Day 283: Bing callback. This was one of those auditions where you're performing right in front of all the people from the ad agency who are making the hiring decisions. It was 5 of us who auditioned in the group and about 8 or 9 ad agency folks so it was a bit claustrophobic and hot under those lights. Didn't feel as good as the audition did but I still had fun when they made us dance again. Oh well, on to the next.
Day 171: Natural Foods Commercial Callback- Always funny to audition in a room full of people. This one went well. Commercial drop-off at Michael Sanford Casting, it was near my callback so why not?
Documentary Meeting.
Website Wednesday- took care of updates.
Day 172: Lunch with Leshelle, a friend of mine who's just got promoted to PR Director for Tavis Smiley's book division and is moving to New York next month to get started. Congrats girl!
McDonald's Commercial Audition at Kathy Knowles Casting. Was paired up with a guy who I had really good chemistry with so I fully expected a callback!
Day 173: McDonald's Commercial Callback- this wasn't nearly as smooth as the audition. We were brought in in groups of 5 and one of the girls I had to interact with was a hot mess. I don't know any other way to say it. She was needy and gave so many excuses as to why she didn't bring what they asked for and talked a mile a minute about irrelevant crap to the session runner right before he said action. We were supposed to do some improv and then say our lines and I had to keep feeding her her opening line and it was just... irritating. I'm sure there was something I could've done better too but in the moment I was just thrown off by her weirdness. Of course, in this industry there's no rhyme or reason to any of this so she could easily book this spot and leave me scratching my head wondering what the hell they were looking for in the first place.
Day 35: Researched a few headshot retouchers before deciding on Jessica with
Now That's You. Great quality, fantastic price, can't wait to see how my pictures look when she's done with them.
Day 36: Took my husband to see
The Mechanic and we both loved it! Technically this was for pleasure and not business but I can make the argument that whenever I watch
Ben Foster perform I'm auditing a master class in acting. I really believe he's one of the most underrated actors on the scene and I hope he continues to get bigger and better roles as his career progresses.
Day 37: Finally bought
Bitch Is The New Black. This book that will one day become a film is something that I really
really want to be a part of for more reasons than one. Gonna dive in this week and let the role research begin. Oh and I had a callback for Dunkin Donuts in the morning which was followed by being placed on avail in the afternoon.
Heeeeey!
Got a callback for “Low Count,” the student film I auditioned for on Saturday morning. It’ll be held this Friday and apparently we’ll be paired up this time so I’ll be doing the same scene with a potential husband. Though Low Count is the working title, it refers to the low count of white blood cells that patients infected with HIV have. I’m auditioning for the lead, who finds out she has contracted HIV. Though she originally thinks it’s from a one night stand she had during a “weak moment” she eventually finds out it’s from her husband who’s been living on the down low. Heavy stuff- and to think, some women have had this happen to them in real life, it’s heartbreaking.
On a lighter note, however, we had two casting sessions to find what we need for the pilot episode of Diary of A Wedding Planner and it was definitely an eye-opening experience. Although I didn’t want to hold callbacks it looks like we’ll have to in order to make a final decision on 2 of the 4 roles we need to fill. I told Stephen I’m enjoying the producing process so much that I want to do more of it. It’s very similar to wedding planning actually- there’s tons of preparation, you have to develop a reasonable budget that can fulfill your vision and source vendors/locations/crew/actors that fit within it, you have to scout locations and negotiate rates, you have to have a reliable team you can count on and you hope to ultimately end up with a great webseries/film/video that rewards you for all of the hard work and effort you put into it. For now I’m gonna stick with producing material that fits me as an actor but in the future I hope to produce some things where I’m not involved in the acting at all because switching from the producer hat to the actor hat is a lot to take on.
SUPER EXCITED because my family & I are on AVAIL for a
national commercial. A national, SAG commercial- yes this is a very big deal for me! We're so close to booking this that I can taste it...and yet, it's not in the bag already so I really should be thinking "realistically" rather than having my head in the clouds. But I'm sure you all know by now that I keep the clouds in my eyeline at all times so it's a little too late for that. Optimism can be both a strength and a weakness when it comes as naturally as it does to me. I think a lot of creative types can relate.
Anyhow fingers have been crossed and more importantly, prayers have went up. Now all we can do is wait- and hope.
We'll see.
Callback went okay. I felt a bit self-conscious at first since my hair didn't really look like my headshot but I quickly put that outta my mind since there was nothing I could do about that. Although it's a print job we got to do some improv which is always fun. The direction the CD gave us was to be bubbly & excited with lots of hopes and dreams, easy enough. We came in in groups of 3 and each took turns telling our "friends" good news.
- The first girl in my group was taking the next step with her boyfriend and moving in together.
- The other girl was excited about landing an interview with her dream employer.
- I was happy to tell them I had secretly eloped in Jamaica.
What any of this has to do with American Family Insurance? Who knows? But I had a good time and as far as I could tell I was the only one there without an agent so I took that as a sign that somebody needs to be signing me-
and soon.
Of course I
WOULD get a callback when my hair is a mess!
Had to run to the beauty supply to get a hair piece that looks like my headshots. Couldn't find an exact match but I got as close as I could get. Not totally happy with it but it'll do for now.
One step closer to landing this print job.
Back to Sunset Blvd. tomorrow.
Callback's tomorrow night. I was sent the whole script this time so I have an opportunity to fully prepare before I go back in. This time, however, I'll be reading for both female roles. And although "Becky" has the most screen time, now that I've read the script I actually see a lot more of myself in the character "Shay" so we'll see what happens.
