Jeffrey James Warner

Jeff James Warner

Date of Birth: November 28, 1963

Long Beach, California USA

Following a one-year stay at the Southern California Military Academy in 1977-78, he attended Woodrow Wilson High School where he enrolled in film class and also made sets and backdrops for the school's plays. After a year at Long Beach City College, he attended the Focus Institute, a school for aspiring film makers. He landed his first acting part in a no-budget 1985 independent film as "soldier #3" and continued playing mostly bit-parts and extras in military or war genre productions for the next ten years. In the mid l 990's he formed his own company, GI Concepts. His new company was innovative, being one of the first of its kind to provide production companies with background actors, costumes and military technical advice all from one source. Previously, the only available option was to hire extras, rent costumes and consult technical advisors all separately from scattered resources. The simplification and cost savings of providing all of these services from a single company has made him somewhat controversial in recent years, being very popular with producers and very unpopular with freelance technical advisors and costumers. Consequently, Jeff Warner is now air-apparent to the military technical advisor niche in Hollywood. Today, the trend seems to be in favor of GI Concepts and similar multi­service providers who are rapidly replacing single-service companies and freelance military advisors. The military advisor gurus of the 1980s and 1990s are now finding it increasingly difficult or impossible to compete.

His boyish looks have enabled him to convincingly play the role of soldiers in their 20's despite his actual age being much older. He has worked in a handful of feature films including Memphis Belle (1992), Saving Private Ryan ( 1999) and Pearl Harbor (2002) however, he is more closely associated with made for cable-TV military or war documentaries. Rather than acting, in recent years he has been spending more time behind the camera as a costumer, prop-master and technical consultant for the same type of programming.

Trademark

Frequently seen as an extra or small role actor in television war genre documentaries on The History Channel, A&E and The Discovery Channel since the mid l 990's.

Usually plays small roles or bit-parts in the productions his company GI Concepts is hired for.

Trivia

Is a published author and has written a series of six military reference books.

Toured Europe and the Pacific as a battlefield archeologist.

Is left-handed.

Was born on Thanksgiving Day.

Does not drink alcohol and is devoutly anti-drug. Claims to have never used any type of recreational drugs.

Has been romantically linked to a number of women and several long-term relationships but has remained a bachelor and has no children.

Is distantly related to Sam, Albert and Jack Warner who founded Warner Brothers Studios.

Is a second generation native of California.

His father and five uncles all served in World War II but he was turned down by the U.S. Marine Corps in 1981 for a Thyroid condition.

Began collecting military memorabilia at age 6 and is rumored to personally own several thousand military uniforms of all descriptions.

Formed his own company GI Concepts in 1995 and established it as a one-stop-shop providing several military related theatrical services.

Was once hired as a soldier in a floor show at a private dinner function in 1995 to honor the film stars who did their part for the war effort during WWII. In attendance were some of the most notable names from the golden age of Hollywood including Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Charlton Heston, Hugh Heffner, Mel Torme', Charles "Buddy" Rodgers, George Montgomery, Marc Lawrence, Fayard Nicholas (of the Nicholas Brothers), Ann Rutherford, Margaret O'Brien, Ann Miller, Virginia Mayo and Penny Singleton.

Ironically, he is a self-proclaimed pacifist.

Personal quotes

(on making war films) "It's all just smoke & mirrors and it's been like that since the days of silent films. The only difference now is, what they can't pull off with smoke & mirrors they create with computer graphics. But still I think it's important to make them because they're all great human interest stories. And of course we should all remember what Winston Churchill said, those who don't remember history are doomed to repeat it."

(on the controversy over his company GI Concepts) "I think its funny how many people hate other people who come up with a new idea that works. GI Concepts is simple and it saves everyone time and money but you'd be surprised how many people say nasty things about it and me. I guess I can't blame the competition for being upset. After all, GI Concepts does take a lot of business away from them. More and more all the time. But I think the main reason those people are mad is because they didn't think of it first."

(on the entertainment business) "There is very little glamour in any of it, but people who aren't involved in it think there is. The reality of it is long hours, hard work and locations that are almost always too hot or too cold. Not that I'm complaining, I love what I do but that's really what it's like. It's a job and more often than not, it's tough."

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