topless and unemployed

the food, the rad, and the ughly

2007-03-10T04:30:00.000-05:00

just an update to let you know, the interviews begin with talent agencies. they are the first line of offense for the local actor. they negotiate and they appropriate. new audio coming soon.

happy new year!

2007-02-20T22:27:00.000-05:00

i've shit myself with local acting gigs of late. that's been my life for the last couple months. 'course the blog has suffered. but i'm not really sure i wanna continue this thread. my buddy mcchris uses his blog for complete self promotion. zombie sitcom = movie industry critiques and the odd link. maryk gives the broadest appeal because she has boobs. overdroid thinks he is poised on the edge of total digital human domination. yet his blog celebrates the accomplishments of one joseph limbaugh, a verified homonid. and clunky robot has pretty much set the muthah-fuggin' standard for dedication and manifestbrication.
this blog has been a string of audition descriptions, slagging sets and a general tone of defiance towards the folks in command of the acting labor force.
but i'm gonna start over.
i'm gonna find out what makes this town tick in terms of movie and commercial production. stay-tuned. podcast coming soon.
insert hand-claps here.
click on the still above if you want to see a clip from a film. it stars paul giamatti and michelle willams. i am a total dink in it. but a well-dressed dink. and a fantastic mortuarian.

foul-mouthed kids

2006-12-21T03:13:00.000-05:00

if memory serves me correctly, she is a member of mensa. which means she's fighting a "dull" image. seriously, though, i had sex with her. her character. between the pages of the script. she cures my character's gay.

awesome x-emplar

2006-12-19T23:06:00.000-05:00

the guys at 7030 (clunky robot, cdub, etc.) have kicked shit up a notch. great animation, funny writing. and that is sincerely yours voicing the wizard. cdub as the halfling. amber nash stepping in as hooker from the first dimension. click to watch below, but go to youtube.com to see part II. you have to. you need to get hooked and watch all of them.

niche

2006-12-18T21:45:00.000-05:00

alt take was 'yes. you can.'

short-form adventures

2006-10-28T03:14:00.000-04:00

this one day
i was invited to play a 'short form show' with t futch and his company laughing matters. he tells me that, i think , so it's clear there's no need for d e e p talk about the 'prov. it's for a multi-national corporation, after all, and they get what every multi-national corporation deserves. a few grown men tapping on audience members, filling in ____s and generally having a wingding of a time.
laughing matters is atlanta's longest running improv. we used to kid around how dad's garage would become atlanta's longest running joke. so far, so good, dad's garage.
the company we did the short-form for was siemens. from their website:
Do you know how, where and when Siemens crosses your path? You may be surprised!
they crossed my path outside the walnut room. i was surprised. so surprised only a scotch on the rocks from their open bar could still my astonishment.
they were a funny group, from all over the world. what they shared was a love of sex. almost all their suggestions were typical innuendo. we made a few. but neither of us made a semen joke. it's no laughing matter.
yet another short-form improv show i was invited to occured in the north georgia mountains for a jewish kids camp. s coulter, cruchic and i drove up, coulter uttering benign phrases in a german accent. it was funny. even funnier? the first person we met at the camp was german. like, uber deutsch. the thickest german accent i ever heard. it was dripping with tomatensaft. coulter was außer sich vor ironie.
we workshopped through the day and into a crisp evening. we performed in their synagogue (temple for you reform types). no open bar.
on the one hundred-mile drive home through the foothills of the appalachians, cruchic pulled off the highway to a hidden dairy queen. she claims these small town DQ's are a cut above. we all got ice cream. i got a butterscotch sundae, for which the mentally handicapped man at the register charged me eight dollars US. the manager, a sixteen-year-old, remedied this with a roll of the eyes. "it's been a loo-o-ng day," he said. as an after thought, cruchic added a hot dog to her order. it came wrapped in foil. it came teeming with flies. and not just regular houseflies. but big green-eyed, freshly maggot-hatched horseflies.
she returned it for another one. i know. i'm as surprised as you are right now. scotch on the rocks...
the manager yelled through the window "hey, man! this has flies in it." the cook quickly served up a basket of french fries. "not fries, man. flies!"
at this point, cruchic wisely got her money back. none of us questioned the integrity of the desserts. we didn't wanna know.

