Marc Brumer Really Likes Acting!

Marc Brumer, late of the Suge Knight/Kanye lawsuit (our previous coverage here), thinks you should hire actors to read depositions to jurors:

"If a doctor isn't available, which happens all the time, you can do a casting call and find some guy who was on "One Life to Live," some gray-haired guy," Brumer says. "You give him the deposition ahead of time so he's prepared, and he'll come in and you're going to get what you need."

Exactly!

Let's say some crotchety, decrepit old country doctor accused of malpractice is not available to testify, I would bring in classic OLTL character actress Andrea Evans, who memorably played Llanview's red-haired wild child Tina Lord Roberts, to read his testimony:

Who could possibly ever rule against poor Tina?

(Hey, I spent a lot of time in college watching daytime soaps.)

Of course the Florida Bar, still debating the possible benefits of email service(!), has not yet caught up with this new phenomenon:

Hiring actors to portray witnesses hasn't become widespread enough to draw the attention of the Florida Bar, so there aren't any rules that govern it.

Brumer, for example, isn't required to disclose that his deposition reader is a professional actor. In a legal sense, he says paying an actor $200 an hour to prepare and read a deposition is no different from asking a legal secretary or a paralegal to stand in for a witness. 

Well I guess one difference would be the deposition-reader is in fact a professional actor and the jury does not know this.

Other than that, yeah I suppose there's no difference?