Feliks Schwartz

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**Feliks "With A K" Schwartz** (born October 23, 1986) is an American Actor, Model, and Anomalist. He is best known for his role in the crime thriller *The Callisto,* in addition to appearances in numerous horror films and in a series of "Keno's Pizza" commercials.

Schwartz was voted "Most Killable" in 2013 by *Phasmagoria* *Magazine*, a horror & sci-fi publication.

*Feliks Schwartz is a figment of TheRichUncleSkeleton's imagination.*

## Early Life

Feliks Schwartz grew up in the suburbs of Northeast Yankton, a part of North Yankton. He is the middle child of three, all who were brought up by their single mother. His father left when he was young. It was late into his teens when Schwartz discovered he had several half-siblings, from several different families his Father had started. He phrased it, "Setting up franchises." After high school, Schwartz attended college and was working on an Arts Degree until a sudden accident disabled his mother. With his families financial stability in question, he dropped out of college to help provide. The only job he could get at the time was delivering pizzas for a local pizzeria "Keno's Pizza."
It was when the pizza chain began expanding into other areas that Schwartz found his desire to become an actor. The pizzeria put together a series of commercial spots for nearby cities, and he lucked into the role and became the local face of the company.

## Career

#### Early Work

Schwartz began his career in commercials for "Keno's Pizza" in Northeast Yankton. The moderate success of the ad campaign generated a local celebrity status for him. This lead to him staring in other local commercials before making the decision to move to San Andreas and pursue acting in Los Santos.

#### Career Setbacks

The clout of a small town local celebrity did not hold weight in Vinewood. Schwartz was struggling to secure roles, managing to get work as an extra in various television and commercial projects. When he was unable to find work acting, Schwartz sought out employment in the nightclub scene of Los Santos. Like many unsuccessful actors in Los Santos, he had hopes of "being discovered" while working in a bar. Schwartz went 2 years without an acting role.

#### Finding Recognition

After 2 years of no work in entertainment, Schwartz managed to find an audition with Richards Majestic Productions via a connection with a close friend. Due to his own personal lack of experience and the possible hiatus taking its toll on him, Schwartz failed to land a role again. This time though, he was not pushed aside. A producer working on *Meltdown* noticed Schwartz after his audition and offered him work via RMP's subsidiary Horror studio "Splatter SFX Studios." While Schwartz could not hold a dramatic scene on his own, he was able to make a name for himself in "Direct-To-DVD / VOD" horror movies.

Early on with SSS, Schwartz mainly scored roles as throwaway characters, typically dying shortly after being introduced, or if he was lucky he managed a 1-5 line speaking part. His ability to "die on screen" caught the attention of horror fans, noting that "Schwartz's acting chops may not cut it for headliner roles, but his ability to deliver gut wrenching death scenes is astounding." Schwartz found that his patience when it came to practical make-up special effects offered him opportunities other actors wouldn't take. The lengthy process of applying make-up and prosthetics drove other actors away, but Schwartz was hungry for work and pushed through. Due to this, Schwartz quickly became a known face in the horror genre, and fans both praised and mocked his "dying abilities."

Schwartz began attending Horror Movie Conventions, garnering a modest fan base and acknowledged his status as a "living meme." In 2013 *Phasmagoria Magazine* did an interview with Schwartz titled *"Everyone Loves You When You're Dead"* and awarded him "Most Killable" in their end of year awards issue.

#### Cult Status and Commercial Success

With his name reaching cult status in horror circles, Schwartz was finally getting recognition for roles outside of being more than a "warm prop." In Spring of 2015, Schwartz was offered the role in a project originally produced to be a spin-off television series based in the universe of the *John Wick* films. This time instead of being another on-screen death or background character, he was cast as a major role as "The Concierge." Production hit a dead end when Summit Entertainment, at the behest of parent company Lionsgate Films, pulled the plug citing "Creative Doubts and Scheduling Conflicts" during a dispute over distribution rights for the series. Originally the series was hoping to premiere on Netflix, but contract negotiations fell through. At this point Summit Entertainment was no longer interested in producing the project and the scripts were sold off to "Filmila Inc." Not wanting to see the project fall through, Filmila Inc. funded the series and managed to secure streaming rights via Crackle.

