Bart Johnson (High School Musical) Full Interview

[Music] welcome to has Ender the chat I'm Adam gory and this is our interview with Bart Johnson thanks for checking out the interview and make sure you like subscribe and hit the Bell to get alerts for new videos as they come out check in the description below for links to Bart's social media accounts as well as the podcast social media accounts thanks for checking us out and enjoy the video one thing right off the bat that I kind of noticed when I was doing some research and some of this came off Wikipedia and I always like to like double check before just assuming what I read on Wikipedia is right because it's Wikipedia um but you had a pretty interesting like upbringing so your your mom was a hair stylist in Hollywood like you grew up in Hollywood you've always been kind of in Hollywood yeah yeah born born in Hollywood yeah literally like born in Hollywood Community Hospital me and Leo DiCaprio are the only only two people I know that were like actually born in this little tiny tiny Hospital in Hollywood and then yeah my whole entire life as as far as I can remember but yeah you could ask about that those they that's a I got some interesting little nuggets I guess to say about that okay cool yeah I mean so you started in Hollywood and then you guys moved to Utah when you were yeah I how old were you was it like high school age or young yeah yeah was a freshman in high school yeah my my dad always wanted to be cowboy and uh my mom got to point in her career where she's just doing movies she's going on locations anyway so she's like let's they my dad grew up as a crop duster in like literally like a crop duster in Wyoming so he uh he just always wanted to be a cowboy so he moved up there and got pigs and goats and a cow and and uh he was so got Cowboy how how was that going from Hollywood I mean you're you know 13 14 going from Hollywood growing up 13 years of your life and then going to Utah after that I mean that's like that's got to be like uh what is it City Slickers you remember the movie City Slickers oh yeah yeah yeah it was like if City Slickers had a nightmare it would be that's what it was it was like you know and I was really into music and fashion and all that stuff at the time and um man I'll tell you going up there it was a really small town because it was a it's a town called Midway which is right outside of Park City Utah which you got you got all the amazing skiing but like I didn't ski I'm a California kid and uh right and there the the our town was known for was high school at the time was known as um we were the state champs 10 years running in wrestling and Rodeo and I'm like Rodeo they're letting these kids they're like bucking Broncos and riding bulls and stuff and it's like that was that was my that was my that's that was my community now I didn't know there was a state champ for Rodeo oh man I it's the craziest thing man it's a that's a legit CRA it's crazy it's can't wrap your head around it where did you ever try did you ever try rodeo Oh no dude they did let me put this way I wasn't it wasn't uh it wasn't a warm welcome from those guys guy it was brutal man I got beat up all all the way oh my God yeah there was like there's there's like a group of us uh that had moved from California up there um over the course of several years so we like all like became friends and uh that made all the Cowboys and the redneck hate us even that much more and they had some some great names that I wouldn't repeat on on oh boy in public that uh what whatever it was uh it was it built a lot of character let me say that it built but it was rough man no it was legitimately like because the thing is is like uh you know it's not cool for like a senior um to bully a freshman right it's like what's wrong with you you're like you're a punk you're freaking like how cowardly nope nope not then fresh it's like I'm gonna punch this guy you get punched in the face it's crazy man it's like it's the craziest thing there's These Guys these state champ wrestlers the state camp for some reason he was a senior I won't say his name but I know it and uh he had it out for me for some reason and so they would like they grab me in the hall we had a our school is a square and it's like you can't escape it it was just like classrooms on all lockers and classrooms all around in the Square so all you do is walk around in a circle that's it can't escape anybody and you know it's in the snow so you see it's all indoor and uh those guys would like grab me and put me in a circle and just like push me back and forth like I like punked me like as in a movie man it was crazy but it was like it was pretty rough man it pretty rough but yeah that does sound like a movie like California Kid moves to like uh you know rural town and gets picked on like that's there's definitely a movie that has exactly that plot I'm sure no you know what's funny it's like it's the opposite of K kid it's like he moved from small town to the big californ well he was New Jersey yeah small toown New Jersey to like this you know big city and it's like man big I asked my kids my kids go to school now and I'm like hey you guys ever get bullied like they're like bullied that's not cool man not people don't do that that's not that's not a cool thing to do like whoa well that's good that's great man that's not how I grew up but that's pretty wild I know it's a point of emphasis nowadays yeah yeah yeah they're a little more uh