Tom Provost
10 min read ⭑
“I’m continually amazed by the world and the people I see and meet. I love to express that sense of wonder through my writing.”
Tom Provost teaches film and acting at Chapman University, as well as the popular filmmaking course, “Cinema Language: The Art of Storytelling.” But in his case, the old saying that “those who can’t do, teach” doesn’t hold up. Tom is a passionate storyteller, screenwriter and filmmaker with credits such as The Presence and Young Washington, set to hit theaters on July 3, 2026. In his interview, you’ll discover his most memorable Christmas meal (and its surprise ending), how cold plunging resets his thinking each day and how writing helps him awaken wonder in both himself and others.
QUESTION #1: ACQUAINT
Food is always about more than food; it’s also about home and people and love. So how does a go-to meal at your favorite hometown restaurant reveal the true you behind your web bio?
Most who know me well say their favorite restaurant is my kitchen. If I’m being honest, it’s the same for me. Yes, this is in part about cooking. I love to cook and love to cook for others; it feels so good to craft a meal and watch others enjoy or even be transformed by the meal. But I learned to cook because I love to eat, and even more than cooking for others, I love to eat with others.
One of my most memorable meals was Christmas night of 2020. This was in the middle of the pandemic, we were all in our “circles,” and that night, two of my closest friends and their two teenage boys came over for Christmas dinner. I’d worked for days prepping: we’d landed on “Italian Steakhouse Night” and had gougeres and antipasto to start, then my twist on Julia Child’s Caesar salad, a pasta course of cacio e pepe, beef tenderloin with roasted potatoes and creamed spinach and ended with toasted blackberry cake with cream.
I’ve known the couple since before they were married, so I’ve been with the boys their entire lives. We laughed and dined and listened to music and read passages to each other from our favorite books. It was a magical night, made even more important by the surreal isolation of the pandemic and the fact that, after 20 years, it was the house’s last meal. The next morning, the house caught fire, and I lost everything, including the house. We all still feel we sent the house out in the best way possible.
Mike Frandson; Unsplash
QUESTION #2: REVEAL
What “nonspiritual” activity have you found to be quite spiritual, after all? What quirky proclivity, out-of-the-way interest or unexpected pursuit refreshes your soul?
This will sound ridiculously “of today” and probably a bit silly to anyone who has never done it, but a few years ago, through my dear friend Diederik, I discovered cold plunging. Google defines it as “cold-water immersion involving submerging your body in cold water for one to five minutes, usually for health reasons.” I don’t sleep. I never have, and in a yearslong pursuit of sleep, I found that a plunge helps. So I plunge at 40 degrees each night before bed. It has transformed my sleep. I’ve become so addicted to plunging that I also do it upon waking.
Now, if I only do it once a day, it is morning when I do it. When you plunge, the shock to your body is severe, to say the least, and it takes every ounce of concentration to breathe. There’s nothing else. It purges the mind: every thought, rumination and worry bouncing around in your brain is vacuumed out in a nanosecond. When I plunge, after that initial mental purge, I am left with only two things: a deep awareness of my body and an intense feeling of God surrounding me. Because of this, when in the water, I repeat The Lord’s Prayer over and over (I’m Catholic; it’s my most important and moving prayer).
I find that, more than anything, a plunge helps me escape the worries of the world and gives a clear-eyed vision of what is important. I may lose that vision moments after emerging from the water. But a cold plunge grounds me in a way I’ve never before discovered.
QUESTION #3: CONFESS
Every superhero has a weakness; every human, too. We’re just good at faking it. But who are we kidding? We’re all broken and in this thing together. So what’s your kryptonite and how do you confront its power?
My friends have nicknamed me “the Tornado” because, well, I don’t stop. I barrel forward without thinking, and I often spin around, trying to do too many things at once. Look up “bull in a China shop,” and I imagine you will see my photo. This trait can be a positive. I get things done, and I get them done fast. But I can also feel like Wile E. Coyote after any of his experiments have gone wrong: standing amid a mess of devastation, holding an exploded piece of dynamite.
