TWO ROOMS Opens at Hollywood Fringe Festival Tonight

Christopher DeVinny is a recent graduate of The American Academy of Dramatic Arts but he is also, at only 26 years of age, an Iraq veteran. DeVinny joined the Army in 2006, at the tender age of 19, and was deployed with the 2nd Battalion, 12th Infantry Regiment, during its 15-month deployment in Iraq's Al Dora Province.

It would be his first and only deployment - an experience that, as he puts it, left him a "marked man". He was medically discharged from the Army in 2010, and it was then that he decided to follow a nagging instinct to pursue acting. Armed with only a GED, he applied to just one acting school: the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. To his surprise, he was accepted, and on graduating went on to be selected as part of the prestigious Academy Company.

In TWO ROOMS, Chris plays Michael Wells, a University Educator taken hostage in Beirut during the Lebanese hostage crisis of the 1980s. It is the first role to hit this close to home for him. Though his character, Michael, is a civilian, he is faced with many of the same fears, horrors and questions that Chris either experienced, or witnessed first hand over his deployment. And which also gave him greater perspective on this volatile region.

"My time spent in Iraq was eye opening. I realized that given a different circumstance, I could have been the person shooting at me. That really puts things in perspective. We are not all that different. If we really want to make a change, we must empower and educate people. Look at how segregated our own country was. While cynics would say we are still having issues, we have integrated as a country. This came from both sides realizing that we're the same. We educated ourselves and indulged in each others lifestyles and culture. What the Middle East truly needs is more people like Michael Wells - educators".

One of those questions, that raged the world over, was whether soldiers like Chris should have been there in the first place. A theme that also resonates for Michael in TWO ROOMS who, along with his wife, chose not to leave Beirut when perhaps they should have.

"Some would say that the government has failed Michael, some would say that to negotiate with terrorists only enables them and some would say he didn't have any business being there in the first place. Everyone has heard the slogan, 'no man left behind'. What most people don't realize is that this doesn't mean, 'regardless of the situation'. While it has very powerful meaning to me as a soldier, it is, unfortunately, only an idea. There are realities: physical, logistical and even political that can deny this from being a possibility. The truth is, we still have prisoners of war spread out all across the globe. As well as civilian hostages".

But ultimately, DeVinny feels that art is the most powerful weapon we have in this world.

"Our (American) culture is spread throughout the entire world through film, theater and television. I believe is to our job to use art as a weapon of change".

TWO ROOMS opens tonight, June 8 at 7pm at Complex Theatres as a part of the Hollywood Fringe Festival.

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