Hollywood musician, actor, writer, director, and dancer Sacha Carlson can do it all. Born and raised in San Luis Obispo, he broke into Hollywood in 2017 when he was just 14 years old and was hired to play the bully Scut Farkus on a live-streamed TV movie A Christmas Story Live!
“I went to Bishop’s Peak Elementary School, Laguna Middle School, SLO High School up until sophomore year when I transferred to Templeton to do independent study because things started happening in my career, so I had to step away from public school,” he explained during a Zoom call from his Woodland Hills studio apartment that was filled with his guitars and equipment.
Catch his act
Hometown hero Sacha Carlson returns to SLO County with his rock band to play Frontier Stage at the California Mid-State Fair on Saturday, July 18 (8 p.m.; all ages; free with your fair admission). Carlson’s band includes Ryan Deack (drums), Maria Grace Ono (guitar), Julian Bailey (bass), and backup vocalists Mia Mercolino and Ethan Drew.
In 2018, he appeared in two episodes of the TV series American Housewife. At 16, he was able to more fully develop a character in the popular 2020 Netflix nine-episode TV series Julie and the Phantoms when he played Nick, Julie’s lifelong love interest but boyfriend to her nemesis, Carrie. Surprisingly, the show wasn’t renewed despite being very well reviewed. Meanwhile, he was developing his music career.
“In fifth grade, we had a guitar class at Bishop’s Peak, and my music teacher, Miss Lake, had us learn some basic songs: ‘Smoke on the Water,’ ‘Hell’s Bells,’ ‘Seven Nation Army.’ That really started it for me. After that, I went to get some further lessons from local guitar teacher Justin Pecot, who was just awesome. And I studied with him until I was about 15.”
Meanwhile, Carlson was also taking dance.
“I grew up dancing at the Academy of Dance SLO, so really, everything comes back to SLO for me,” Carlson continued. “Drew Silvaggio was my dance teacher. I grew up doing ballet and jazz and tap, performing at farmers market and the Mid-State Fair, so this [July 18] show [at the Mid-State Fair] is really a full-circle moment. This is the first time I’ve been back [to the fair] since then.”
Carlson did his first feature film in 2025 called Everything I Ever Wanted, where he played struggling musician Aaron Gray opposite budding playwright Natalie Freeman (Ali Gallo). It wasn’t widely distributed, but the audience that’s seen it loved it. It currently has a 100 percent audience rating on rottentomatoes.com and is available to watch on Tubi and Pluto TV.
“We shot in Savannah, Georgia, for a month and a half and had a great time,” Carlson smiled. “Then we recorded the soundtrack in New Jersey. It was just really a blast, man.”
Carlson mixed his writing, directing, music, and dance skills in 2025 when he co-directed a couple of music videos for his original songs including “Remnants of a Falling Star” and “Drive You Like a Cadillac,” the latter of which is titled Sacha Carlson and the Light: Drive You Like a Cadillac, a nearly seven-minute music video set at a 1970s-era variety show called Boogie Bus, where Carlson is a last-minute substitution when “The Stones” cancel. It’s a blast, with sharp choreography and an absolutely rocking song, and it took home Best Music Video at the Leo Awards and the World Film Festival.
‘I was in eighth grade, and that job for me was definitely a game changer. It was really the defining moment where I was like, “I want to do this for the rest of my life. I want to act. I want to be a musician”’
—Sacha Carlson
When he and his band play the Frontier Stage at the California Mid-State Fair, he’ll be drawing from his catalog of hundreds of original songs as well a few select covers from the likes of Led Zeppelin and The Black Crowes.
“I’m going to throw in a couple covers because they’re so fun, and it’s good also to bring some familiarity to people,” he laughed. “A lot of the songs I’m playing aren’t released, so it’s a little hard in that respect because it’s a lot of new material.”
He’s working on an album with Stone Temple Pilots bassist Robert DeLeo, who’s also producing. Ryan Williams (Stone Temple Pilots, Pearl Jam, Rage Against the Machine) is the engineer. How he met DeLeo is crazy.
“I was working at Moondoggies in high school, and he came in one day,” Carlson recalled. “I didn’t know who he was, but we chatted about music for like 40 minutes. He told me, ‘Oh, yeah, I just got off tour in Australia.’ I was like, ‘Cool,’ you know, but I didn’t ask [who he was] because it’s just whatever, right? People are people. But then he mentioned he knew the Foo Fighters, and I was like, ‘OK, man, who are you?’”
Carlson frequently busked outside Moondoggies on Friday nights, so he invited DeLeo to come by.
“I was like, there’s no way he’s going to show up,” Carlson laughed, “and then he showed up, sat in the gutter, and listened to me play for an hour. That was four years ago, and since then, we’ve recorded an album that’s almost ready to be released. He’s become a guiding light and a mentor for me.”
Carlson’s also got an upcoming music project in the U.K. with guitar wiz Chris Turpin of the bands Mirador and Ida Mae.
“He’s an incredible musician and songwriter, and it’s been just a blast working with him,” Carlson gushed. “We’ve been working in the Cotswolds, out in the English countryside in this ancient land. It sounds so, like, woo woo, but you know, it’s magical, it really is. You walk down the street and there’re castle ruins. It’s like out of a fairy tale. Getting to go and write and record in that environment has been a real treat. That project should be coming to light here soon.”
He also recently signed to a new manager, Paul Geary at Shelter Music Group. Carlson is only 22. He’s done a lot since he got his big break on A Christmas Story Live!
“I was in eighth grade, and that job for me was definitely a game changer. It was really the defining moment where I was like, ‘I want to do this for the rest of my life. I want to act. I want to be a musician’—that’s all-encompassing of all the things I loved growing up, which were dance, music, and acting. It was like Candyland, you know?” ∆
Contact Arts Editor Glen Starkey at gstarkey@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in July 16-23, 2026.
