My name is Jay Castle and I'm a model / actor in NYC. I write screenplays in my spare time so that one day I can be a filmmaker however, I wasn't always on this path. I was born in Queens, raised in NJ, and went to college in Boston for Psychology. Though I never showed it, from a young age my life has been filled with the constant reminder of death.
By the time I was in college, roughly every 6 months one of my close family or friends would die. It was a tough thing to get through knowing I could never truly grieve for someone fully because I knew I would soon need to begin the process once more for someone else. It made me numb to everything, helpless, and quite disillusioned with the very major I was going to college for. When I was finished with school I moved back home and after failed attempts of acquiring a job in my field, I ended up getting a job constructing a building.
I now had a job but I felt lost. I wasn't working in my field, the deaths continued and I felt like life was simply wasting away. After X amount of time, my friend from college invited me to move to Boston with his girlfriend and her friends. I accepted and lived in a house with 5 people all who worked in the arts. In a year their influence ignited my own passion for the arts, specifically movies and storytelling. We eventually all went our separate ways and I moved back home but things were different this time, I was different.
As usual my first instinct was to get a job in my field and thankfully I failed. One day, while searching for a job, I stumbled across a casting call for a fashion show. It was close by and I had nothing going on so I figured why not.
When I showed up, I was in complete disbelief. The casting call was being held in THE BUILDING I HELPED BUILD all those years ago when i worked in construction. I was walking inside having flashbacks of being filthy, huddled around gas canister heaters at 7amin the relentless winter because there were no walls. Now I'm inside a studio on a beautiful august afternoon pretending to be a model. I unknowingly built the blocks to my potential future, literally, and it worked. I got the show and it would not be the last.
In 2 years I have walked in New York Fashion Week a dozen times for international designers from Dominican Republic to Peru. I have acted and consulted screenplays for short films. Met so many interesting people along the way. The penultimate came this past February, during New York Fashion Week, my picture landed itself into Vogue Mexico which is every model's dream. Years ago I was lost but now I have a vision. It's a nice lesson to learn that unbeknownst to you, even in your darkest moments, you are always building the blocks for your future whatever it may be.
