Airola has police experience on film

Saturday, Oct. 7, 2006 | 7:55 a.m.

Jerry Airola laughs when he talks about killing Gary Busey. He chuckles about his bar fight with pop singer Pink, who kicked him in the stomach. And his brief stint as a barking drill sergeant? Well, that came to the Clark County sheriff candidate naturally.

"I did every one on the first take," he says. "And they let me ad-lib."

If November disappoints, the sheriff hopeful can always fall back on his acting. Airola is a card-carrying member of the Screen Actors Guild with small parts in three films, one TV pilot and one music video. He's played a bad cop, a good cop, a cowboy and a drill sergeant in a James Coburn movie that's almost impossible to rent - "American Gun."

His greatest role may be yet to come. Airola's confident he'll become sheriff. He's confident, or he's acting. But there are no small parts here.

Airola is on the screen for approximately 20 seconds in "American Gun," screaming at young soldiers learning to fire rifles . "What are you ladies laughing at?" Airola shouts, kicking a cadet in the leg . "We're gonna do that again, gentlemen! Ready! Aim! Fire!"

The sergeant's bulldogged rebuke, the spitty, staccato approval ("Good shot, gentlemen!") are all Airola's own. Director Alan Jacobs let the actor do what he wanted with the scene.

"I just walked through and did it," Airola said.

Airola spent time on the seminar circuit in 1999, lecturing groups about business . It was at one of these engagements that a relative of the director approached him, hoping Airola could provide Jacobs some fiscal counsel.

They met once to talk about money. Afterward, Jacobs asked Airola whether he wanted to audition. The rest is history.

Airola's music video debut came three years ago when he played a saloon cowboy for pop singer Pink. While you can't really make out his face, Airola is the dusty cowboy Pink kicks . The song is called "Trouble."

Airola plays some sort of futuristic stunt man in "X-Treme Fighter." The movie was released straight to DVD in 2005.

And in "Soft Target," Airola plays a rogue detective who kills a colleague played by Hollywood bizarro Gary Busey. Requests by the Sun for a copy were refused by the production company; the movie hasn't yet worked out a U.S. distribution deal. (The movie is available, however, in the Czech Republic for 299 Koruna, or $13.36. )

Anyway, Airola's not so sure he wants anyone to see "Soft Target" just yet.

"I don't know if that would be good or not," he said. "I played a bad cop I end up being the guy that killed Busey and he was bad, too. Everybody was."

Airola would sooner have people watch "The Hollywood Division," a Fox TV pilot about a group of detectives with Airola in the role of a nameless defensive tactics instructor. The 2003 pilot, however, was never picked up .

The sheriff candidate insists it was never his goal to be memorable on the silver screen, and says he's not really looking for other acting jobs. "I'll never pursue it," he said. "It's not the lifestyle I'm after."