je sui l'petit cochon

2006-10-18T11:19:00.000-04:00

Guys, I got a heads up on an audition for a commercial job where they need a character with a French accent. If you can do a believable accent let me know ASAP do (sic) that I can submit you. Thanks!
well, that's all i need to hear! i spent over a year dating a french girl. she can tell you, in that time, we spoke to each other a lot. almost daily. by the hairs on my barbichette, i'm your spokesthing!
my droite side is my good side. and i love manger, so in between shots, you'll find me at craft services. partaking of the brioche and fromage, and of course any super bonbons.
mind if i take off my shirt? cool. i've worked hard to look like this, and it's a waste to stay clothed.
like i said, french is a wonderful accent. when applied to english words, it softens any angular tones. might be perfect if this commercial is a soft sell. i can't tell you how many truck ads for the new model year could use a french accented announcer. somehow we americans have managed to make chevrolet an ugly word.
can you hear it:
no muh-nay down
lo-lo ay-pe-argh
pro-wd to be ani-merican.
wiss ze highess jz-ivetrain powuh in ziss way-class
in conclusion, my accent is believable. my french girlfriend sure believed a lot of the lies i told her. which were in english. so imagine how wickedly effective your campaign and i will be with je and le thrown in there!

2006-10-13T13:55:00.000-04:00

so i say to pasi nurminen:

tomorrow, my lord: time goes on crutches 'til love have all his rites.

and she looks back at me like i make no sense (see right). this bill snakespeare stuff is hard.
last night i did my first performance as claudio. he is right and noble. it's a stretch.
i also came up with some very creative cuts to the script. chopping about a full minute off the running time. then adding it back on by missing an entrance.
the middle ground i want is affording the language to do a lot of the work, yet avoiding the lifeless talking heads stuff that loses people. theatricality mixed with intelligent banter. could we do it the way they do 'curb your enthusiasm'? is't possible? it'd be great? i'd like it?

was did does do

2006-10-06T15:10:00.000-04:00

this blog is usually told in the past tense. looking ahead, though, can be exciting.
fortunes can be told by observing light from the stars. light that is older than we are. stars from the past tell our future.
i will be taking the place of justin w in much ado about nothing at pp. that means i have less than one week left to get my act together.
zombie sitcom will be in it. as the lead, they call bene-dick.
perhaps i should know something about shakespeare. i will do some research. and i will learn.
about billy snakespeare. and his wife anne hathaway with words. their kid homelet. i will learn about bill and stratford-up-on-it. thin, delicate boys playing girls. fat, unsightly girls stage managing. how little will have changed from now until next week!
one of my favorite moments will be when the awe-dience (that's what they'll be full of) dreams in their seats that they are the stars. telling us what we already knew.

mmm...BAR-B-Q cat...mmm...BAR-B-Q mouse

2006-09-26T13:58:00.000-04:00

we shot an industrial a couple weeks back for a terrific restaurant chain.
they're known for an ad campaign that utilizes cows pleading for their lives by proffering the persona non grata of chickens.
it's run by devout southern baptists who don't work on sundays. because the bible says so.
we shot on a sunday.
something else the bible says:

O jerusalem, jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! (matthew 23:37)

i bet the slaughterhouse constantly stages this comical scene - protective mother hens gathering chicks right before they get stamped into sandwiches.
another thing the bible says:

and whether it be cow or ewe, ye shall not kill it and her young both in one day. (leviticus 22:28)

the polite thing to do, i guess. it doesn't apply to chickens. in fact, the ingredients of said chain's breakfast bagel include (among other things) eggs and chicken. that's baby chickens cooked up along with adult chickens and smothered in cheese. 'cept on sundays.
the industrial we filmed was a guide to dealing with thieves. i didn't audition for the role. they called me. they had the perfect part. thanking them and hanging up i thought 'i bet it's a thin, weaselly dude'.
the script reads:

"FINGERS" JOHNSON is a SLIM, LITTLE WEASEL, with a SLIPPERY LOOK, DISPOSITION, & VOCAL DELIVERY.

that's me.
during the shoot, a friend of mine phillip d had this line to deliver:

However, Leon's entry was a very rare occurrence as you'll see next in my little presentation called "Gettin' in the back door!"

we all laughed. a lot. each time phillip said it. the director hollered at us. the baptists weren't amused. they said it wasn't funny.
wasn't it?
my character was part of the plan to break in. we were all excited by the prospect of "fingers" slipping in through the back door.

exquisite corpse

2006-09-21T11:22:00.000-04:00

a mighty spectrum of the most powerful symbols on earth. each diligently researched (the ninja turtle: ate arugula. in a cardboard box. the fish: ate microalgae. in a toilet. the dollar bill: disappeared. in a flash. the woman: gave life. without words.) and recreated for the unflinching camera eye.

merely...

