Summit County resident Jaime FitzSimons worked as technical advisor for the new Hollywood movie, ‘Street Kings’

SUMMIT COUNTy — Before David Ayer accepted the director position for “Street Kings,” which has its nationwide and local release today, he sent the script to friend and former Los Angeles cop, Jaime FitzSimons.

FitzSimons, now a captain with the Summit County Sheriff’s Office, worked on the Hollywood flick featuring Keanu Reeves and Forest Whitaker as technical advisor, traveling back and forth from Los Angeles to Summit County in production last summer.

The two — Ayer and FitzSimons — met in Los Angeles when FitzSimons was compelled to write to Ayer after seeing “Training Day,” which Ayer wrote.

“He sent a letter to my agent, which normally I don’t respond to, but something about it was really genuine. We are kindred spirits,” Ayer said.

The film, set in the world of law enforcement, is familiar territory to film director and writer Ayer. Yet for the realism he was going for, he would hire FitzSimons, who worked with the Los Angeles Police Department since 1990 before coming to Summit.

As technical advisor, FitzSimons helped Ayer with the slang and lingo during rewrites, before joining the set to check on costume and set arrangements.

“All the tiny details you would never imagine ... you have to make it believable,” FitzSimons said. “The Los Angeles Police Department is known throughout the world for its uniform ... its tactics ... it’s a famous and infamous law enforcement agency.”

He also coached the actors on police procedures, mainly with the film’s star, Keanu Reeves.

Ayer said, “The thing about Jaime is he’s really smart and really articulate and understands how to talk to actors. He helped them not just with policing — to walk and look like cops — but also how to think like a cop.”

Ayer explained that Reeves approached him to direct the film.

“It’s a James Ellroy script that’s been kicking around town for some time. Keanu wanted to try something different, to key in on that role and he figured I would be a good director.”

What Keanu created, according to Ayer, is a rogue, violent street cop — “someone with a lot of demons, a lot of internal life boiling under the surface, very explosive and reactive.”

FitzSimons appears in the movie briefly as the LAPD captain.

When asked how the streets of Summit County compared to those of Los Angeles, FitzSimons said, “Everything that I thought I had left behind in L.A. I have found here, just on a smaller scale, with the exception of violence toward cops.”

“Street Kings” opens today at the Skyline Cinema in Dillon. Check film capsules on page B8 for showtimes.

<i>Leslie Brefeld can be reached at (970) 668-4626 or lbrefeld@summitdaily.com.</i>