cultured here in La I guess I didn't mean that you asked where I was uh where I was at I'm in South Eastern PA so I grew up maybe hour outside of Philadelphia and then mov a little bit I live a little bit further from that now okay do you know uh Happy Valley is that state yeah where where Penn State is yeah State College yeah and they call that state state college is yeah I think that's the actual like Town name is technically okay yeah yeah I shot a movie there once so I didn't that's like my whole experience of Pennsylvania I did a movie called Happy Valley is a really it's a really bad movie my wife went to Penn State so we've been there times beautiful man beautiful I wish I could remember the creamies cuz they're like dude the dairy and the ice cream and the milk was like gosh man about that Yeah we actually it's funny uh maybe 10 minutes from our house a place like we're we're 3ish hours away from Penn State but we're close enough that they Penn State crey ice cream some places around here have it so like we'll we'll be able to drive only like maybe 10 minutes and get some of that Penn State ice cream it's so oh is that the is that the crey Penn State creamy that's the one y yeah oh there it is okay it's worth a trip you know what I mean you might as well get out here and try it yeah yeah well I wonder if that's what I had back in the day I mean I was like obsessed with this place it was it was so good man it was so amazing yeah it's right was it right on campus it wasn't on campus okay H they have a couple maybe I was getting the uh maybe I was getting second tier man maybe that that wasn't the right I'm sure there's Pence probably known for Pennsylvania's known for farms and creameries and things like that right that's yeah so I might have been a been a uh you know a runner up maybe I did it's PR good it's get back there we don't have crap here in California man we have crap we have crap we have nothing good here yeah I I have only ever had it once and it was in Vegas um and I I remember it was a few years ago it was right before covid so it's like early 2020 I remember being like this is pretty good but we have like out here we have like five guys Smash Burger and they're all pretty damn good too so Five Guys well here's the thing case some point five guys I love Five Guys it's an amazing Burger I take my family there it's like $80 it is I take my family to in Out Burger it's like 25 like it's really okay oh yeah yeah it's and when you when you got three kids and you're like you know it's like oh makes a big difference man makes big difference yeah eating out in general is expensive nowadays but yes I um you know maybe I wasn't paying attention to how much I paid I probably should have paider attention were you just your yourself were just buying by yourself uh it was my wife and I okay so two yeah mix when there's five you know yeah get a couple kids following you around then you're gonna that's going to make a real difference yeah no totally um so yeah you said you get back to Utah every now and then to to ski I I noticed I saw I think it was either your Twitter or Instagram um you you were out there recently to ski and did you have did you get hurt or something I thought I saw you on like a stretcher that's me man yeah I I I I think I'm gonna post on my Instagram today but um yeah I broke my uh I broke my rib number one right here attached to the clavical is freaking brutal man it hurts so it's it still still hurts not nearly as bad but like I can breathe deep now which is great but like I bruised like I don't know all my ribs I guess because like if I cough I'd rather die than cough like it hurts so bad it's crazy like you wouldn't think it would hurt that bad but uh it does so what happen just fell or yeah just it's nothing great man it's like it's this is how lame it is we were skiing with two GoPros in the insta 360 that three cameras rolling and we come down we'd like tear up this powder Hill like yeah yeah yeah it was great first run of the day it was like over Knee Deep powder Utah powder which is primo is the greatest come off the run it was incredible I can't believe I turn off all the cameras then we get on the hard pack and I just I was excited whereever I hit a jump which went too high and when I came down I landed like on this Mogul that kind of like tossed me and I was going Head Over Heels no big deal again and I I just tucked as hard as I could because I didn't want to land on my head the way I was going and I just came down and like smashed between my shoulder blades and it just went crack and it sound the sound is I don't know broken a rib but it's like you you hear it which is so gross man it's like you take a twig and you smack you crack it over your knee he just like I'm like uh oh uh oh and but I landed on my back so I was really scared I I broke like a you know like a like vertebra vertebrae or a collar bone or something you know I was like oh no oh no I just stay on my and my body just felt like like didn't feel normal I just like stayed on my back I'm like oh man please please please please can I okay I'll move my fingers I can move my toes I just like I did but like my body felt like don't move kind of like that feeling you know and I was like what I what I do and I was hoping broke my GoPro in half I was like let me see the GoPro is that broken in half because I heard something break so anyway it turns out that uh yeah broke ri right that's that's that's still scary though you