Acting from the Heart
Aaron Jackson stands below the Pine Elementary School stage, looking up to feed lines to Isabella Sansone, who responds from her script. Suddenly he says, “Do it like a mean prisoner in jail,” something Jackson had demonstrated earlier in the class, and Sansone begins speaking in a raspy voice. “That was very good,” Jackson comments, “but next time, don’t forget to change your mannerisms as well as your voice.”
Jackson is not a teacher. He is an accomplished actor who got his first role, a commercial for a local waterbed store, when he was just 5. “My dad took me to an audition. There were 200 kids and I was fourth to be called in to perform for the producer. I couldn’t believe it when he said, ‘That’s what I want kid’ and I got the job! I got paid $150 but today that could easily be $15,000.”
Due to academic achievement, Jackson graduated after ninth grade and won scholarships which enabled him to study acting overseas in Britain. He returned to the United States and, at age 18, was contracted for the TV series California Dreams, which ran from 1992 to 1997. He has since done a dozen movies and TV specials plus some commercials.
Along the way, he met “a beautiful woman who lived in Florida” on a bus in Nashville. “Shortly after we were married, Shannon’s father died, so we moved here to take care of my mother-in-law,” Jackson explains when asked how he came to Pine island. Two kids later, Pine Island is still home, although his career frequently requires he travel all over the country.
Along with being an actor, Jackson is a coach, manager and director who has a studio in Cape Coral. Knowing how acting had benefited him from a young age, he decided to offer coaching to schools at no cost.
“For elementary students, the acting class is a huge confidence booster because many of the children would never even want to get up on a stage. And because of the FCATs they must take, developing characters from a script helps them build comprehension skills,” Jackson says. “It’s somewhat the same for middle school students, but those classes also develop skills so those with talent and the desire can get acting work. Some of the high schoolers I work with have decided they want to have acting careers, so I help them train for competitions which award scholarships so they can realize their dreams.”
Does he ever spot children who he thinks have a natural talent? “Yes, in fact, today I saw two who I think could have potential. Children are among those I coach at my studio and at Florida Repertory Theater.”
Jackson says one of the reasons he does his volunteer coaching is that the arts are not as well funded as some other programs, like sports, and the schools do not have the money to include programs on drama and acting. “I spend a minimum of 16 hours a week, most weeks more, in the schools,” he says. Along with Pine Island Elementary, Jackson holds his programs locally at elementary, middle and high schools from Naples to Port Charlotte in Southwest Florida along with schools in southeast Florida.
While Jackson typically holds acting classes at Pine Island Elementary school twice a year, he’ll be back soon. “I’m co-directing the elementary school play this year, as I did last year,” Jackson said. “And we may start an after school acting club.”