Shane West

The fast, furious and enigmatic career of late-'70s punk rocker Darby Crash, who died of a heroin overdose Dec. 7, 1980, at the age of 22, remains a half-buried L.A. legend. His demise was overshadowed by another rock death the next day -- the shooting of John Lennon 3,000 miles east. As explored by debuting director Rodger Grossman in "What We Do Is Secret" -- screening at 10 p.m.

SHANE WEST readily sacrifices his body for the Germs. The actor doesn't have much on Darby Crash, the original frontman of the infamous late-'70s L.A. punk provocateurs, who had a habit of cutting his chest onstage and smearing peanut butter on anything that moved before committing suicide in 1980, at age 22, with a heroin overdose. But to portray Crash in this year's Germs biopic "What We Do Is Secret," West underwent intense body modification to match Crash's feral, ragged physique.

Last year he appeared in the small, touching film "A Walk to Remember." Now the 25-year-old actor has moved into the big-budget company of Sean Connery in "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen." And that's not his only interest. West is part of a band -- Johnny Was -- named after a Bob Marley song, but that's where the connection to the reggae artist ends. Johnny Was is rock with punk undertones and a little emo thrown in.