Unscripted - A Blog for Actors - Backstage

Casting Conundrums and other updates

Since last you heard from me, I've started that acting group I mentioned in a previous post.  It's made up of fellow grad school alumni, and it's been going well.  Granted, without an official teacher to please, the motivation to put in the work has to come completely from inside ourselves, but we're managing.  For the most part we're doing scenes for one another and giving feedback, but if anyone has an audition coming up it's a great place to make sure you know what you're doing before you get in the room.

Also, my latest project, the supernatural web series Shadow Free, finished its first season run.  I was extremely happy with how everything turned out, and the rest of the episodes lived up to and surpassed the pilot.  We're about to start work on some interim material while the writers and director get ready for season two.  They've told us what to expect, and they're really stepping it up.  It's nice to know that's waiting for me up ahead.

Otherwise, things have been slow.  Slooooow.  I had a meeting with an agency that got me pretty pumped, but didn't lead to anything bigger.  They want me to keep them informed of any other casting directors I get to know.  And that brings me to yet another catch-22 that can slowly erode an actor's sanity.

5 Years Ago Today...

I moved out of the childhood home I grew up in and moved to New York. I didn't realize what a monumental moment it was at the time. I didn't exactly believe that I would really be able to pull off supporting myself. There was a lingering fear that I would have to give up and move back home. I was like one of those contestants on a reality show that keeps complaining, "I don't want to go back home yet."

When I reflect back on the last 5 years, I get incredibly nostalgic for those times in my life. I will never again see New York from the same perspective as when I first moved there. When I go back now, every block has a memory. I remember trekking up to Times Square for my very first audition and thinking, "This is it. I'm here." I had such a distinct plan and vision for how my career would unfold. I was so completely innocent and trusting of the people I encountered. When I imagined my life 5 years away, I didn't picture myself being where I am now.

How Not To Talk To An Agent

There is a fine line between self promotion and self implosion.  In this business, it's one we all have to walk on with frequency and skill.  You've got to be brave, but you also have to be conscientious.  Personable and professional.  Pleasing, but not a pleaser.

As someone who tends towards shyness and observation, I know that I have to work hard to put my feet in the right doors.  I have to remind myself to be more outgoing, especially in situations that I recognize as having good networking potential (but really, in NYC that's just about everywhere.  You never know who is in room.)

So where to draw that line?  It's hard to tell, and there are no hard rules.  What is important to remember at all times is that you are first and foremost a human being.  Use those human instincts.

My Picture Blog #22

A couple years ago, on one of my impromptu visits to New York City I took a photo of a mailbox that was being used as a trash can. Stuffed to the brim. Classy.

Truth is, seeing that photo back then made me feel awful; as an artist and as a New Yorker.

The huge differences in lifestyle and environment from the East Coast to the West Coast have, no doubt, influences on the creative mind and spirit.

What's pretty vs. what is raw. What's glossy vs. what is honest. 

All things infiltrate the aritsts' subconscious and either add to our source, or need to be filtered out.

Well...today, while on my bike here in sunny SoCal, I took this photo of an actual trash can, also stuffed to the brim.

The thing is...that's a bumper. A car bumper.

Talk about things you only see in Los Angeles! Happy Memorial Day Weekend Everyone!

I'm about to start traveling in June...you'll see where...

(photos courtesy of yours truly and the thoughtful residents of Santa Monica)

Yours Truly -- Ann Hu

 

Imposter's Syndrome

Ironically, the weeks that followed my last post, entitled Catching Fire, could plainly be described as "dousing the flames."  If you read that post you'll remember that I was feeling my career taking off.  I'd had several months of fairly consistent acting employment, so much so that I had little time for my stability job or blogging.  Then I had a tremendously busy week of gigs, abundant auditions, and amazing feedback.  I managed to cram more into one week than I had some months.  I felt unstoppable!  

Then everything came to a screeching halt.

Don't be concerned, nothing tragic happened.  But that's the problem, nothing happened.  And that's why it's tragic. 

Judging The Material

If you’ve been in acting for any time at all, you’ve come across scripts that suck. Just out-and-out suck. Whether the story is poorly written, characters are scarcely developed, scenes are nonsensically strewn together, or any of a dozen other things that make for poor movie material, we’ve all read scripts that make us cringe. Sometimes, we get cast to play characters in these scripts.

One oft-repeated pat phrase in acting is “don’t judge the material.” Like homemade butternut squash soup, it’s easier said than done. You can’t help it. Once you’ve read the material, you’ve formed an opinion on its merit, and once you’ve done that, you’ve judged it.

