My Life as a Model

From GQ. Courtesy: The Sartorialist.

Earlier this year, when my friend Scott Schuman a.k.a. The Sartorialist was looking for bike riders for his GQ page he asked if he could include me. I’m realistic enough to know that being a male model is not high on my list of career opportunities and to no great surprise I ended up being the smallest of all the pictures used, but my son’s classmates were impressed and there was certainly no downside to my brief moment of fame.

Shortly afterwards, I got a call from a friend in the casting business asking if I would model (perhaps “strike an awkward pose” would be a better description) for Apple, who were doing a shoot at their 14th Street store, and this time it was a paying gig. So off I went to the Apple Store, where it became clear I was to play the role of the grey-haired small business owner as opposed to the dashing blogger/cyclist. The other “models” were younger out of work actors whose ability to appear natural in their roles was far greater than mine. However, the photographer Roy Zipstein, was a total pro, and with only the latest state-of the-art Canon digital camera, his pictures looked like they had been produced by a full size production and lighting crew.

I had forgotten all about this until I got an e-mail this morning from the shoot co-ordinator to tell me we were now live on the web! True to my prior model status, you have to scroll way down to see me, but there I am - a polo-shirted businessman hoping to use Apple’s Commercial Credit Program so that financing a Mac will be as easy as using one. I hope you are feeling the emotion behind the role!

Courtesy: Roy Zipstein