Actress Glenn Close isn’t spending her days pretending to be a commoner at any Occupy Wall Street protest. She’s busy prepping an Oscar-bait film – “Albert Nobbs” – for awards season and helping out an Army veteran in need.

Close recently nominated Army Staff Sgt. Allen Hill as a subject for an “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” episode, helping to dramatically improve his life in the process.

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Hill, 43, is a National Guard and U.S. Army veteran who served nearly 20 years, including two tours in Iraq. He earned a Purple Heart for injuries sustained when an Improvised Explosive Device demolished a Humvee he was riding in. He has been in treatment for post-traumatic stress since the Nov. 1, 2007, incident and away from his wife and two children for much of that time. It was a dismal existence.

But earlier this year, on a hot August night, Hill and his family stood on a street in rural Franklin County, Kan., awaiting a life-changing event. Friends, neighbors, well-wishers, military members and American Legion Riders also waited. The Hill family was about to see their new home built by volunteers on the ABC television series Extreme Makeover: Home Edition …

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As a veteran, I want to say “Thanks” to Hollywood.

Too often, the only thing we hear about the Industry is that a new movie is coming out that portrays our soldiers as near mindless half-wits turned into raving murderers by America’s unjust wars. But that kind of nonsense is not the whole story.

Recently, J.J. Abrams, the director of the new “Star Trek” re-boot packed up cast members like Chris Pine, Eric Bana, and the lovely Zoe Saldana and flew off to premiere their film. This premiere was not for a bunch of overpaid, over-pampered movie stars in some gaudy theater. Instead, it was in a dusty hangar in the Middle East, and the audience was made up of our troops. And that is not the exception. (more…)