New Character

Former Child Star David “Davie” Straynor Davie Straynor is a 27-year-old man whose face adorned many-a magazine cover and teenaged girl’s bedroom wall as he was growing up. He had more film offers than his agent knew what to do with, and he was on two hit TV shows. As an adult, he’s found it hard to even get arrested. Male Human Charismatic Hero 2/ Former Child Star 3: CR 5; Medium-size humanoid; HD 5d6+5; hp 26; Mas 13; Init +1; Spd 30 ft.; Defense +2; touch +1; flat-footed +2 (+1 class, +1 Dex); BAB +3; Grap +2; Atk +3 melee (1d3+1 unarmed strike, or by weapon); Full Atk +3 (1d3 unarmed strike), or ranged +4 (by weapon); FS 5 ft. by 5 ft.; SQ Shady Contacts, Pseudo Occupation (Blue Collar: Class Skill Drive); AL Former cast-members of Restless Dead; SV Fort +4, Ref +3, Will +2; AP 8; Rep +1; Str 10, Dex 12, Con 13, Int 12, Wis 11, Cha 16. Occupation: Celebrity (+1 competency bonus to all Perform (act) skill checks). Feats: Low Profile, Royalties, Simple Weapons, Webmaster. Skills: Bluff +10, Computer Use +4, Craft (writing) +2, Concentration +3, Diplomacy +7, Drive +4, Gamble +5, Gather Information +8, Knowledge (popular culture) +10, Perform (act) +8, Perform (dance) +5, Profession +4, Sense Motive +8. Talents (Charismatic Hero): Charm (Charm).

Background At age of six, David “Davie” Straynor was cast as Matthew Van Zendt, the psychic youngest son of a family of cursed monster-hunters in the hit horror television series Restless Dead. However, as the Restless Dead franchise turned cold, David was entering his teenage years, and the constant cracking of his changing voice was downright ridiculous. When Restless Dead ended, David took a year off from acting, except to appear in a music video intended to launch his on-screen sister Helena Rise into pop-music stardom. The song failed miserably and the video became a source of many jokes, giving David a taste of what falling out of public favor is like. Luckily for him, he missed most of the abuse, as he was traveling in the Andes mountains. Returning from his year off, David was cast in Shadowcreek High, a prime-time teen soap opera with supernatural undertones. The critics hated it, and, despite the show’s popularity with viewers, the network cancelled it after ten episodes. David believed in the show, so he bought the rights to it—using all his savings to do so—and tried shopping it to cable and smaller broadcast networks. The effort failed, and he emerged from this attempt with no money, and a property no one was interested in, and a reputation as a primadonna with bad taste, as the network that cancelled Shadowcreek High went on a public relations campaign to silence public outcry and ridiculed David’s efforts in the process. For the next few years, David kept looking for acting work, but everyone from his agent (soon ex-agent) to studio executives paid more attention to industry press that painted him as a passé child actor with no talent and delusions of grandeur. He couldn’t even get a part in a Z-grade movie. All he managed to find was work doing voices for commercials and

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American versions of Japanese cartoons. Once his agent dropped him, he resigned himself to the fact that would be all he’d find, no matter how many casting calls he went to, or agents he called. The only bright spot was that his home was paid off. David spent the next few years in total obscurity. Although the fees he could demand for the voice-over work got bigger as his reputation grew in that field, he still could not make ends meet, so he went to work as a graveyard shift security guard at the Happyland Amusement Park. Here, for the first time, he got to know “normal working folks,” not to mention a handful of shady people who also work mostly at night, such as repo-men and car thieves. Continuing his struggle to return to doing what he loved full-time—acting—David decided to make a website advertising his voice-actor services. Although the initial result was a string of tabloid stories about the fall of another child actor (“Child Monsterhunter Now Stalking Night-time Trespassers in Happyland!”) through it he discovered that there were dedicated fan communities to both Restless Dead and Shadowcreek High. With hard work and a flurry of cheap promotional efforts, David eventually transformed his website into a hub for online fan activity not only for himself but also for his former co-stars. The website proved to be a possible path back to an acting career for David. It became the start for successful grassroots efforts that convinced the studio there was a market for DVD releases of Restless Dead. Soon, David and other actors were invited to horror conventions to talk about the show. What’s more, David is starting to see offers for work other than cartoon voice-overs… the most promising of these so far is an offer to appear on a special episode of the reality show Spookmaster.

Current Sketch David believes he can revive his television career, and he is certain that his upcoming appearance on the Spookmaster

Halloween Special (where he and a handful of other minor celebrities and has-beens are going to spend the night in what is reputed to be a haunted house) will do just that. Meanwhile, he continues to work nights as the graveyard shift security supervisor at Happyland Amusement Park, run his website, do occasional voice-overs, and attend sci-fi or horror conventions within reasonable driving distance of his home on the outskirts of Guardian City. Money remains tight, because his website is so popular that sales through the banner ads aren’t covering the bandwidth expense, and the royalties earned from reruns and DVD releases of Restless Dead and the two movies spun off from the series have not yet proven to be a significant source of income for him.

Personality David is an eternal optimist who believes that he is merely in a career slump. Yes, it’s been going on for about a decade, and sometimes it seems like the world is out to get him, but he remains convinced that success is once again waiting for him just around the corner. Sa

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