Actor Neil McDonough is on a mission to tell stories of faith and inspiration.
McDonough’s latest film, Guns & Moses, is about a rabbi who currently runs a small synagogue in California with his wife and five children. According to the official account, the faith leader “becomes an unlikely gunslinger after his community is violently attacked.”
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The actor who portrayed Mayor Donovan Kirk in the film said the film was “about honouring God and loving your neighbor.” It is a mission of kindness and understanding that it can be linked to McDonough’s own struggle to lose his job in Hollywood after standing in his own Christian faith.
“I had this incredible career, so it was taken away from me a bit because of my faith and love for my wife,” McDonough said. “I didn’t want to do a kissing scene because I didn’t want to put down a Rube through something like that.
McDonough had previously shared his journey with CBN News. He made a media splash a few years ago due to his long-standing policy of kissing his castmates.
“I didn’t kiss a woman on that show years ago,” McDonough said. “Then I became a blackball.”
He continued, “I lost my home, I lost everything – the car, you named it. I went bankrupt.”
McDonough said he dealt with his “large drinking problem” and not being able to get a job by consuming alcohol for two years. Ultimately, he overcomes those struggles and then makes a powerful film with a red-hearted storyline.
In a recent interview with CBN News, McDonough offered advice to those who faced similar struggles after facing their ideals.
“You have to keep your faith for those who have gone through what I have experienced,” he said. “You must believe that if you have God-given talent like me, if I believe in him, he knows he is going to do anything.”
McDonough said, “When I got through those issues, I don’t think I made myself and made enough about him. And there was a two-year period in which I was trying to spend this horrible time in my life, where self-compassion, alcohol and everything else was trying to spend this horrifying time in my life.”
He eventually put the bottle down and said he found healing and returned to the Lord. He now sees his reded filmmaking as a way to honor the Lord. And this is what he is trying to achieve with “guns and Moses.” When asked about making films dealing with anti-Semitism when anti-Semitic hatred unfolds around the world, McDonough said people need to learn to love and understand each other.
As for current dynamics, he said “the press certainly doesn’t help,” making it seem like the media “everyone hates each other.”
“It’s terrible, it’s fate and darkness,” McDonough said. “Well, that’s not true. There are so many amazing, beautiful, fantastic, and wonderful people in the world. You’re not hearing from them, but from those who cause these hate riots and all of these things.”
Ultimately, the actor said he hopes that films like “Guns and Moses” will show people how to love their neighbors better.
“It’s okay to have different ideas,” McDonough said. “It’s okay to be different. It’s part of life.”
For more information about this film, click here.
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