hear you hear something snap and you're like yeah like you said like laying there like okay I can move my extremities so that's you know cuz I mean I I remember you know people get in like pretty rough ski accidents around here we have like ski slopes it's probably nothing compared to Utah I'm not a skier but you know we have a few probably bunny Hills compared to what you're ski uh but you I mean I've only skied once or twice in my life and like you go you can go from not fast to fast real quick oh yeah yeah yeah yeah no there's I've been that's my second time in an ambulance o over well when moved to Utah that's all I did like that's all I did there's not a lot to do there and I just fell in love with it we got a season passer $90 unrestricted $90 that same pass now is probably like four grand to get that pass uh 90 bucks man so like ski every day we put in like over 50 days of uh full days on the hill and then we'd go every day from home from school we just hike up and build jumps and practice back flips and stuff and like that's just all we did and and uh when I was in college that was uh the idea was to pursue uh try to race professionally and like you know was like looking at the Olympics and like want I was a mogul skier like a pretty competitive Mogul skier and uh and then it was like the big decision like in college like okay I really like this acting stuff and I really like the skiing stuff I love them both I'm pursuing them both and uh one day I was uh I was going home from a theater re I was rehears on night in theater and um uh and then doing my other stuff during the day and uh I fell asleep and I rolled my car I got I got a scar on my elbow right here just to remind me if I ever think about it I'm like you can't you can't do it all man you got to focus and you gotta like get after one of them so that's when I was like okay I'm gonna drop out of college I'm Gonna Leave skiing behind which was broke my heart it's the hardest thing I've ever done was College I I could live without college that was that was rough and I just packed up my car moved to LA and and uh pursued uh pursued acting and and uh and for the next 10 years years like I I cried over leaving skiing behind it was the it was so hard um but yeah like you know I just figured you know you pursue a sports career and you're done by late 20s and then in acting it's like you know I could be in I could be doing that for the rest of my life so I think I better you know who knows who knew that both those paths would have led me to ultimately be a PE teacher in one way or another so here I am did I did I read that you also for a brief time were uh Premed at University of Utah is that accurate I was pursuing yeah that's what I was that's what I was going to school for um okay yeah then you transferred to Yale which can't be easy to get into so I mean you have Premed and Yale that's like you got to be pretty smart to yeah that was a that was just a that was that is not as fancy as it sounds that was just a theater program and it was not uh it was not a a a track of school or anything like that so that's not that's not really and and you know it was like every it lit like for the longest time on I don't know if it was on Wikipedia or something like that it said uh graduated from the Yale School of drama I'm like that's not true I even called Yale I'm like I like it like if people are gonna make crap up about me keep that one but like I'm asking interviews so often I'm like can you just get take that off matter of fact it was on my I was on my it was on my IMDb for a long time and I was at Sundance Film Festival and I was at this party and they're like oh yeah these two guys created and they own IMDb and I'm like you guys listen F something on IMDb Fe me they're like oh boy here we go I'm like they had this really strange response and I was like what what why you guys responding that way like we get this all the time it's one of two things and I was like what and we've had they've had death threats they've had like people like go after because two things on imv I'm like I can't imag like what is it and they're like age people's age they don't have their age on there and adult films like they have adult films like no that's not no since I went I graduated from me school of drama I didn't graduate from y School of drama and they're like oh oh okay well yes yeah that we can do like okay cool that was you're like yeah your yours is a much easier request than either of those yeah yeah yeah uh speaking of age though you know what another thing that I didn't realize until I was like doing some research before we were chatting is that when you did High School Musical you were only what like 35 36 years old yeah I'm not sure exactly how old I was I don't I have to do the math me I'm sure when it came out versus like when you actually filmed it was probably I I think I was 35 35 it came out in 06 so 2005 came out oh I was I was 34 I was 3 that's right I was 3 34 years old when I did the movie when we Shot the movie because I was born in December um so I was 34 okay so here's the funny story um the funny story is uh I so I met Kenny Ortega um while we were shooting so here's the story so when when when I um was in college I my my mom who's a hair stylist she did um uh you know growing up um when I okay I was born in Hollywood right um and my mom was a hairstyle she did Mora Mindy Brady Bunch Charlie's Angels I remember as a little kid being on the set of Mora Mindy and