Creating Christmas lights for Hollywood celebrities, actor Tim Holmes brings his Strongman and firefighter skills to excellent use.
Tim Holmes has been signed to MCA Records as a solo artist, appeared in soap operas, then became a firefighter and a Christmas lights designer. Tim has been in Real Steel, Machine Gun Preacher, Hostel 3, S.W.A.T.: Firefight, Street Kings 2: Motor City, and Oz: The Great and Powerful as The Strongman.
We talked with Tim about his family life, firefighting, his movie career, and his Christmas light business in Hollywood. Check it out.
Theresa: And you are inside “MyFixitUpLife” with my husband Mark.
Mark: And my wife, Theresa, and I am feeling magical today.
Theresa: You’re feeling magical?
Mark: Yes as if I were, in fact, transported to the land of a movie I have never seen.
Theresa: When you say magical, it makes me think; I don’t know why maybe it’s because I’m hungry, but I’m thinking about Lucky Charms.
Mark: Okay, I am going to skip all this stuff I have to say.
Theresa: But you know what, Lucky Charms there’s a rainbow of sugary yumminess that is in the Lucky Charms cereal box. Do you know anything about Lucky Charms?
Mark: I’m going to go right to Tim Holmes …
Theresa: All right.
Mark: Who is are guest and he is the Strongman in the prequel to, I hope I have that right, “Oz the Great and Powerful”, and Tim I’m going to ask you a surprise trivia question. As a parent and as a former child, can you in fact name the blue stars and whatever else is in Lucky Charms?
Tim: Can I name the blue stars?
Theresa: He wants to know if you know anything about Lucky Charms because I put him on the spot about that breakfast cereal.
Tim: All I know is that they’re magically delicious.
Theresa: They are magically delicious! Everyone has a style for eating their Lucky Charms too. Do you eat all of the marshmallows first or eat all the brown parts first? Or do you eat them all together?
Tim: What I’ll do is take a nice big gallon milk of Vitamin D whole milk, can’t do the non-fat milk it just doesn’t taste right, pour it on it and I’ll sink them in just a little bit, and I get the big size table spoon, not the small little tea spoon, but table-size spoon, and I take big huge, heaping bites of it. I don’t pick it out because I like the marshmallows with the stuff together. I like it all at once, it’s nice.
Theresa: You sound like a guy who likes to eat and, my husband, Mark he’s a whole milk guy too. I was reading about all the food you had to consume to work out to become the Strongman, and it sounds a lot like my husband’s diet.
Tim: It’s not really a diet when you’ve got to gain, but it sure is fun let me tell you. I’m actually doing that again right now I’m trying to gain. I’m back up to 230. I’ve got to get up to 245; I’ve got 15 more to go.
Theresa: What do you have to gain for?
Tim: The sequel.
Theresa: Oh.
Mark: Are you kidding me? That’s great news! Is it “Oz the Greater and Powerfuler?”
Tim: “Oz the Great and Powerfuler.”
Theresa: Not it’s the Strongman, it’s called, “The Strongman,” right?
Tim: Yes. The movie is called, “The Strongman Returns.” I thought it was going to be “Oz the Great and Powerful,” something with another name after, you know how they keep the same name just add something after it like the “Twilight” series, stuff and all that kind of series.
Theresa: That’s so cool.
Tim: Hopefully that will be going off the end of this year and it looks like it’s going to be done in California.
Theresa: That is so good and I saw, was it on Facebook that you were moving out to LA?
Tim: I actually go out there. I used to live out in LA from 1985 to 2002, then I freaked out and moved back home, and bought the house I grew up in, in Michigan. Found my wife and came back here to get married and have kids, and that’s what I did gosh darn it. I still go back and forth. I have a place out there too as well in Woodland Hills.
Theresa: You freaked out?
Tim: Yes, so I go back and forth all the time. Yeah, a mid-life crisis man. I don’t know, it was just one of those things that I wanted to get married, I wanted to raise a family, but I did not want to do it in California because I had no family there. Here in Michigan in the house I grew up in, where I live now, my grandmas 10 minutes away, my uncles five, my sisters 10, my aunts, my uncles, nieces, nephews; I’ve got a big family support.
I’m just a family guy. I want to be around the family. I want to have my kids around the family. I want to raise them in that environment so I just needed to come back home.
Theresa: Now does your family still have a flower shop?
Tim: No my dad actually sold that. He sold that in the ‘90’s. I left in ’85 to north California to be a rock star.
Theresa: If your family has a flower shop and you’re growing up like that, I can imagine there are a lot of girlfriends that expect to have flowers for absolutely every occasion possible.
Tim: They did. My gosh they did! I always had flowers. It was the best.