I'm sorry, which one of us is the professional?

Several weeks ago I was at a party. It happens. At the party, I met a cute girl. Also happens, though a lot less frequently. After a while, it became clear that the she needed to get a cab home and that after several excellent margaritas from the host, she needed a little assistance to get from said party to said cab. I try to be a gentleman on occasion (we all need hobbies, right?) so I helped spot her down the four flights of stairs and started looking for cabs in the street. While I did this, she spotted a 24-hour taco shop and declared it was time to eat. So we went in and got some food.

Over burritos, she then proceeded to tell me exactly what I was doing wrong with my acting career. Don't you love it when people who don't work in your industry tell you they know what you should be doing with your profession?

Attitude is Everything

There was a recent discussion over on Facebook that got me thinking. The original post was about how one particular voiceover audition had been sent to pretty much every voice agent in the known Universe. So the conclusion was how could one person possibly book the job? (Do you see the irony?)

The discussion went on and on about how frustrated people were with the sheer number of people that now do voiceover. And it is true, anyone with an iphone can call themselves a voice actor. Heck, homeless guys and 14 year old kids are getting "discovered" on YouTube and landing huge national gigs. But many of the comments were of the "I have no shot" variety.

Now, I am the first to admit I am optimistic to a fault. I DO think I will book the voice gig that was sent to every voice agent in the known Universe. But I can appreciate the reality that it is hard to be seen (in this case, HEARD) when there are a million and one other talent also up for the job. Acting is a numbers game, sure. 

However, this is a case of ATTITUDE is EVERYTHING. 

We can all agree that SOMEONE has to book the gig so why shouldn't it be YOU. 

I certainly think it should be ME! 

--Mercedes Rose 

 

Celebrate the Web: Creating a Pilot in Seven Days

I spent the past week working on a project for the Celebrate the Web (CTW) pilot contest. Teams in the contest have seven days to write, shoot, edit, and publish a web series pilot based on several elements provided by CTW.

Most of you know that I love the web, and have some experience creating series for YouTube. Most of my online work has been very simple, sketch comedy based, though... so creating a full pilot was a pretty foreign task! I was really thrilled for the opportunity to work on this, knowing that it would force me to pull something together quickly with no excuses for putting it off.

Many of the teams for CTW had quite a few people, cast and crew... even writing teams! We would have loved to expand our group, but it was such a last-minute decision to join the contest that our team ended up being made of just two people. Neither of us went to film school, and acting is our primary career path... but we had a blast trying to pull this together. From the get-go we made a decision that we would stay positive, not focus on our lack of equipment or assistance, and not beat ourselves up if things didn't come out 100% perfectly. We really just wanted to put something out there.

We wrote for one day, shot for two days, and edited for another two. Audiosocket even very generously gave CTW team members access to their entire music library, which made our pilot eons better than it would have been otherwise.

It certainly isn't a perfect pilot, there are lots of things that I would change, but I'm really thrilled that we were able to pull something together on absolutely no budget (this was made for $0), with no fancy eqiupment (I wish we had had something for sound... but we didn't!), and with just two people. A huge thank you to Celebrate the Web for holding this contest, it is such a great way to get content created. I've had a blast watching the other pilots and tweeting back-and-forth with a new community of web creators.

You can watch our pilot--under[cover]employed--below, and vote in the contest here. You'll also be able to check out all of the other wonderful pilots at that link! Voting is once per day, now until May 31st. Thank you for your support!

 

--Laura Hunter

Know Why You're Saying No

I went to a wonderful Catholic women's college. While there, I found a great monologue that happened to have swear words in it (the "f-word", which at that point in my life, I had never used). I wanted to change the swear words in the piece to non-swear words. I had a long discussion with two of my amazing professors on the matter.  They were supportive of my choice, but they gave me advice: I had to know WHY I didn't want to use the words.

Catching Fire

Last week was a WHIRLWIND!  I'll cautiously say that it felt like something in my career caught fire, (in a good way) and I'm still blissed out and catching my breath while I try to process it all. 

Since I returned to acting, I've been doing whatever I can to meet the Casting Directors working on the kinds of projects I'm pursuing.  I've had modest success, but before last week there were still some targeted offices I wasn't getting into.  All of a sudden, something happened!  (Perhaps it was that crazy super moon?)  Three of the big CD's I'd been hoping to get in front of all called me in within a few days of each other.

Behind The Scenes With The Kardashians

Sorry it's been awhile since my last post! I've been busy creating videos for my new Youtube Channel "HeyUglyBaby". So without further ado, here it is! Hope you guys like it :)

 

--Tamara Dhia

Is My Hair Holding Me Back?

