"This is what I do. This is all I do, so I have to make it as good as I can make it. Because otherwise ... I'm not a person who plays golf. Hair's a big deal, and it's a huge deal to me. If you're in the center of pain, at home crying over somebody, if you wipe your eyes off and look in the mirror, and your hair looks great, you're going to notice."
It's this passion and dedication -- along with the tattooed Antin's chiseled, dark good looks and considerable charm -- that caught the eye of producer Ben Silverman, who, with partner Mark Burnett, previously turned New Yorker Rocco DiSpirito into the chef America loves to love (or loves to hate, depending whom you ask) in NBC's "The Restaurant."
"I loved the movie 'Shampoo,'" Silverman says, referring to the 1975 sex farce starring Warren Beatty. "I thought the idea of following a straight, Lothario kind of rock-star hairdresser as he went about trying to grow his business, or go from the middle tier to the 'A' tier would be exciting television.
"Jonathan Antin is a real star, whether it be with brush and scissors or behind the camera. The guy has an amazing presence and charisma and sex appeal."
"Blow Out" chronicles Antin's efforts to open a sister salon to his current West Hollywood operation. This time, Silverman partnered with "Big Brother" producers Arnold Shapiro (whose mother was a hairdresser) and Allison Grodner.
"The idea of helping to do a television show about an occupation that I grew up in was intriguing to me," Shapiro says. "It made my mother very happy, by the way."
As to the inevitable comparisons between DiSpirito and Antin, Shapiro says, "They're artists who have put themselves in an entrepreneurial position, but they're still primarily artists. But they didn't crack up; they didn't go to the hospital; they didn't hit anybody."
"I love the fact," Silverman adds, "that they both named their businesses after themselves. It's Jonathan Salon: Beverly Hills, and it's Rocco's on 22nd. It shows you the kind of personalities they are."
A native of Beverly Hills, Calif., (but, he points out, he grew up in an apartment, not a mansion), Antin wanted to shake things up in his swank hometown.
"I'm spending a good portion of my life savings on my salon," he says. "Beverly Hills is equally as competitive as West Hollywood, which is kind of a newer vibe.
"I'm bringing a different thing into Beverly Hills. There's no one like us in Beverly Hills. We're the black sheep. But we are coming in with nothing but love. The salon is on Wilshire Boulevard, directly across from Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus. I walked by this space probably 2,500 times as a child."
Antin is in the thick of production at Jonathan Salon: Beverly Hills. The crew trucks are squeezed into a narrow side street, with monitors showing comprehensive views of the new salon -- including Antin tucking into a sandwich for lunch in his unfinished office area.
The part-industrial, part-loft-style space -- with concrete floors and tool chests used as hairstylists' stations -- was barely finished in time for its opening party. Even now, things are still a little rough.
"It's definitely taking me longer," Antin says, "to finish everything that I want done than I thought. There's still a lot of work to do. But listen, if I was at West Hollywood right now, as exhausted as I am, I'd be asleep upstairs in the office. I wouldn't be able to cut hair. But the city vibe is here. It's that little B-12 shot."
The show also promises drama, whether from clients and their makeover stories or from stylists, which include the also-tattooed, up-and-comer Brandon Martinez.
"One's a younger version of the other," Silverman says. "They're both single, straight and sexy and like chicks, so there's a competitive streak. There are a lot of the archetypal relationship issues between alpha dogs."
"Brandon's a character," Antin says. "But I'm not a player-hater. I like the boys around. I'm a guy's guy."
Antin has even had a little help from his showbiz friends, including Rodney Scott and Kate Bosworth, two former cast members of The WB Network's "Young Americans."
"Kate's the first client that I had in the salon during the construction, in the middle of the construction, dust everywhere," Antin says. "My electrician had gotten me a salon chair from next door, and a cape and a mirror. I cut her hair in the middle of crap everywhere. It was just construction guys, crush, crush, banging and chopping walls down.
"All of a sudden the dust settles, and I finish her blow-dry. I turn her around into the mirror. Kate Bosworth looks like Brigitte Bardot. So cool, man. It's really cool.
"It's funny, a week from today is supposedly the last day of shooting, and all of a sudden, I'm used to it now, and I'm saying, 'Hey, wait a minute, where are you going? What do you mean we're done a week from now? Then what do we do?'"