Mark: Did you bring them a forest of flowers? Tow it behind you in a trailer?
Tim: I mean, I’m the only guy who would bring a dozen red roses to school, I’ll tell you that. In high school it was sweet.
Theresa: That makes me want to twirl my hair a little bit.
Tim: Yeah right, twirl my hair, “Oh my God he gave me a dozen roses! He’s so cute.”
Theresa: Oh yeah.
Mark: When you moved back from LA to Michigan and you were a firefighter at the time right?
Tim: Yeah I was a firefighter in California and I was going to try to get back in the fire department back here in Michigan, but it didn’t happen because they said I had to go back to school and get me certified, and go through the academy, be an EMT, and be a medic, and do it all again here in Michigan; which is a two to three year process.
Then I found out how much they paid and I said, “Nay never mind.”
Mark: In that time you in fact remodeled the house that you now live in right?
Tim: Yeah this house was built in 1956. It’s a cool house man. It’s an open-floor plan. It’s on Grand River which has got a great view of the river every morning. I gutted it, all new windows, the hardwood floors that were there I sanded them down with a belt sander, redid them, new tile, all new light fixtures, all new paint, baseboards, crown molding.
Then, on and on, and that was inside, then I moved to the outside. Then, I did all new siding it’s really cool. I did new soffits, new fascia, new roof, and new chimney. Then I built a pole barn next to my house like an attachment, and I made it the same too. I made it the same kind of fascia so it looks all like one piece.
Then I got into the landscaping part of it started knocking all that stuff out. Yeah I love doing that stuff.
Mark: I’m going to inform the rest of my portion of the interview with both jealousy and awe. You’re doing all this and you act, and you produce, and you’re directing your own stuff.
Theresa: And he could save me from a burning building.
Mark: And he could save you from a burning building.
Theresa: With a dozen roses in hand as well.
Mark: And you can hang Christmas lights like a madman.
Tim: Yeah man that’s … only in America can you make enough money to live all year in Michigan, by the way. I couldn’t make enough money to live all year in California decorating people’s places for Christmas, but in Michigan yeah you can definitely live all year-round. This would be my 17th year doing it. My uncle runs, pretty much, my business now for me and my clientele is all referrals, and I’ve got huge clientele.
I have Arnold Schwarzenegger, Nicholas Cage, Ben Affleck, Jennifer Garner, Michael Keaton, Jim Belushi. Huge Directors; Jim Mangold, Josh Whedon, the guy who did “The Avengers,” and “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” the President of 20th Century Fox, President of ABC. I’ve got these huge guys; I’ve never seen people with so much money in my life.
When your assistant has an assistant, you know you’ve got some.
Theresa: I think that’s something that everybody would fantasize about, but I’m curious all these famous people that you’re doing their holiday lights for, is there a different kind of what they’re looking for? Are they looking for white lights? Is it simple? Is it like the Griswold Family Christmas kind of explosion of crazy? Or is it different for everybody?
Tim: Everybody is different. Most of my clients are Jewish and they are married to either a Catholic, or a Christian woman, or vice versa. Some of them will want to be all white and they’re doing these Christmas lights for their kids because come on. What kid doesn’t love Christmas lights? It just makes Christmas so much happier when you come home at Christmas time and you’ve got Christmas lights on your house.
It’s just amazing. Who doesn’t smile when you see that? Everybody is a little bit different. Usually they let me do what I want. We just have a budget and we work with their budget, and I just light it up. It’s either all white or some years they’re like, “Let’s do color this year.” Then I’ll switch up to color. We were doing a couple LED, but a lot of people don’t like the look of LED, they like the conventional lighting which is strange right?
For California you would think everybody be more green because it’s a tree hugging state, but whatever. Let the utility bill rock and roll.
Mark: Does the power grid actually go down when you plug in? I mean, is it just like… boom?
Tim: I’ve had a job before where they had to rent a generator to power the Christmas lights.
Mark: Oh you’re kidding? The service to the house isn’t enough?
Tim: Yeah, so the generator rental is like five grand.
Mark: That is awesome.
Tim: I was like you’ve got to be kidding me. It’s another level of money and it’s just unbelievable the kind of money people throw away on Christmas. I mean God bless them I love it, thank you because you’re feeding my kids, but it’s an awesome gig. I started this in the fire department. It’s a slow season for acting in the winter, and I just needed a little extra Christmas light money, so I said you know what man, there’s no way these cats are doing these Christmas lights on their houses because they’re like CEO’s and they’re way too busy, and they’re millionaires, they’re not going to climb up that tree, or climb on the roof.
