BEN PATRICK JOHNSON - "Give me SEX"

Beside being one of the businest voice-over acors in Hollywood (as a signature voice for Major League Baseball and NASCAR for Fox and comedy and dramatic movie trailers for theaters and TV), Ben is an avid supporter of The International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission, and an amazing writer.

Photo by: Matthew Mitchell

His first novel, In and Out in Hollywood, based on his tumultuous first year in the TV business at the show EXTRA, was published October 2002 to critical acclaim. The just released follow-up, Third and Heaven, chronicles a year in the lives of four best friends living in West Hollywood.

He did let us enter his world and we were happy to ask a few questions:

Participate
Ben: It's amazing that we have the technology now to communicate via blogs and other means on the Internet. I love reading responses that come into my blog site, about my new second novel Third and Heaven as well as fitness modeling and movie trailer voice-overs, which is my main full time gig.

Artists
Ben: Why is it that I am always drawn to semi-crazy artists? Whether it's for friends or lovers, I seem to choose the kookiest, most off-the-wall people to surround myself with. I couldn't just fall in love with an accountant -- no. I have to be drawn to pop singers with crystal meth addictions and dancers who break their feet and decide to become fortune tellers. (Welcome to my life.)

Rights
Ben: I am forever hearing from some friend or other that they're excited about a new song they just downloaded off the Internet. Usually, they have stolen it via one of the peer-to-peer sharing networks. It's amazing to me how so many of these people also make their living from the generation of intellectual property (music, film, books, other arts) and it's as if they see no connection between their stealing others' intellectual property and increasingly limited opportunities for new artists to break out commercially. This is how we make our living. Don't steal! If you really like a song, spend 99 cents and buy it on iTunes, for heaven's sakes!

I- Me, Myself and I
Ben: I'm a strong believer in time spent alone. This is something I used to be really uncomfortable with. (Me, hang out with Ben? Ick! Who'd want to hang out with HIM one on one?!) But it's absolutely necessary for me as a writer ... time to reflect, time for introspection, time to go over what I'm writing in an undisturbed environment. If we each spent 30 minutes a day in meditation or reflection or just sitting and enjoying some music we like, we would be happier people, on balance.

Sex
Ben: Sex is one of the best things in the world, along with good food, good laughter, and good writing (both doing it and reading it.) Give me sex and lots of it from now until I'm 100 years old (along with just enough of the other good stuff) and I'll die a very happy man. NO -- I mean it: Give me sex!

Photos by: Duane Cramer (1) & Matthew Mitchell (2,3)

Comments

[j horner]

i'll accommodate his request -any- time he wants.

[Xarro]

Same here.

[SanFranDuke]

If Ben says he wants to have sex at 100, does that mean that he will have sex with some guys who is 100, now; or does it mean that he will have sex with another 100 y/o then?

[Joeseph]

He is HOTT