Hello!
My name is Paul Danner, but my friends call me “Happy!" I'm an actor, producer, writer, and director currently based in Atlanta, Georgia.
I’ve been involved in entertainment for virtually my entire life. In high school, I devoted much of my free time to producing Right From Wrong, a short film that I wrote and directed. At 16, I was handling the budget, hiring actors, meeting with industry professionals, scheduling shoots and rehearsals, and managing all of the equipment and funds. The film later went on to have a premiere with acclaim at the Landmark Art Cinema in 2019. At the same time, I was studying theatre at the British Academy of Performing Arts in Marietta, GA, and working backstage in my high school’s theatre department.
As soon as I graduated from high school, I founded Kindled Spark Productions, my professional theater company. I directed our first production, a musical called Hedwig and the Angry Inch, opening in August 2019, to great success. At the same time, I was working as a professional actor, appearing as a recurring cast member in Paramount Network’s Paradise Lost, as well as performing in various theater productions around Atlanta. I scheduled Hedwig’s regimen in accordance with Paramount’s production schedule. I was living with dual residency in Atlanta, where I was producing Hedwig, and Baton Rouge, where I was filming Paradise Lost. Unfortunately, I had to dissolve Kindled Spark Productions in March 2020, due in part to the COVID-19 pandemic.
I waited to start my college career until the pandemic died down rather than spend my tuition on remote-only classes. I chose to attend Oglethorpe University, pursuing a Bachelor's in film and media studies with a minor in writing. This way, I could devote my degree and academic studies to film, media, and writing, while at the same time, involve myself in their theatre projects. I worked either on stage or backstage for the majority of their stage productions. I was also a proud member of Alpha Psi Omega, the nationally recognised theatre fraternity. Not only did I end my tenure Cum Laude with an appearance on the Dean’s list, but I completed my degree a semester early due to the level of vigour that I exemplified over the course of my academic career.
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It was then that I founded my film production company: Broken Clock Productions, which I currently manage in my free time. Throughout its short existence, I have produced several award-winning short films and documentaries. Some of these projects include An Audition, which won the “Best Micro-Short” award at the ATL Short Film Festival, Dog Problems (aka Cookies and Chrysanthemums), which took home both the “Best Overall” and “Audience Favorite” awards at the Last Looks Film Festival, and my debut documentary, Divided We Fall, in which I interviewed supporters of the January 6th insurrection and traveled to Washington, D.C. on election night 2024 to speak with voters and witnesses of the 2021 Capitol riots.