Post-Wrap of the Pilot Episode - Response to TV Show Viewers: Post 46

Response to TV Show Viewers: Post 1 - January 23, 2026

Response to TV Show Viewers: Post 45 - May 4, 2026

In the spring of 2014, I was making an effort to put on a faithful face, to be an example of hope and optimism. But on the inside, being sensible, practical even, I had to own up to the truth that I hadn’t knocked this opportunity over the fence.

And it was getting even further away from me.

I’m not being overly rough on myself now as much as I am sharing details to satisfy those still curious. To more than a few, I come off as supremely certain within the episodes, and some feel they need to set me straight. Perhaps, in sharing this response series, I’ll make it a little clearer that I realize I don’t have all the answers.  

Even now, over ten years down the road, there’s a whole lot I don’t know about what happened after the producers left South Carolina. However, in May of that first year in TV, I had post-filming involvement in the form of voiceover work and am able to write some about that.

Within the two weeks of the filming and interviewing to create the pilot that would eventually kickoff all of the American Rehab series, I learned that producers had much more quantity than they’d anticipated. The introductory half hour episode we’d all been working on would be paired down to twenty-one minutes. However, the math of it all showed that they’d actually accumulated enough footage to produce the six episodes after only ten days!

An expectant producer had let me know that they were ready to “fast track” the first segment, requiring executive producers and editors to comb through what they had to make a compelling initial seven minutes. That creation would take a week or so, they’d get anticipated approval, then circle back so we could finish the house and filming before August.

However, by mid-April, I was again being reminded of how dissatisfied producers had been with me, how despite their professionalism, I’d witnessed expressions and posture that served as feedback. I hadn’t been delivering as hoped. Weeks after their exodus, it became clear that the quantity wasn’t equating to quality. And as a result of my ineffectiveness, they needed me to begin logging time in a local recording studio to provide usable dialogue to bridge gaps and sew up holes.        

These sound booth sessions brought back comparable satisfaction felt while filming the first day of the test reel on November 7 of 2013. I had producers in other parts of the country coming through my headphones, listening to me repeat many of the things I’d said back in March, but this time I was alone, talking into a microphone in a soundproof room with audio technicians behind the glass partition. I was living out a scene I’d watched in movies and television, with the highlight of this experience being the session when my star-eyed daughter came along to watch and listen.

This voiceover work spilled into May, telling me without saying so that they would not be returning before our kid’s schools let out for the summer. These studio sessions then carried over into June, solidifying even more substantially some of my natural, privately held evaluating over my performance on camera at the end of March.

Through the headset, producers directed and encouraged me. Although unable to read expressions, I could hear their tones of voices. They seemed taken aback— unexpectedly surprised in a good way—as if I was coming through beyond what they’d anticipated or been prepared for. This was the opposite of how I’d felt filming for the two weeks, an ease inducing, necessary moment. And this collection of hours added up to an uplifting end to my part in creating the pilot episode.

Although I was encouraged that they'd be able to cobble together enough, as the weeks of summer formed months, I began to once again think that our chances of getting onto HGTV were back to slim. 

Response to TV Show Viewers: Post 47 - Coming Soon