David Conrad shot on location throughout Pittsburgh.
David Conrad brings his best to his beloved city.
David Conrad stood me up. There I was, my bottom lip drooping into mocha latte at Espresso a Mano in Lawrenceville, a rendezvous location he had chosen, romantically where we had met just weeks before. I brag to Matt, my favorite barista, that the actor is meeting me there this morning. I even store my debit card on the counter so that I can buy his coffee. Thirty-five minutes later, I blushingly fetch it and leave with my proverbial tail between my (primly skirted) legs.
My BlackBerry buzzes with his apology before I am back at the office, and he promises to meet me “anytime, anywhere.” So, my faith that he is the blue-eyed wonder that so many (OK, women) have made him out to be has been temporarily restored. Still, I have him meet me on my turf and my time: That Saturday, we scoot up to sidewalk seating at Square Café, where he orders the French toast “with caramelized apples on the side, please.” He is amazingly candid — about his big crushes on Nicole Kidman and Grace Kelly, his favorite show, Burn Notice, the bumper cars at Kennywood, and the last shot he had in a bar (“Pickle juice and whiskey. It’s like drinking a Rueben.”) He is all charm, wit, and passion. He is everything everyone told me he’d be. He’s better.
Conrad spent the last five years playing opposite Jennifer Love Hewitt on Ghost Whisperer and has chalked up an impressive resumé, acting in films such as Men of Honor and Wedding Crashers, and spending stints on Boston Public and LA Confidential for television. But the actor, a Swissvale native, keeps coming back to Pittsburgh.
He enabled the buying of two buildings in Braddock for artist housing and studio work. He commissioned the repainting of old mural-sized ads throughout the Mon Valley, preserving Pittsburgh history. He works with LAMAR on pro-bono billboards to promote small communities and non-profits. He wants to see the Museum of Labor History built at the Carrie furnaces in Rankin.
During the week we spend together, Conrad attends a press conference, where local preservationists argued to save Mellon Arena and to surround it with green space — a grand-scale recycling project. He put up some of the $15,000 the group needed to buy their time and fund their research.
He sits on the board for POWER, the International Poetry Forum, the Mattress Factory, and The Kiski School, where he is an alumnus.
“I want to make sure that that school provides what I had,” Conrad says. “My headmaster, Jack Pidgeon, made sure that kids who could have never gone to private school got that education. I was 13, and I think he just looked at me and said, ‘you’re the one. I’m going to take a risk on you.’ I owe him an unutterable debt; it changed my life completely.”
Two years ago, Conrad made a documentary about his history teacher, Tamas Szilagyi, which he called Tamas. He counts the project among his greater works, dismissing more celebrated roles.
Although we drooled over his hunky performance as Bradley Cooper’s best friend in the hilarious Wedding Crashers, Conrad actually regrets taking the role. “In the end, it was charity, and you should never take charity. I mean, as an actor.” He says he was actually up for the bad-guy role that Cooper got.
He’s tough on himself as an actor. The Juilliard School graduate says that drama school changed his life. “It taught me how much labor the arts actually take,” Conrad says. “When you look in the eyes of someone who has failed hard, you see what the people in the arts go through every day. When someone’s screaming, ‘Don’t [mess] around! There are 4,000 people in line who want your job! You think what you did was meaningful?!’ — That’s love. That’s work. Do you really think that anyone should walk out on stage and be paid for it and somehow not be significant?!”
And in that moment, he looks tortured.
That week, he discovers Ghost Whisperer will be canceled. He’s pretty cavalier about it, but there’s a level of sadness in his response.
Surprisingly, when Kim Moses, executive producer of show, cast Conrad, she didn’t know he was from Pittsburgh. It wasn’t until the first day on set, when Conrad showed up in a “Donora Chamber of Commerce” T-shirt, that the two made the connection.
“I ran over and said, ‘I’m from Monongahela Valley!’” Moses says. Nicole Norwood, director of studio development for ABC, is also from Pittsburgh. “The three of us called ourselves The Pittsburgh Mafia,” Moses says.
She speaks highly of Conrad.
“It’s amazing, with how much he works and how talented he is, that he has not moved — lock, stock, and barrel — to Hollywood,” she says. “David has hung on strongly to his roots. He was always engaging us on Ghost Whisperer, bringing realism to the show, bringing Pittsburgh to the show.”
She tells a story about going on a book tour with Conrad, promoting Ghost Whisperer: The Spirit Guide. On a trip through Pittsburgh, Conrad arrived at the bookstore early, scouring the shelves and producing more than 20 books. Before the reading, the actor briefly talked about each of his picks, why they were valuable reads.
