact, getting older, and we’ll be dealing with loss from other causes.” When Spirtas and his writing partner, Michael Slade ( Another World, One Life to Liv e) sat down to sketch out the After Forever story, they believed it was important to see gay men presented in popular culture who are not 20- or 30-something stereotypes propped up for comic relief. “They are vibrant, complex, complicated, and sexual human beings who enjoy living life,” Slade says. “One of the most exciting and rewarding things for us has been the fan mail. Our viewership reflects a total cross-section of the population. We hear from men, women, gay, straight, trans, middle-aged, young and old; all of them moved by and emotionally invested in the complexities of Brian and Jason’s story.” As for Anderson, his work in After Forever is a welcome return to the limelight. In the 15 years since he took time off from the Hollywood game (except for
www.afterforevertheseries.com
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