Regina actor lands role in movie starring Julia Roberts

A Regina born actor can be seen on the silver screen this Christmas season.

Mark Dozlaw landed a small role in the Hollywood movie Wonder, starring Julia Roberts, Owen Wilson and Jacob Tremblay.

The movie is about a fifth grade boy with facial differences entering a mainstream elementary school for the first time. The movie is currently number three at the box office.

In the movie, Dozlaw plays a doctor who helps Roberts give birth to her son, played by Tremblay.

Dozlaw said he was “purely excited” when he found out he landed the role, getting the call while surrounded by family in Saskatoon.

“Usually when I get these calls I’m in Vancouver so to get the biggest call that I’ve ever had with my family, that was pretty awesome,” he said.

This is the biggest project Dozlaw has been a part of so far in his career. He also worked on a television show called Rouge.

“The episode I was in, I got to work with Ashley Greene, she was one of the stars of Twilight (so) that was an awesome experience as well. That scene was a fairly large role compared to what I had done before so that was a lot of fun to keep moving towards bigger things,” Dozlaw explained.

When it comes to meeting Roberts, Dozlaw described the star as amazing.

“Right when I met her, first thing she did was introduce herself as Julia. She introduced herself, shook my hand and the entire day — we were shooting about eight hours and she kept making jokes, having an awesome sense of humour and keeping everyone in a good mood and working efficiently and feeling good,” he said.

With the movie being in theatres over Christmas, Dozlaw hopes it will spark some interest in him from other productions. He said January is when the industry starts casting lead roles for new TV shows coming out over the next year.

“A lot of people are seeing this movie, it’s quite high (at) the box office, I think that will help with further opportunities coming up,” he said.

Dozlaw spent the first 18 years of his life living in Regina. With his high school teachers keeping him interested in theatre, he eventually moved to Vancouver to study performing arts.

He said he always has to explain where Regina is, and no one believes him when he says he’s from here.

“Usually when I say Regina, Saskatchewan, there’s a little moment where they might chuckle or something, and they’re like ‘excuse me?’ and I saw Regina, Saskatchewan and they say ‘maybe I’ve heard that before,'” he explained.

Dozlaw’s parents are currently living in Saskatoon, but he still has many friends and family in Regina.