A must-read for anyone considering a career in the film industry, and to those who are faced with seemingly insurmountable hurdles. Tommy Burke’s Not Just Sunglasses and Autographs will raise you up and walk you through it.
With his heartfelt and candid autobiography, Tommy Burke, the beloved assistant director, whose final gig was on Chicago P.D., continues to inspire anyone who crosses his path.
Not Just Sunglasses and Autographs follows Burke’s journey from bar bouncing in Boston to over 30 years behind the camera working on award-winning television shows and movies. This is an endearing story of overcoming the odds through dark humor, tenacity, authenticity, and happiness. Initially envisioned as a memoir about a guy who went to battle with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma and lived to tell the tale, Burke was then thrown a major curveball with a Parkinson’s disease diagnosis.
With equal parts pep-talk and gut-punch, this unvarnished and vulnerable handbook of lessons-learned, in life and work, encourages readers to keep moving forward, embrace resilience, step out of their comfort zones, and take life head on.
Our publisher, Barbara Roche was fortunate to spend some time talking with Tommy Burke about his journey:
When did you decide to take pen to paper and write the book?
I often times put off a person with my answer to, “why did I write a book?” by answering, “I wanted to write a book.” That might seem like an innocuous answer, but you’ll see by the stories in the book I was always looking for new experiences and challenges. My stories exemplify hard work, humor and motivation. I probably could have done without the two serious diseases and the two separate occasions I had guns pointed at me. But they have their purposes too.
What was your main motivation to tell your story?
Among other reasons, to show the other side of the film business. The men and women who constitute film crews are looked at as people who show up to work limos. They are not that at all. They work 70, 80 or 90 hours a week and a lot of times in adverse conditions and risking personal safety culminating in a lot of divorces.
Another motivating factor was to show that if you stick with something, no matter how many times you screw up (and I screwed up a lot), just keep trying. Always keep your life in motion.
What is your personal mantra?
- Never complain. Suck it up or change direction
- Never be on your death bed saying “I wish I would have…”
(I picked the right industry for that.)
When you were offered the position of first A.D. on Chicago PD, what were your concerns about uprooting your life in LA and moving to Chicago for this job?
I was always looking for the next challenge. Moving a lot was unique too Chicago PD. I paid for an apartment in Los Angeles the first year even though I was living in Chicago. Finally got smart and put everything in storage the second year. I did enjoy my off-season time in Chicago.
You’ve trained many PAs. Who became your shining star?
I would like to tweak this question. Firstly because of my experiences as a PA. Say what you want about me as an A.D. but I was an amazing P.A. Few could compare to my past history as a P.A. I would often bark out to P.A.s sitting around on the set “I have had 17 surgeries and 4 broken bones and I’m twice your age and I am moving twice as fast as you.” As a result, I’m a tough critic.
If I could single out one person it is Illinois based editor Erin Anderson. She worked relentlessly on this book. I had to put her name on the front of the book because if I had asked her to she would have declined. I always say if you liked any part of the book it probably came from her.
If you could go back in time and talk to your younger self. What advice would you give?
This is what I have always believed:
- It’s no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then. — Lewis Carroll
- The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good man to do nothing — Edmund Burke
- You can’t stay in your corner of the Forest waiting for others to come to you. You have to go to them sometimes.
- I always get to where I’m going by walking away from where I have been. — A.A. Milne
You started out in the restaurant business how did that experience help you when you made the jump to the film industry?
I didn’t make a jump to the film business. I fell into it. My book details my falling into the film business akin to entering those hedge mazes. I didn’t know where I was going but I was going to get there quick. I do say the restaurant business helped me in the business as I was always on my feet. You learn to accommodate people’s bad attitudes and priotize and hustle. I may bring your salad with the check but I was going to keep a smile on my face. The one thing I have noticed is that people who didn’t start in film and started in a people-based occupation seemed to do the best. I am infamous for asking a P.A. “I don’t care what film school you went to because you aren’t getting near the camera. What restaurant did you work in?” I will say this, the industry is going to be in a little bit of a shake-up. I honestly don’t know how it will pan out. But it will always need a strong work ethic.
So, you, I mean you, when you have done your side work give the industry a try.
What is a piece of creative that you worked on that particularly moved you?
There are many examples. I am preparing to tour on this book. I know I will have a lot more to tell. The one that comes to mind right now was a P.S.A for heart disease. I don’t know how we were ever allowed to enter this person’s house. The wife had died, at most a week earlier, from heart disease. We were to do a “tragic day in the life” of someone who was cut down by a heart attack. Her dresser, jewelry and clothes had not been touched since she left in an ambulance never to come home again. We had work to do but we were on eggshells while we were in that house. The husband might have still been in shock. All the friends and neighbors had dropped off food in the family’s desolate times and he had so much he just kept offering the crew the extra food.
Aside from the obvious hurdle of working while getting through chemo, what was the biggest challenge you had to resolve on a set?
The hours. I remember working on 20-to-24-hour music videos in the beginning. People don’t realize that through the glitz and glamour there is a crew working the whole time. I remember starting on music videos at 7 AM Saturday morning and calling my parents in Massachusetts at 9:00 AM at their time the next day. My record is 36 hours straight. The cancer while working crazy hours was a whole new world of hell best explained in the book.
What does your daily routine consist of?
My restaurant experience begat my film begat my cancer ride which has set me up for my Parkinson’s today. Being an Assistant Director gave me the skills to attack Parkinson’s. The unofficial credo of being an AD is always to keep the camera rolling. With my Parkinson’s it is always to keep moving. The only medicine that works with Parkinson’s for me is mostly exercise. I’m retired but I work as hard as I did on a set. One of my favorite sayings is one I borrowed from a crew member. I always say, “I’m a coiled spring.” What that means is I am always ready for anything. Every hour of every day I’m trying to do something physical or mental. A lot of times I don’t succeed, but I am always trying.
What is one source of inspiration you now draw from, outside of work?
The final reason I wrote this book is to inspire other Parkinson’s sufferers. I read in a lot Facebook groups of people with Parkinson’s whose lives are so painful they wish it to end. Who knows where I’ll end up. I’ll go down swinging. The first year I was diagnosed I was walking 3 miles with a 15-pound vest. I am not doing as much today. I think there are too many Parkinson’s sufferers who disappear into the dark when they are diagnosed. There is going to be a new day for Parkinson’s people and others with neurological diseases. They just need to see it coming.
You are now facing the challenge of your lifetime with Parkinson’s disease. What advice can you give to those who are suffering from things they cannot control?
IT IS TO NEVER GIVE UP. I know I might be on the floor some-day trying to get up. I doubt it. I wasn’t much into sports as a kid. My hero, when it comes to attacking Parkinson’s, is Jimmy Choi. Another Illinois native who has embraced the disease and continues to fight the good fight.
Where can we find your book?
Either Amazon, Audible, or Tommy Burke.com
Are you available to do guest appearances?
It would be my greatest pleasure to meet people and to share my stories and hear theirs.
Contact Tommy Burke here: Email Tommy
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