Ash Adams - Acting Career

Acting Career

By the time he was 20, Adams had already started making efforts to enter show business, and the connections he needed to break in. Jason formed a notable early relationship with actress Maree Cheatham, who eventually started passing his profile around to casting directors after she took a liking to his "chops". One of the directors that responded was a casting agent for the inaugural installment of A Nightmare on Elm Street. Adams made his professional acting debut in the 1984 smash hit horror film, in a small role as an anonymous surfer.

Afterwards, Adams ramped up his auditions and prospects tenfold; in 1986, the casting director at ABC's Ryan's Hope announced that they were looking to cast an adult actor to take over the role of John Reid Ryan on the soap. Adams came in to read and won the part, of which he played from August 1986 until the show's final episode on January 13, 1989. His character had previously been a child for RH's first decade on the air (known as "Little John Ryan" and later "Johnno Ryan", and played from newborn stage to age 10 by Jadrien Steele, from 1975–1985). Adams is known for being one of the earliest soap actors brought into take over a role due to SORAS-ing (Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome).

Adams became noticed on the Hollywood scene in a major way during his years on Ryan's Hope, and after the soap bid farewell to viewers in early 1989, he was in high demand for new ventures. ABC immediately cast him as the lead in a two-hour movie pilot they were considering to pick up as a weekly series, Thunderboat Row. Even though the movie was well received, it never became a series. This was followed by a guest shot on the syndicated revival of Adam-12, just before he was cast as François Gaultier in Lionheart (1990), alomgside Jean-Claude Van Damme. On the heels of Lionheart's success at the box office, Adams was catapulted into heavier movie roles in The Arc (1991), Original Intent (1992), the indie flick I'll Love You Forever..Tonight (1992), the cult horror favorite Puppet Master 4 (1993) and with an appearance in the short The Privilege Cage (1994). Occasionally during this time, Adams still turned up in some guest roles, including in two episodes of ABC's The Young Riders in 1990, playing Jeffrey Darnell.

In late 1994, Adams returned to series TV full time as Agent Dan Sandler on the action series Vanishing Son, which ran as a part of Universal Television's Action Pack in first-run syndication. Although Vanishing Son was successful as a series of four made-for-TV-movies aired under the Action Pack banner during 1994, the weekly series was less so, and was cancelled after 13 episodes in May 1995. In the following TV season, he co-starred as Max Houser in the syndicated serial drama Acapulco Bay, an American adaptation of the Mexican telenovelas Tú o nadie and Acapulco, Cuerpo y Alma. Things in a sense came full circle for Adams on Acapulco Bay, since one of his co-stars was the woman he credited for launching his career, close friend Maree Cheatham (who played Victoria).

Subsequent movie roles for Adams included Deputy Steve Stowe in The Stranger (1995), a cameo in Mother (1996), and large parts in Striking Resemblance (1997) and Water and Power (1999). He continued to appear in guest shots on popular cable and syndicated series, including an episode of Renegade in 1997, and on Pamela Anderson's V.I.P. in 1999. By this time he was now going professionally by Ash Adams (for reasons discussed below), but despite the change in his stage name, in certain credits of his listed above from 1996 or later, he continued to be credited as Jason Adams.

In the early 2000s, Adams put aside time to specifically focus on live theatre work, at first committing to popular productions at the Actors Studio in New York City. It was there where he starred in Mass Appeal and Return to the Chicago Abyss. He later returned to the Los Angeles area to star in the local production of Hurly Burly in 2004. In between the latter two plays, he made a guest appearance in an early episode of ABC's 2003 revival of Dragnet. The most important development in Adams' career outside of his acting at this time was his preparation for a filmmaking career. Before he had finished his stage work in New York City, Adams had already started raising funds for an inaugural movie project of his own, while launching a production company which ultimately became his independent film marque Bravado Pictures.