Cooper / courtesy photos
Submitted
If Darin Cooper and his best friend, Craig Karlin had known as eighth-grade boys that Cooper would be in a major Hollywood motion picture about the birth of the Ford GT40 and acting opposite Matt Damon and Christian Bale, they probably wouldn’t have believed it.
Cooper and Karlin were born in Oakley just nine days apart, and both
about as far from Hollywood as two friends could get. At age 14, Cooper’s step-father urged him to buy a beat-up 1965 Ford Mustang Fastback from the Gfeller family in Winona. It had been used as a coyote wagon, tearing across fields and pastures in western Kansas hunting coyotes in the middle of the night.
Needless to say, the collector’s item needed a lot of work. Over the course of the next four years, from his earnings as a carry-out boy and checker/cashier at the local grocery store, Cooper dropped every nickel into turning the beat-up clunker into a dazzling, albeit annoyingly loud, hot rod. And his best pal, Karlin was always along for the ride.
Cooper performed in high school plays but went off to Fort Hays State University to pursue a career as a graphic artist. He and Karlin pledged Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity in the fall of 1984 and lived in the original fraternity house, then located at 403 W. Sixth.
In 1989, Cooper moved to Los Angeles after earning a B.F.A. in graphic design. Even though he worked as a freelancer for two years, he knew in his heart that the real reason he moved to L.A. was to pursue acting in Hollywood movies.
Today, Karlin and Cooper speak frequently staying caught up with each other’s lives and
families.
Having been in Hollywood for 30 years, Cooper has acted in nearly 150 television, film, and theater roles. Two of his highest profile films have been 2010's "The Social Network" and 2014's "Gone Girl" — both directed by David Fincher.
Cooper
Cooper’s latest film, "Ford v Ferrari," is about the birth of the Mustang. The film is
set in the early 1960s and stars Matt Damon as Carroll Shelby, who created the Shelby
Mustang. Christian Bale plays a top-notch race car driver and Cooper plays Sam, who has a history with Shelby.
The movie is directed by James Mangold and opened nationwide on Nov. 15.
EDITED, 3:20 p.m. Friday to clarify plot of movie.