They’re paying someone to do it. It looks really nice and clean, not sloppy. I said all right, I’m just going to pass out a flyer around the rich neighborhoods with my picture on it, and I had a picture of me in my fireman outfit. Come as a fireman and say, “Hey I’m a fireman, dah, dah, dah. I’ve got a side gig here. I’m decorating people’s houses.” I did it legit. I said, “I’ve got Workman’s Comp Insurance, liability insurance, it’s safe. You don’t have to worry about a break-in, or dying on your property. I’m covered insurance wise. So give me a chance and let me help you out and make your holidays less stressful.”
It’s just took off man because, I don’t know, I’m from Michigan so I’m a little bit; I’m not shady. Sometimes when I first started out, I did a job and I’d break even because I didn’t know how to bid it, you know what I mean because I’m starting out. I was like oh I better not charge that much next time because I really didn’t make anything. I got the guys, got the insurance, got the gas, got the liability, maintain it, and then take it back down and store it.
I crunched numbers and said this is stupid. I’ve got to charge more.
Mark: Sounds familiar. Geez, I wonder if I ever experienced that a thousand times doing contracting projects? Has it ever worked out where you’ve gone to a casting call after doing a Christmas light project, or whatever, and the guy’s like, “Hey, you’re the Christmas lights guy!”?
Tim: No, no it hasn’t which is crazy, but I think now it’s going to start helping me a lot because I’m finally getting to a level in my acting career where I’m getting scripts sent to me. I’m reading scripts and I’m getting projects offered to me. Now that I’m at that level with a support team behind me, and agent, manager, lawyer, publicist, these people that I’ve been in their lives for this many years are actually going to be able to help me.
Mark: Wow!
Tim: Before they couldn’t really help me because I’m just another guy in Hollywood who wants to be an actor, yada, yada, ya. Now it’s going to be more to my advantage so I am excited.
Theresa: Especially since you are the Strongman.
Tim: Yeah what a role huh? What a break!
Theresa: What a name for just to be able to say, “I am the Strongman.”
Tim: I’ve got to get a license plate.
Theresa: You definitely have to but then I know somebody probably is looking for that right now.
Mark: I’ve seen you on “Vegas” the T.V. show with Dennis Quaid, and I’ve seen a couple of other things you’ve done, and you sound like a nice guy, but you play some bad dudes. I mean bad in a cool sense.
Tim: Yeah from all these years of acting, and I was always trying to be the pretty boy, leading man-type, clean face, nice hair, dah, dah, dah. I’m like I wasn’t looking because bottom line dude, I am pretty, man. There’s some pretty boys out in California if you want a model they got them out there. They can act.
I’m like, man, I’ve got to find a different route, a different avenue, a different niche, so then in my acting classes I said, I’m only going to do all the heavy roles, all the antagonistic roles, and drama, and try to work on that side of my acting; the villain, the bad guy. Because bad guys work and you always see a bad guy that feels like who is this guy? I’ve never seen this guy, who’s this bad guy?
They always, usually, a no-name actor to play a bad guy role, and they let them play it. I’m like, I’m going to try this so I just really concentrated on that in 2008 and 2009 working on that, and actually wrote a screenplay being a bad guy, and shot it. That’s when I started booking. I started booking in 2010 and on, and on, and on. All this bad guy stuff and I’m like this is it man. This is my niche. This is where I’m going to get in the back door and build up a resume in my acting career in a bad guy role, bad guy role, bad guy role, bad guy role, and just keep building up.
I like playing the bad guy. It’s fun because you get to be more creative in your role as a bad guy. The directors pretty much like, “Oh I don’t know how to really be the bad guy, but I need you to go from here to there and just do this, and that, and that. Cool?” Then you just go ahead and do your crazy bad guy stuff like, “That was perfect. That was a very scary thing you did there.”
Theresa: I could imagine you having two sons, right?
Tim: Yeah.
Theresa: They probably, when you are going to school or whatever, I don’t know how old they are, I bet the teachers and everyone will be a little bit scared at parent/teacher conferences.
Tim: Yeah they better not mess with my kids. I’m coming.
Mark: You should show up with the Strongman bar-bell and the outfit on over the shoulder.
Theresa: Yeah.
Mark: “What do you want?”
Theresa: Yeah, my dad can beat up your dad. I think that shirt fits.
Tim: And just kick the door of the school, BRAAAAHHH.
Mark: There it is, that is the Strongman bellow, Tim Holmes Actor on Twitter. You can see him in “Oz the Great and Powerful.” You can also see him in “Real Seal” with Hugh Jackman and you will be able to see him in “Oz the Greater and Powerfuler,” or a title to be named later.
Theresa: Yes, but we have to go to break. We’ll be back in just a minute with more, “MyFixItUpLife.”
Check out a trailer about Tim Holmes and his family’s Christmas light business.