meeting um Robin Williams in his uh Mor Mor foror costume and he gave me the nanu nanu handshake if you know like you're any 80s babies out there that know what I'm talking about um so it was like a really cool like upbringing and then when she uh got um to into features it it kind of changed the game because in television you you you have to live in LA and then when you start doing movies you can live anywhere so she started doing uh M Gibson's hair she did um like a couple of Il Lethal Weapon movies and she did joh trolas hair and she did uh Antonio Banderas and she started doing these movies she was like none of them shootting La anyway so we might as well move out and so my dad who always wanted to be the cowboy was like we're going to a farm and they found this place called the Johnson Mill and on Johnson Mill Road and this Old Flower Mill and we moved out there so um we were living out there and my mom's uh doing this movie called Newsies so um news's big Disney music with Christian Bale and Dave Moscow and ell so um she said come down and visit so I went down and I was I must have been 20 21 and I got on the set and I was like I I've always loved movies I love like on my whole entire youth I I was a little kid sitting in the hair and makeup Trail they're just kind of watching you know and the actors always really super nice to the kids on the set and it's like Oh yay the hair hairstyles brought their kid and always really friendly well I I would watch and just you know it's just so fun if you've been on a on a movie set like set culture is this really cool if you love movies it's it's fascinating like watch these movies and I still remember the the the scene the first scene I watched was Christian Bale when he was this like towards the end of the movie when he had he had the papers he was kind of a scab and he was walking down and and and ends up the the uh they're beating up David Moscow and they're going to go uh um getting this fist fight and it was just like really cool to watch that and I was just like this is the this is the coolest thing I've ever seen in my life and then I became friends with Ellie Keats and I started hanging out with her and she was this kid she had this cool house in Hollywood Hills I'm like you do this for a living like wait a minute this is way better than a job right so that's kind of where I got super interested so so so Kenny Ortega I've known him forever and then so uh he's a really good friends of our family and he was very supportive and he watched anytime I was on a TV show I did TV series for Warner Brothers called Hyperion Bay and he would watch that and call me go hey this you did so great on this scene and like I watched you on this you did such a great job on that just amazing so cut to he did uh Hocus Pocus he did all these other movies and then he's doing this little movie in Utah and he said um he called me up out of the blue and he said Hey listen I'm going to Utah and I'm gonna make this movie um it's a musical it takes place in a high school we're just calling it High School Musical until me come up with a name but um it's there's no money and there not it's a little movie but we're it's no one's going to see it but we're going to have we're going have the best time we're going to have a great time do you want to come up to Utah I know you love Utah let's go to Utah and have a really fun summer and I say well yes I don't I'm I jump anything Kenny Orga was doing I don't care what it is like I'm in and he didn't like that Disney was giving him a short list of all the people that could play coaches so he' already been auditioning these people already working with them and he's like I just don't feel like any of them are uh that's they're not our coach Bolton we need our coach Bolton he's like you you are our coach Bolton I like okay cool great yeah let's go so he s me the the sides you know you get sides as an actor you don't get the whole script you just get the your line song I I don't know what it is and um he said you're going to play Zack Efron's Dad I'm like I who's I don't know okay all right cool so I went in and auditioned a universal uh for these casting directors Natalie Hart Jason ladura and the great amazing casting people and I didn't get it I didn't get the role I was like oh man what a bu that would have been so fun and then like a few days later Kenny Ortega calls me go what happened they said you you didn't yeah you're you're you're too young you're like they said you're way too young for this so you're supposed to you're supposed to what' you wear what'd you wear the audition I was like I don't jeans and a t-shirt he's like you're supposed to be Zach's father I'm like who's Z I don't know who that right back then young actor by and and uh I was like wait wait I'm I'm not I'm not old enough to play I'm way too young to play the a dad like I'm I'm gonna play Dad no man I like I it's a weird thing in an actor's life where it's like you're whole entire career you've been the basketball player you know you've been the guy like I'm supposed to be in the action and then they're like oh no now you're the coach so you know uh now you stand on the sidelines so I'm like oh I see oh I I stand back here and then kind of just like watch everybody else play I'm like oh that's kind of it's kind of a a humbling experience realizing like I'm not now I'm not the star uh but uh anyway he got he Kenny says okay listen this what I'm do I'm gonna get you back I'm gonna