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But Zappacosta was all smiles recently during his first day of shooting on the locally produced independent film Halo, which was filming on location at the Rum Jungle nightclub in West Edmonton Mall.
"Geez, I guess the Oscars are next huh?" Zappacosta joked. "Between Grammys and Oscars, I don't know what I'm going to do with myself!"
The Juno and American Music Award winner, who has distinguished himself doing musical theatre in addition to a recording career stretching back to the '80s, plays bad guy D.Z. in the flick, directed by veteran local filmmaker Gilbert Allan (Winter Kill).
"By the end of it I'm kind of like a repentant heavy, but not until I kill a woman with a bat," said Zappacosta. Well, yeah, that would be enough to make most people feel bad.
"I'm going to have a wonderful time. It's going to be pretty intense the next 10 days, but it's going smoothly and it's wonderful."
Being shot on high-definition digital video with an eye to direct-to-video sales or perhaps foreign broadcast, Halo also stars Maracujah's Christian Mena, who won acclaim for his role in the musical Rent, and features country singer Julian Austin.
"We wanted to get some names involved in this project, and it seems like a lot of musicians want to get into acting," said executive producer Michael Maxxis.
Halo is a drama set against the urban nightclub scene, a deliberate move to appeal to the coveted teen and twentysomething DVD-renting demographic. Maxxis likens it to a fusion of The Fast and the Furious, Coyote Ugly and, well, Striptease.
The producers are pegging the budget at $1 million, with the caveat that the figure includes what it would have cost to rent the locations, vehicles and other goods being supplied by the bevy of local businesses for free.
And we're not talking about the loans of lighting rigs and somebody's 1992 Ford Escort here. The 20-year-old Maxxis, who has made extensive contacts with Edmonton businesses and nightclubs through his self-started high-end valet service, wrangled a Porsche from Norden Autohaus, a Z4 roadster from Bavaria BMW and a Ducati 996 motorcycle from Argyll Motor Sports.
Some scenes have even brought together huge groups of motorcyclists in one location, all volunteering their time and their rides.
"We had a couple of wipeouts," Maxxis said. (No, the Ducati wasn't involved.) "Nobody was injured, but it is a challenge when all these engines are revving and you're in a residential community at 3 a.m."
Former restaurateur Franco Imbrugno wears the hats of co-producer and actor - he plays the owner of the movie's titular nightclub - and the screenplay comes from local journalist and screenwriter Greg Kennedy.
Not a bad assembly of Edmonton talent. But what makes the movie even more unique is the absolute lack of any government funding. All of the investment has come from local businesses.
Maxxis said he created his valet business, which he plans to expand into the global market, for the sole purpose of making contacts that would allow him to do make movies. While the actors and director ply their craft, his concern is 100% focused on commerce.
"You create a product, you finish it with your own money and then you sell it," said Maxxis. "We're one of the first groups of producers and filmmakers to be doing that."
Halo will continue shooting until Aug. 1 at various locations in Edmonton, with the producers hoping to have a final cut of the movie ready by the end of September and have it into distribution channels by next spring.
Zappacosta, for his part, said he'd happily do the movie thing again, as long as he can wedge it into his music-making schedule.
"The challenge is something," he said. "Being a musician and being onstage and performing, you're constantly in front of people who are always taking some kind of potshots at you. So it seemed the next most appropriate thing to do was for people to make fun of my acting abilities."