The series, now titled *The Callisto* made minor efforts to distance the project from the established *John Wick* film. Critics and Mainstream audiences were unable to see the separation of the two pieces of media, and the series was given poor reviews with middling ratings.

#### The Callisto

While the series failed to garner love with mainstream audiences, it did manage to attain a cult status in the action genre circles as well as from fans of Schwartz's work in horror. The series focused on *The Hotel Callisto*, which was originally set to be the Los Santos version of *The Continental* from *John Wick*, but in a change from the original material the series focused on the general criminal underworld instead of just the circles of assassins. Schwartz starred as "The Concierge" who acted as a facilitator and *Fixer* for the represented groups in the series. His character would deliver the "Crime of the Week" in each episode, and serve as a link for all the stories to converge. The story for the first season had Schwartz's character finding himself as the new caretaker of The Hotel Callisto, and at the center point of a criminal conspiracy that threatened to expose the operation, resulting in The Hotel burning to the ground at the end of the season. The production company did not expect for the series to be renewed for a second season, so the story was written to have an ambiguous climax which could serve as both an ending and potential bridge to further stories.

Surprisingly a second season was green lit in 2016. The show underwent a major change in tone and style in an attempt to further distance itself from the upcoming *John Wick 2* that was expected to release the following year. Much like the first season Critics and Mainstream audiences disliked the series, while also managing to alienate previous fans with the drastic changes. The series now had Schwartz's character performing his Fixer tasks for a multi-national corporation embroiled in an international criminal ring at odds with other entities in the same field of work. While the series attempted to maintain the "Crime of the Week" set up, the overarching story involved corporate espionage and politicking in the criminal underworld and less of a focus on the individual characters that filled out the show's roster, fans expressed their dislike claiming that the show had "Jumped the Shark." The show was abruptly cancelled, this time with no surprise renewal.

#### Fall From Grace

After the cancellation of *The Callisto*, Schwartz was out of work once again and attempting to hold on to his new stardom. He auditioned for many roles, but never found any of interest as he did not desire to go back to his roots in horror or turned down roles he felt were typecasting him as his Concierge character. Schwartz was on his way out of the Vinewood spotlight, when he found a place in Fashion Modeling after a party in the Rockford Hills. Schwartz represented brands such as Didier Sachs, Perseus, and Sessanta Nove. While modeling was a new venue for Schwartz, the life of luxury it provided was short lived. An IRS investigation into "Filmila Inc." exposed ties to the Italian-American Mafia, using the business as a front for laundering money via funding projects with no plans to actually release the content, then using the "failure" as a write-off. Due to this investigation into the companies finances, Schwartz's own finances came under scrutiny and it was found that he had failed to pay federal taxes dating back to his arrival in Los Santos. in 2018 Schwartz was sentenced to 5 years in Darkwood Federal Penitentiary in Carcer City.

## Personal Life

#### Incarceration

In 2018 Schwartz was sentenced to 5 years in federal prison for charges relating to tax evasion, money laundering, and perjury. Schwartz's financial sources were seized, the ones with illegitimate backing were dissolved, while his legitimate investments were put into a trust under his children's' names to ensure they were provided for in his absence.

#### Anomalous Research

At a young age Schwartz was fascinated by the occult and paranormal. This stemmed from his love of horror and science fiction movies, and grew into a desire to seek answers from the unknown. In 2014 Schwartz founded "Carpe Noctem: Anomalous Phenomena Society." *CNAPS* sought to explore the occult and paranormal experiences and attempt to prove or disprove the existence of these occurrences with a focus on "scientific explanation."

"Everything has an explanation grounded in reality," Schwartz was quoted during an interview with "Ray's Occult Publications" in 2015. "Our minds may not be able to comprehend the vast expanse that exists around us, mostly due to being limited by our human senses. Often the strange and bizarre are explained away as 'magic' or 'spirits' when really the answer is much more simple than that."

*CNAPS* continues Schwartz's original desire of exploring and explaining the paranormal.

## Filmography

**Television**
 2015
 2015-2017

**Music Video**