get you in for a screen test okay and we're to put some gray in your hair just gray on the sides be a little bit in here and uh you're going to wear a suit and you have a sports coat and you're going to act serious you're gonna act like the age you're supposed to I'm like okay okay okay I'm sorry yeah okay do it let's do it and so I went in and did all that stuff my now my mom's a hair stylist so she has all her hair and makeup buddies so they're just like oh no problem come in and did me up and I went in there and I acted serious and I got the part so it was uh it was great yes I got I got the part then I get the set and I'm like I'm not old enough to do this crap why am I you know uh it was I was torn between like loving the role I love I love the RO more than anything like it's the greatest like greatest greatest experience in my life was uh was playing that part which which is kind of interesting because as much as I grew up on musical like my favorite movie in in the whole entire world Singing in the Rain like but I you know okay all the musicals like all of them like all the Jee Kelly movies and sunr St brothers and you know Oklahoma like all this I just like I as a kid like I I watched that in in high school like was doing a lot of mus Musical and then after in college I was doing a lot of musical so it's was like really fun really fun so I had like the time of my life but they didn't let me sing and they didn't let me dance and I'm like I did all this theater and now I'm gonna play B like the only thing I didn't do was play basketball that's the only I didn't do in this whole entire thing so that was um that was interesting but um yeah I had the had the greatest time ever is actually it's interesting because like um I had done a series before high school music school like I had done a series at Warner Brothers for Warner Brothers television we shot right at the Warner Brothers Studio and uh and that was like probably the best thing that ever happened in my career because it's kind of like a lot of people really love that show it's kind of like critics loved it and everything and then I did this Disney show and then nobody wanted to hire me after that show for a while because they're like we don't want the Disney D like HBO is not like hey who's that kid who's that guy who's the adult on the the Disney champ show they they don't do that they're like I kind of lost my cool factor for a little while there until the movie became like nostalgic you know till like in the last five years or so now people are like I I'll get a job on a TV show and then it turns out like the showrunner the producers are like hey man I love your movie H coach hey coach is here you know so it's like now it's pretty cool and it's like a it's a really cool thing to be a part of so but I never uh stopped loving it from day one from from shooting it till right after I I I know um a lot of the cast what's funny is a lot of the cast tried to separate themselves from the movie I mean a lot of the cast like oh look you know we're doing moving on a biger and I get it I totally get that but I I've been around long enough to know like no no this is a gift like to be a part of something special like this where it really made a huge impact this is a this is a gift you guys like embrace it be grateful for it and just enjoy the ride and appreciate your fans appreciate all those people that appreciate your movie and like that's a that's a such a gift to you guys so um and I think now that it's kind of come around where it's like now they realize like oh not we're not all gonna have Zach and Vanessa's career like like the and become the superstars that they dat did at least not on this not now not now so it's like just you know be grateful so anyway that's that's the story of uh age and oh oh oh oh I left out I answered everything except for the question you brought up was uh so I had this ring I had the my championship ring I have a here sometimes I how um that I wear in the movies it says because my character Jack Bolton he won the first state championship game when he was a senior in high school and he was the team captain back in the day they mentioned that in High School Musical one uh I think that's what they mentioned that so I have this ring and it says when I won and I was like looking at the ring and I'm like I was 11 years old old I was 11 this year in this movie when I would have won this champ so okay that's cool uh I like it I'm glad I have the job but uh yeah I kind of feel like I slipped under the radar with with age there and they cast the mom already and so they couldn't find the coach they're looking for the coach couldn't find the coach and they like okay we'll get the mom let's get Kiss cast the mom okay we got the mom now let's find the coach we're like well now like now we got a agent so kind it was it was a little but I think it I thought out great yeah no totally and like what's funny too is you mentioned like it's nostalgic now like I was 19 when the movie came out so like I was in college I totally missed the High School Musical boat you know what I mean I was like too cool for that kind of stuff you know 19-year-old college kid but what's funny is like now I have like uh kids and nieces and yeah yeah if you have nieces and uh or young young people in your family then I I I remember when I when when the movie first came out the only people that recognized me were all the kids at elementary school I go take my kid drop my kids