I was born in Miami, Florida but grew up in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, I always knew that I would someday attend university in the US. Now, when I was in elementary, middle school, and even high school, I was the class . So for me acting was a natural progression. Upon graduating from high school I went to the University of San Diego where I majored in Theatre Arts. And after I graduated from there, I made the necessary move to Hollywood to follow my dream. My first year out in LA I worked retail at Best Buy and also DJ’ed for an event company. I eventually quit both those jobs to work full time for an event photography company. I primarily now make my income from production work.

I thought it would be hilarious to shoot something where I had to live with that character. So I put together a script, a crew, ne developed his character, and also wrote the insanely funny yet poignant poem that is in the sketch. We shot the sketch with a few friends and I called it “my roommate the Emo”. At the time it was only meant to be a one off sketch. But then I started thinking about my past living situations and so many more ideas came to mind.

I thought about, when I first moved to LA, was very interested in doing stand up. I had written some material that I always wanted to perform. One of the bits I had come up with was about my first real life LA roommate. She was a girl and was sweet as could be, but I would always joke that she was a racist and would do super racist things to me like leave cotton balls on the apartment floor for me to pick up.

With that joke in mind, I started working on the next script, “my roommate the Racist”. Unlike the first script I wrote, this time I gave my character a name. And because of sheer laziness and also my love for Jackie Chan, I decided to use my own name (Jackie Chan used his real name as his character name in his first couple of US movies). And I’m glad I did because “Lu” turned out to be the perfect name for this character.

We shot the new sketch and it had a beginning bit and a middle bit. After we wrapped shooting later on that night, I got one more idea for a bit that I wanted to add to the sketch. So we called Chris Mollica back (the actor playing the Racist roommate) and we tagged on an ending bit after the credits. And that format of a beginning bit, middle bit, and ending bit, became the format for the show and hence “my roommate the” was created.

What made you decide to “go for it” and use Roommate as your claim to fame?

What made me decide to go for it was the fact that I noticed how much fun we all had filming those first couple episodes. I had never laughed harder or had more fun filming anything else like when we were doing the show. And the episodes just kept pouring right out of me, out of us. Since day one  picked up the idea of the show and ran with it. I really liked what he was writing, so I decided to executive produce his episodes as well as mine. Which I am glad that I did because since then, he has helped me develop the tone of the show to what it is today. And once we saw how people responded so positively to the idea, we decided to keep it going.

Is Roommate profitable?

Yes and no. Since its conception, “my roommate the” has been immensely educationally profitable but never been monetarily profitable. The reason that I make the distinction educationally profitable and monetarily profitable is because while the experiences and knowledge we’ve gained from producing the show are invaluable, we have yet to make any money from the show. Matter of fact, the show has cost me a lot of money to produce. How much you ask? Well, a gentleman never tells, but let’s just say more than one year’s tuition at any private southern California university. But like I said before, the wisdom, new found skill set, and business savvy I’ve gained from producing the show totally make it worth it.

What’s your best advice for anyone who is pursuing their dreams?

Never lose sight of who you are and what it is you originally wanted. If your pursuit is something in the realm of the Entertainment Industry, then get ready because dark days are ahead. Every thing you think you know about yourself and what you believe is going to be put to the test in ways you can’t even begin to imagine. My experience is specific to LA, so I can only speak on that; This city will come after not your weaknesses, but your strengths. It will attack you in the areas you are most sure of and confident about so that once it takes them from you, you’ll have nothing but your weaknesses to fall back on. And that’s when the real mindf*ck will begin.

Unfortunately there in no avoiding this, and you can’t really prepare for it. All you can do is trust in yourself. Trust that no matter what is thrown at you, you’ll adapt and evolve so as to survive. You can’t have a back up plan because it’ll prevent you from being present. And from being bold. You can’t hold back. If you want to catch up to your dream then you have to chase it with all you’ve got. And when you’re done and feel like you have nothing left to give, that’s when you’ll have to dig even deeper and reach into the depths of your soul to find the strength to pick yourself up and keep fighting.