Marc Blucas

Holding Court: WFU’s Marc Blucas on his new film

After years as a nice guy in movies and television, Marc Blucas - a former Wake Forest basketball player who starred on Buffy the Vampire Slayer - is finally getting a chance to play an edgy character.

In The Killing Floor, which was released on DVD this week by ThinkFilm, Blucas plays David Lamont, a hard-charging literary agent who specializes in working with horror writers. Then someone begins stalking him, as if one of the horror stories he edits has turned real, and he has to figure out who and why before the mindgames turn deadly.

"The truth is, every human being - and to be specific, every actor - carries a certain essence about them," Blucas said in a phone interview. "You say that actor gives this particular energy off. I give off, ’Hey, this is a guy you like and trust.’ That makes it hard for me to play a bad guy."

That’s what appealed to him about playing David Lamont.

"This guy’s kind of (a jerk)," he said. "He thinks he has the world in the palm of his hand, until someone turns his world on him."

When he was filming the movie in New York, he and director/co-writer Gideon Raff worked together on developing the character.

"It was the first project where I felt it was a true collaboration," Blucas said. "He and I had no ego about it, we would go, ’I disagree with you about it and here’s why’.... At the end of the day, all we want is a good final product, and the only thing that can get in the way of that is ego."

Blucas got into acting after a career in sports. He played basketball in high school in Pennsylvania, then got a scholarship to Wake Forest University. He played for the Demon Deacons from 1990 to 1994, starting alongside Tim Duncan.

After college, he didn’t make the NBA and spent one year playing basketball in England for the Manchester Giants before returning to the United States.

His acting break came when the producers of the Whoopi Goldberg comedy Eddie, released in 1996, were looking for a boyishly handsome basketball player.

That led to roles as a high-school basketball player in Pleasantville and in the sports comedy series Arli$$, among other TV shows and movies.

He has appeared in a wide variety of movies, ranging from the war drama We Were Soldiers to the stoner comedy Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back to the romantic comedies First Daughter and The Jane Austen Book Club. And though he has yet to find a breakout hit role, he has stayed busy.

"Right now I’m doing an improv-style broad comedy," he said. "I’m having the time of my life using a muscle I’ve never used."

He tries to get back to Winston-Salem and Wake Forest University occasionally. "I usually come back at least once a year and get to a basketball game and spend the weekend," he said. But that’s not easy for a working actor who has to be ready when the next role becomes available.

"It’s so hard to plan my life," he said. "It’s so last-minute. The joke among actors is, if you need a job, plan a nonrefundable vacation, because then you’ll get something."