off to elementary school and the kids would rush up to the fence um at the school and I was like oh crap I can't I can't drop my kids off at school now this is crazy I did anyway but um um but it was a thing it was like a little bit of a problem but then if I went to Junior higher high school nobody nobody knew who I was and then a couple years later same thing happened the junior high a couple years later they they have it at uh high school then I was shooting a movie in um uh Connecticut um a couple years ago and we were shooting on the college campus there in Connecticut and all the college kids are com and the whole entire men's basketball team like team run up hey it's coach coach hey you're the reason I play basketball man you're the reason I like watch that M there's a big like seven foot tall like you know pro basketball looking guys uh you don't want to get a picture of stuff of was super so it's been uh yeah it's the gift that keeps on giv yeah seriously like I I didn't even see the first movie until like six months ago after uh my niece for like a theater Camp did High School Musical as a theater camp and I'm like I it's about time I got to watch this movie so I finally like watched it and I'm like I I get it I see the enjoyment out of it it's very catchy like some of the songs like they just get stuck in your head all day yeah yeah but the thing is is like everybody wonders like why that movie you know because they tried to do it over and over and over after that movie they did several different movies where they tried to Let's capture that lightning in a bottle again and it just didn't work you know we had um without promotion there was like no promoe no special promotion for High School Musical one it was just you know it was just like any other Disney musical and we had over 18 million viewers that first night that's insane like nobody gets 18 million views that's crazy with no no marketing and no special push more than any other movie and 18 million and it's it really is Kenny Ortega I mean he put his special sauce on it man it's like he's got this incredible Vision I mean this is a guy who choreographed Michael Jackson's tours for like 14 years he's uh you know he's done xanadoo to to I mean you name it like a million different things that he's he's put his like special choreography on and he's just done he's just so brilliant and he has a really high standard and he's so creative and so amazing and it's like he made this film great so for and that's why if you talk to anybody in the cast from High School Musical we are like Kenny Kenny we are not worthy of Kenny or he is he is the he is the king man he is the magic Maestro well hey I I know we're kind of running out of time so I'll Before I Let You Go though I want to find out if there's any or what upcoming projects um you have coming out this year that maybe people should keep their eyes out for yeah yeah I did a um I did a movie during Co called held which was pretty fun I did it with the guys who who who made um The Gallows which was a a big hit kind of Thriller um so held held is really fun that's on Hulu now um I've got two films coming out this year that I have not seen yet uh one's called what rhymes with reason and the other one's called someone like you haven't seen those yet and then next week I go to Texas to go shoot a new Taylor Sheridan TV show called landman with Billy Bob Thorton so super excited about that um I'm a recurring character on that show and I do my first episode um in a week get down there in a week very cool and then of course I'm all over social media I've been loving doing the Tik toks so please come see me on Tik toks it's uh bartor Johnson and uh I do a lot I try to do some fun flashbacks and kind of like paying off homage to uh the show and and entertain the fans and stuff so I've really got to kick out of that one so come on by there yeah I'll put I'll put all the uh links to your socials in the description too for anyone listening who wants to just make it easy and click and and check it out one other thing I forgot to mention uh your wife Robin also an actress um your family functions have to be just like insane like your family is from Hollywood her whole family like a and like you know Blake Lively obviously that whole connection with with all that like is there do you guys I have to know do you have like family functions where your side her side all get together and it's just like I wish I could like just post a video of of Charades we do this thing called speed charades uh but it's like yeah there's a bunch of actors we got uh yeah Uncle Ryan in there and we got uh Blake and and Robin and all the all the live family tons of actors on the Johnson side and it's just it's total Mayhem man it's a it's it's good times it's good it's really good fun but yeah big big wild family functions for sure yeah that should be I feel like that should be like a reality TV series of some sort you know what I mean you guys all doing charades yeah yeah yeah it's pretty good it's a it's a pretty fun group man for sure and everybody the the cool thing is like everybody is just all about family like there you know that's everybody gets it everybody knows like this is what matters Family Matters like it's just and it's a huge family there's tons of us so uh it's usually like not really any friends or really at all it's just kind of like we're busted into this seems uh just a family so uh it's pretty it's pretty [Music] [Applause] great