A friend of mine - an actress - once told me "Working in commercials can be your waitressing job." I was sort of taken aback when she said this. What???

She booked one or two commercials a year, and it helped her stay afloat as she pursued tv shows and indie films. It was her "day job" essentially. No one had put that idea in my head. 

So I've been fervently pursuing commercial representation. First a manager, then an agent. When I met with the manager, she had two words to say about my headshots: "Too old." Those were her thoughts on my makeup. 

Scamtastic

I can't even write about this subject without seeing red. Predators in the entertainment industry have devised so many ways to bilk money out of the poorest people in the business - new and struggling actors. Everywhere I turn, there are people selling snake oil to actors promising them stardom or at least a leg up for a mere $49, $99, or $249.

It makes me sick.

One popular scam is for self-styled "agents" to offer to represent new talent. Most new actors are only too happy to get their first agent and will sign on any dotted line they are told to. The agent then tells the actor that he or she needs multiple new headshots (photographers charge for each "look" so the more looks an actor does, the more expensive the session). The actor is then steered to a photographer the "agent" has a relationship with for these new headshots. What the actor doesn't realize is that the "agent" gets a kickback for the referral and the agent has no intention of ever actually representing this actor.

Rockette Inspiration

After a vacation, it can be so difficult to get back into the groove of ‘real life,’ even though my real life doesn’t always feel that real, between auditions, rehearsals, memorizing of monologues, and the taking on and off of tights.  But even so, after getting back from a European family vacation for two weeks, I found it extremely difficult to motivate myself for the onslaught of auditions that were to come.

Celebrate Your Goals

 Living in NYC has taught me to that no one is going to motivate you except for yourself. 

Moving to New York was pretty overwhelming. Instead of being a big fish in a small pond, I was thrown into an ocean of hometown superstars. 

That is why it is so important to set tangible, realistic goals for yourself. I've talked about goals before, but no one is a better cheerleader for your team than --- you! Seeking performance work is a full-time job with no paycheck, and the only incentive is what you give yourself. When I don't give myself a direction, I fall into supreme laziness and a touch of the blues. 

When I made the big move, I read that the Glinda replacement on Broadway was 24, and I thought, "I can do that! I'll totally be on Broadway by then." When my 24th birthday came and left, I was crushed. I hadn't reached my goal. 

Going Through The Motions

Every now and then when the cameras are rolling, I find I lose track of my character, disconnect from the scene, and start "acting." It happened last weekend on a short film when the director had us hopping and skipping around the script with little time to get our heads around where we were in the story.

The film covered some pretty intense emotions (survival, first love, soldier contemplating deployment, and relationship uncertainty) in a short span of time. We were up against a strict time constraint at the location and the director was having us hopscotch around the script in a single take so he could get several bits and pieces he still needed. As an actor it's my job to deliver what's needed when it's needed, but the circumstances were not working in my favor. I knew all the lines without thinking about them, but jumping through the script without pause from scenes of elation to desperation to confusion to frustration killed my connection with the material and my character. I definitely felt myself "acting" at points and that's never a good thing.

Personal Morality: Follow-up

I didn't know my post on Personal Morality would be such a big hit! Thank you to everyone who left comments, retweeted it, shared it on Facebook, and emailed me their own stories. To everyone who sent me their stories on other mediums, I encourage you to write in the Unscripted comments section, as I know that what you've said to me will be inspirational and interesting to others as well.

Here are a couple of things I left out of the post:

- A couple of people have mentioned to me that they wished I had provided the sketch so that you could make up your own minds about it. The biggest reason I didn't post a link to the sketch is because I'm not looking for anyone else's opinions on the subject. I did the sketch, I loved doing it, and I would be delighted if the show called me up to do another one. I neither feel the need to ask for your support, nor care to hear your derision. (I have other reasons not to post the link directly, but if you'd like to look for it... Hint #1: my IMDb page. Hint #2: "Historical". Good luck.)

Stress Comes in Many Forms

Ever have one of those weeks where EVERYTHING is happening all at once? That is what last week was like for me. 

In the span of 8 days, I had filmed 2 short films and performed in 3 shows. I thought I was holding on strongly until Wednesday rolled around. 

I was shooting my second film and was called to set incredibly early. Not only that, but I had gotten home really late the night before because of work.

Between LA morning traffic and finding parking, I was 30 minutes later and had left an hour earlier than my call time. I rushed onto set, lugging all my bags and slightly perspiring. They were running behind anyways so it was all good.

Or was it?