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Movember, as the name would imply, takes places annually in November, when men grow mustaches to raise awareness and funds for men’s health issues. Despite already sporting the necessary facial hair for his role as Mike Franks on NCIS: Origins, Kyle Schmid put his character’s mustache to good use for a good cause: mental health.
Related: NCIS: Origins Showrunners on How Mark Harmon’s Narration Takes Us Inside Gibbs’ Head
“Movember’s got an umbrella of things from prostate cancers to other things, but for me it’s mental health,” Schmid told Parade during an interview for Origins. “I’ve known people who have struggled with substance abuse. I’ve lost friends to suicide. I’m in an industry that’s full of incredibly talented, vulnerable people and we celebrate that vulnerability. It’s at times what makes us great actors. But wearing your heart on your sleeve comes at a price. At the same time, it’s giving me a perspective to kind of step outside of that and see what’s going on around me in the rest of the world.”
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It isn’t just digging into his emotions for his acting roles that has affected Schmid’s mental health, but he suffered the death of his mother last November, which also gave him a look at how other members of his family were dealing with their grief.
Related: NCIS: Origins Star Austin Stowell Reveals the Personal Tragedy He Used to Get Inside Gibbs’ Head
“Seeing how that affected my family, loss gives you perspective,” Schmid continued. “Without pain there is no change. With pain there’s growth. I just decided that I wasn’t going to let an opportunity like this pass me by again where I was on a show and I just didn’t take the opportunity to try and make a bit of a difference.”
He was also influenced by the birth of his daughter. “I had my daughter nine weeks ago, so I’ve got a family that I want to try—it sounds cliché—but [I want to] make a better world for her. I hope that whoever she’s dating in the future, whoever it is, lives in a world where mental health isn’t a conversation that is shunned. I hope that there’s not a negative stigma around it. Because life is hard, period, for everybody. Let’s talk about it.”
The Movember Foundation was formed in 2003 and the following year began running Movember events to raise awareness and funds for men’s health issues.
NCIS: Origins airs Monday nights at 10 p.m. ET/PT on CBS.
Next, Mark Harmon Weighs in on Casting for ‘NCIS: Origins’
