When screenwriter Dana White was crafting her most recent film, she looked a bit beyond her home of Willoughby Hills and workplace at Kent State University to cast the lead: Barkhad Abdi. How did the Oscar-nominated co-star of “Captain Phillips” land in Northeast Ohio? As is often the case in showbiz, a casting director was friends with an agent.

“His agent told him, ‘They wrote it for you,’” White said. “I like to think that he felt himself in the character. There's no way to describe how good he is in this movie. Working with him is the most incredible, crazy, wonderful, intimidating, scary experience ever, because he's so talented. And you just kind of want to get out of his way and let him do his thing.”

Abdi plays a rideshare driver in the short film, “ Magan’s Fare .” It’s the st

See Full Page