Moderation is considered a grand virtue. Try as I might, I cannot embrace moderation. Excess, motion and intemperance rule. They are my kryptonite. I feel like an idiot with egg on my face more often than I would ever like to admit. Another good friend calls it being a “roller-coaster person,” and she is right. I love to live on the edge, teetering on the brink. I do indeed love coasters and have, in my life, crashed hang-gliding (pin in my shoulder), wrecked three cars (numerous injuries), ripped my bicep off my elbow joint a few years ago trying to lift something incredibly heavy because I think I’m Superman (and I’m not), etc.
Just a few weeks ago, in fact, I stood at the top of a long, steep staircase and, without thinking, raced a friend down the stairs. I won (important!), but I won because I went too fast, cartwheeled down most of the stairs and in the process destroyed my knee — and every plan I had for the summer.
QUESTION #4: FIRE UP
Tell us about your toil. How are you investing your professional time right now? What’s your current obsession? And why should it be ours?
I love to write. I’ve loved it all my life. I wrote my first story in the second grade, “The Monster from Planet X.” (It was illustrated, even!) I have been writing stories and essays ever since. Writing is a way I can express my own feelings and intensity without hurting myself or others around me. It’s a way I can impart the sense of wonder I feel about the world and our experience here, with nature and with each other. I’m continually amazed by the world and the people I see and meet. I love to express that sense of wonder through my writing.
I realized in my late twenties that I had a deep desire to awaken that sense of wonder in others. I’ve found that through teaching (I am a college professor as well) and writing, be it writing stories or essays, I can lead at least some people to a different view of the world and their own surroundings. It’s so easy to get overwhelmed by life and the world and forget to see our experiences and surroundings, even when negative, as beautiful and important and wondrous.
My most recent project is a movie coming out this summer called “Young Washington,” a biopic of the life of George Washington in his formative years. It’s a story where, along with my co-writers, we were able to approach this great man’s life, and the intense difficulties and failures he experienced, with this sense of wonder.
QUESTION #5: inspire
Scripture and tradition beckon us into the rich and varied habits that open our hearts to the presence of God. So let us in. Which spiritual practice is working best for you in this season?
I get in the car, and my favorite song comes on — “September” by Earth, Wind & Fire. (Goodness, can that song lift me out of a wretched mood.) Thank you, Lord, I think. I get to where I’m going and am desperate for parking since there is never good parking in L.A., and, wow, voilà, a space! “Thank you, Lord,” I say out loud.
Do I think God has orchestrated both? Though we could have a great theological debate about whether that is true, I personally don’t think so, or perhaps a better way to say it is that I don’t much care. For me, thanking God for small, even ridiculous things like those can be more important than thanking him for big answers to big prayers, because relating everyday experiences to him in this way keeps me in touch with him. It’s my version of “pray without ceasing.”
I’m a screwup. I’m no saint, but I’ve worked hard for years to direct my random, crazy, ping-pong thoughts — one of the reasons I’ve never been able to sleep much at night — and direct those thoughts to God. As a writer, I spend a lot of time alone, and I talk to myself constantly. Out loud. I taught myself long ago to talk to God rather than to myself. Doing so helps me stay in better touch with him all throughout the day, given how easy it is to get caught up in our lives and forget about him.
This is not even about gratitude, which I do think is incredibly important and transformative. It’s about staying in touch with him, and helping me do something that, for me, is very difficult — submitting to him.
QUESTION #6: FOCUS
Looking backward, considering the full sweep of your unique faith journey and all you encountered along the way, what top resources stand out to you? What changed reality and changed your heart?
One would be Leif Enger’s beautifully written novel, “Peace Like a River.” It’s a remarkable, hard, breathtaking book about a family in crisis and the power of faith. I first read the novel on a weekend trip with some friends. We were spread out in various rooms around a big house. I finished the novel at 2 a.m. (I could not put it down), and when it was over, I was weeping so hard I woke everyone in the house. Among many other jaw-dropping elements, there is a glimpse of heaven in the novel that I don’t believe will ever be surpassed.
