Building his dreams on a firm foundation Student returns from Japan to pursue a degree in architecture

TIFFANY BERWAGER Staff tberwager.roundupnews@gmail.com

The demands of balancing parenthood with full-time school and an acting career can be a handful. However, for Rudolph “Rudy” McCollum, it is a welcomed challenge.

McCollum, 39, was born in Long Beach, California, but experienced a nomadic childhood.

Before moving to Los Angeles when he was 19, McCollum had lived in Northridge and Compton.

The force that drove McCollum to LA was his dream of pursuing a career in acting. He credits his father, Robert McCollum, with igniting this passion.

“As a child I would accompany him to his classes that were in Hollywood, and I would walk up and down the street, and look at the [Hollywood] stars,” McCollum said. “Being a native in Los Angeles, it kinda pulls you in.”

The first part McCollum landed was a television spot while he was still in junior high.

“I got invited to an audition by a friend who was already in that business,” McCollum said. “It was a commercial for a television show called ‘Pump It Up,’ which was L.A.’s first hip-hop TV show.”

Despite this, McCollum did not take acting seriously until he began performing with his father.

McCollum briefly attended Pierce College to study Japanese.

In 1999, he met his wife, Yuko Morikawa, who was studying dance in Granada Hills.

Morikawa grew up in Sapporo, Japan, but moved to California for school. She now works as a pastry chef at Neuehouse patissiere in Hollywood, Ca.

McCollum remembered how when first he saw his wife, he saw the face of their future daughter, before they even started dating.

In 2006, the couple and their children moved to Japan where

McCollum taught English to over 4,000 students whose ages varied from 2 to 75 years old.

While he knew teaching in Japan to be different than teaching in the U.S., McCollum was surprised by how stark the contrast was. Most notable was how he didn’t need a teaching degree because it wasn’t a requirement.

“During that time [in 2006] you could just show up and teach what you know out of the [English] textbook,” McCollum said.

“When I came back from Japan, I was socially awkward. If you spend [enough] time in a country, it starts to rub off on you.” wonder if they are learning,” McCollum said. “You just come in, you teach them, and it’s over.”

During his free time, McCollum was involved in Japanese entertainment. He was cast to act in Japanese commercials, movies and television shows.

“I worked in their industry and I also did their movies,” McCollum said. “In Japan, I did ‘Space Brothers’, ‘The Sushi Prince’, and lots of dramas but I forget their names.”

McCollum’s reason for moving to Japan was his desire to learn their acting method. He felt that by expanding his knowledge of their entertainment industry, he would become better at his trade.

-Rudolph McCollum Architecture major

to the states,” McCollum said.

Back in California, McCollum became a Lyft driver while attending Pierce College for the second time to study architecture. This choice of employment was flexible enough that McCollum could concentrate on his studies and see his family.

It also helped him relearn American social etiquettes.

“When I came back from Japan, I was socially awkward,” McCollum said. “If you spend [enough] time in a country, it starts to rub off on you.”

“Being a native speaker, we do have some degree of experience with the language. But I think the rules have changed now; I believe they’re much more strict.”

McCollum called the Japanese instruction system “English Engineering because of how copy and paste” it felt. The severity of detachment between the teachers and their class was evident in the way the two would interact.

“English in Japan is like a business. In a way, it makes me

“Here, in Hollywood, we’re more animated and there [in Japan], their style is more internal—it’s all in the eyes,” McCollum said. “They’re very subtle people, and I felt that that would help me with my acting career.”

After seven years, McCollum left Japan. While he enjoyed the time he spent there, McCollum felt restricted by the uniformity demanded by their social system.

“I found that, over time, they’re very limited in creative aspects and I’m a creative person. So I knew that I would be coming back

McCollum admits that he became more introverted after living in Japan. He credits Lyft for helping him relearn the English language and open up to others.

“You give like ten or fifteen rides a day, that’s ten or fifteen different conversations on topic matters that wouldn’t dare be discussed in Japan,” McCollum said.

Japan was a source of inspiration for McCollum in different ways, but he began to lose his creative drive. McCollum wanted to take the knowledge and experience he gained in Japan and apply it to creating a better life back in the U.S.