“He thanked them all for watching the show and then asked them each to turn off their TVs at a certain time every night and to open a book. That’s David. He inspires people.”
She praises him as professional.
“He’s a well-trained actor. He brings a certain manhood by way of his values and culture. A lot of that he gets from home, the world he won’t give up. He has a moral compass and a connection to these salt-of-the-earth people who raised him.”
Conrad is more critical himself. He glows about his co-star though. Frankly, he says, Jennifer Love Hewitt has gotten a bad rap. “People see her as kind of girl-next-door, kind of vapid,” Conrad says. “She’s not. She’s intelligent and talented and really friendly. And she’s, like, the best dancer I know. You want to Texas two-step, you want to bust a move, you want to dance the tango, she can do it all.”
The actor’s got his own leading lady, though. Not surprisingly, she’s a Pittsburgh woman. He’s vague about his girlfriend, but he says, “The woman I love lives in Pittsburgh.”
The tough-on-himself actor manifests after our photo shoot on the North Shore, under an overpass. It’s a hot day, and the breeze of cars barreling by feels good. Conrad is eyes-searing and handsome. He’s wearing the blue shirt that I told him matches his stare. Still, when I get back to my desk, there’s an email from him, confessing he’s had a hard day and is feeling low: “I got to my car and wept. If the photos look shitty and miserable, like the inside of me, please tell me, and I’ll do it again.”
The pictures are handsome, but our art director admits that the connection is missing. A few days later, I invite Conrad back for a re-shoot, knowing the perfectionist will appreciate the opportunity.
He calls that afternoon, crossing the Roberto Clemente bridge on foot, and I go meet him with our photographer. He’s all fired up about a meeting he just came from for Waterkeeper Alliance, an advocacy group that is trying to purify the three rivers, the group responsible for cleaning the Hudson.
“I mean, if major industries are complaining that the water coming into their plants is going to break their machines, it’s got to be bad!” He flexes under a breezy button-down. “For me, it’s about the communities. We’ve got kids in Rankin and Donora who are going to have IQs that are 20 points lower — because we can’t clean up the water?! Something has to be done.”
He’s also on the board of the Rivers of Steel National Heritage Area, whose mission it is to preserve national industry landmarks. When the 1,500-pound U.S. Steel sign was auctioned off, Conrad paid $4,000 for it and had it remounted at The Waterfront as a reminder of the former steel site. He also paid $1,500 for the refurbishing of three steel-history paintings, which now hang in the lobby of Steel Valley High School in Munhall.
“There’s money out there for green economies,” he says. “Why aren’t we going after those grants? Why aren’t we putting more farms on the roofs of our buildings?! Maybe we should go more toward the rebuilding of the power plant rather than the new hockey arena.”
He loosens up and starts climbing on the boat docks and jumping off of the steel sculptures by the running trail. Our photographer loves it. He even swings on the light poles, which gets us to talking about Gene Kelly, one of Conrad’s heroes, “a genius,” he calls him.
My cell phone rings, and it’s a frantic call from the office: Jennifer Love Hewitt is on the line. She heard about the story on Conrad and wants to talk to me. Her timing couldn’t be more perfect. “Put her through,” I say.
The actress laughs when I tell her I’m with her leading man and that he’s swinging from a lamppost, channeling Gene Kelly.
“Gene Kelly is a perfect comparison,” Hewitt says. “In a world full of modern men, David’s an old-school movie star. He’s an awesome leading man and a total joy. After playing my husband for five years, I can say he’s the longest relationship I’ve ever had in Hollywood.”
A walker scoots down the path with two Labrador puppies. David stops to pet them and confesses a love for animals. (As if he couldn’t be more perfect.) He doesn’t have dogs, but he has a rescued mustang, Dillian, who lives in a pasture outside of Los Angeles.
“He was a training horse, and I just thought he was the coolest thing. When I asked to buy him, the guy at the stable said, ‘No, you want a real horse, not this one.’ I said, ‘I think Dillian is a real horse.’ I bought him, and now he runs around in a field all day.”
He shuffles up the trail toward the city. “I don’t know — maybe I’ll buy 10 acres in Butler. He can come live here with me. It’s a nice life here.”
POWER, power-recovery.com. International Poetry Forum, thepoetryforum.org. The Mattress Factory, mattress.org. The Kiski School, kiski.org. Waterkeeper Alliance, waterkeeper.org. Rivers of Steel National Heritage Area, riversofsteel.com.