The text that had the biggest effect on my life, however, is the movie “Chinatown.” We were a big movie family, and when I was 8, “Chinatown” played on ABC-TV. Mom decided I was old enough to handle it. We watched it together. I was transfixed from the opening; I already wanted to move to Los Angeles and be in the movies, and “Chinatown” is an amazing love letter to L.A. I was riveted all the way through.
At age 8, I had never encountered a book or movie that ended badly. As far as I knew, every story had an uplifting end. To this day, I firmly state that the ending of “Chinatown” remains the most devastating finale to a narrative ever. When the movie ended so savagely, I melted down. I could not contain myself; I had no reference or ability to deal with the severity of my emotions. I remember repeatedly screaming, “Why? Why would they end the movie like that?”
My mom was a wonderful woman, and she sat with me and talked about the movie for hours. I so vividly remember her saying, “Tom, there are bad people in the world, people who do bad things, and they sometimes get away with it. This movie is a call to us, a call to action, a call to look out for those in need, to seek justice for those treated badly, and to remember that life is so hard for most people.”
Her words had an enormous effect on me, as much of an effect as the movie. I have ever since found myself fighting for those who need help, so much so, I even started a charity for those in need, Bags and Grace.
QUESTION #7: dream
God’s continually stirring new things in each of us. So give us the scoop! What’s beginning to stir in you but not yet fully awakened? What can we expect from you in the future?
I have finished what those around me term my magnum opus. Can something be a magnum opus if only a few people have read it? I don’t know. Does a tree falling in the woods make a sound? Great philosophical questions, but I digress.
Although my writing life consists mostly of screenwriting and the occasional blog post at onfoodandfilm.com, like half the people in entertainment, I’ve been tinkering with a novel for a while, and finally got off my butt this last year and finished it. Currently titled “Reckonings,” it’s a Southern Gothic mystery set in a small town in Georgia during the summer of 1975. The novel is highly influenced by three of my favorite authors: Raymond Chandler, Stephen King and my hero and kindred spirit, Flannery O’Connor.
Along with the release of “Young Washington” this summer, I’m going to begin the arduous task of finding both a literary agent and a publisher. I know a lot about the world of writing in movies and TV and how to get such projects off the ground; I know nothing about how to get a novel published. More than any general area or specific goal of my life, this is something I am having to throw to God and trust him with, not always the easiest place for a Type A “tornado” type of person to sit. I am encouraged by the response from those who have read it. I write what I like to read (maybe my best piece of advice to anyone who writes or wants to write), and so I confess, I like the novel a lot as well. We will see.
“Try as I might,” Tom Provost said, “I cannot embrace moderation. Excess, motion and intemperance rule.”
Perhaps the apostle Peter could relate. One of Jesus’ most passionate followers and closest friends, Peter was known for his zealous — if not impulsive — tendencies. He stepped out of the boat and walked on water, but started to doubt and sink moments later. He declared Jesus was the Son of God before anyone else, but then turned around and tried to rebuke his Lord. He heatedly declared he would always stand by Jesus, only to deny him three times later that same evening. He jumped out of a boat and swam to shore when he recognized the resurrected Jesus, but was hiding with the rest of the disciples days later.
There is beauty in that kind of passion. And many lessons learned through failure. If you, like Peter, are prone to taking big steps of faith followed by humbling missteps, take heart — you are in good company. You serve a God who delights in leading you forward.
Tom Provost cowrote the feature Young Washington, to be released July 3, 2026. His feature directorial debut was The Presence, a genre-twisting ghost story acquired and distributed by Lionsgate Films. A professor of acting and film directing at Chapman University, Provost also teaches the popular series of classes on filmmaking called “Cinema Language: The Art of Storytelling.” You can find some of his writing at his websites onfoodandfilm.com and cinemalanguage.org. Tom founded the charity Bags and Grace, dedicated to providing immediate relief to people living on the streets of Southern California.