A new acting course is being held in the Honors College this semester, and the adjunct professor has something interesting on his resume: a decade-long career as mob hit man.

Professor Steve Blackwood, a 56-year-old actor and college film instructor, played the bumbling mob villain Bart Biederbicke on the NBC soap opera “Days of our Lives” from 1997 to 2007.

 

Taking on a new role

“I played this ‘Yes sir, I’ll kill him, sir’ sort of henchman,” he said of his role.

Blackwood, who is also an OU alumni, explained he has held several guest lectures for OU’s theater program and was approached by the Honors College to teach his first full-semester class called “On Camera and Off.”

“To be asked to teach at the school I graduated from in 1978 … It’s amazing,” he said.

 

Class begins

The course, which is held Tuesday nights from 5:30 p.m. to 8:50 p.m., meets the general education requirement for Art for the 23 Honors College students who are currently enrolled.

Rachel Voight, a biology major and OU sophomore, said  she heard about the course through other members of the Honors College and thought it would be an exciting experience.

According to Voight, students were required to come to the first class meeting with a monologue prepared, and she was chosen to present first.

“It was one of the scariest things I’ve ever done,” she said. “I’ve never acted before and he (Blackwood) is famous!”

Sophomore and Health Science major Mark Wright, who is also enrolled in the course, agreed.

“I was nervous too, but I figured, ‘why not go for it?’” he said. “I can get some feedback and do better next time.”

 

Making a difference

Blackwood said he wants to provide students with the experience they’d need to do a real audition and get cast for a role.

“Not a lot of people have been to Los Angeles, and been to New York and have gone through all that,” he said. “I want to use that to teach.”

Blackwood said he began teaching college acting classes when he moved back to Michigan after the “tragic death” of his character on Days of our Lives.

“Bart was caught in the crossfire of a swordfight between (characters) Tony and André DiMera,” he said. “André missed Tony and put a knife right through my chest. It sucked.”

Since then, Blackwood has held acting seminars at Michigan State, Rochester College and other universities and is currently teaching a course at Hillsdale College.

Since his return to Michigan, his has also acted in several locally-filmed movies, Blackwood said.

He was a banker in the 2011’s “Machine Gun Preacher,” a movie starring Gerard Butler, and he played the role of Lindy in “Cedar Rapids” starring Ed Helms of “The Office.”

Despite his teaching career, Blackwood said he is still acting and is currently filming a movie entitled “Beyond the Mask.”

When his students learned of this, they jokingly suggested a field trip to the set, he said.

His response: “You know, that’s not a bad idea.”

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Contact Staff Reporter Jennifer Holychuk via email [email protected]