2006-09-13T11:28:00.000-04:00

..a man

let's say i'm burnt beyond recognition. one way to identify my body is to look at the big toe on my left foot. there's a rock in it. an unmistakable dark spot. it's been in my toe since childhood.
let's say i've been dismembered. on a beach. the left foot washed out to sea. the best way to identify me at this point is comparing my head to my headshot-resume. or find the credit for taming of the shrew with the georgia shakespeare festival*. i lost a tooth during that show. pry my lips apart with a bottle-opener. the right central incisor may look real. but it is a fake. i pretend that it's a real tooth.
let's say i've fallen into a meat-grinder. feet-first. no rock, no head. my last action is reaching with my right hand to the heavens for help that will never come. for dramatic effect, the machine gets unplugged. this hand is all that's left. a pile of ground me below. peel this hand open and you will find three alloy metacarpal bones. they were broken and replaced while i was looking for acting work in hollywood back in 2001. that place is dangerous.

*three words that do not belong together

rolo compadre

2006-09-07T13:12:00.000-04:00

last week and this week i did a couple of 'dramatizations' for the FM fanfare known as the regular guys. which are a dot org and a pole smoke away from being the regular guys. fans of their show know they have a DUI segment that uses actual police audio from arrests. funny stuff, like a drunk stuttering motorist and his sympathetic stuttering arresting officer. for whatever reason, they can't always broadcast the original. yesterday i recorded with a real cop. to add realism to the bit, they encouraged profanity. i had permission. i unloaded a steady stream of SOB's and em effers on him. which will be bleeped out. officer tony was so revved up he told me i should make fun of his bald head. so i called him uncle fester for the remainder of the arrest.
now i have a friend in the industry. if i should find myself handcuffed in the backseat of a police cruiser, i'm gonna test his sense of humor. i bet they're all that kewl.

stub yer butt

2006-08-31T11:55:00.000-04:00

shot a tiny scene with the kid from the mac vs pc ads. here's a secret. he smokes.
enjoy a still i took legally of that scene.
we were in the middle of nowhere south carolina. where it's no secret, everybody smokes. they have a tobacco museum. wanna learn more about tobacco? their current tour is entitled "cowboys and indians". it costs $20 and "is closed out with a visit to the christ prayer chapel".
nothing could be finer, than filming in carolina.

pilot to bombardier

2006-08-28T14:48:00.000-04:00

here's a short pilot that randall made. he won funding from turner and we're shooting it over with a full budget (and darker plotline) this wknd. isn't dan t delightful? surprised i didn't get cut from this one either. oh did i mention i was cut from talladega nights? edited clean out. one of these days, alice. straight through your jaw and to the moon.

a wipe is an editing technique

2006-08-26T18:06:00.000-04:00

it's a take off on sex and the city. instead of a gossiping bitch talking about loose sex, the lead female is a radio host advocating abstinence for teen-age girls. it's a christian comedy. ignorance is the new education.
i was called upon to provide magically-improvised character work. i bet a brazilian dolores the rewrites will include much of what was improvised by maryk, rp, dan t, t-stolt and jamie m.
our story begins just after sunset at a modest buckhead palace. the casting director and her friend were given use of the screenwriter's home for the audition.
myself, t-stolt and dan t were asked to wait outside on the back deck overlooking the pool and surrounding acreage. this ostensibly kept us from stealing each other's bits.
the view was probably nice. all the lights were off. they couldn't figure out how to turn them on.
so (verb tense change here) we're sitting outside reading our scripts in the dark mosquito-fog. dan t groans over a stummy-ache. he bolts inside to the shitter. i punctuate his exit with a roaring fart. it feels good. it smells bad. t-stolt leans in to take a whiff and pokes my belly. it feels bad. his short jab temporarily stuns my sphincter. without the levee, the new orleans of my pants gets a flood. t-stolt, unaware of his true aim, climbs down the back deck and out. i'm alone. with my li'l squirt.
i touch the back of my pants and my worst nightmare has just become reality. my baby's placenta seeped through my skivvies. a brown blurble is visible on my pants. and now it's on my hand.
one of the first things a smart casting director will do is not shake your hand. they meet filthy actors all day. i can't be certain this is a smart one.
i smell my hand and peer thru the window. with the odor of fresh soil in my nostrils, i count the crucifixes on the livingroom wall. seventeen. yup. i waddle in.
the same octogenarian who can't figure out how to turn on the porch lights shows me to a bathroom and opens the door. dan t quickly brays:
"mattdon'tcomeini'minhere!"
so i go down the hall. this bathroom is filled with bras. hanging on the door, on the sink, over the mirrors, on the floor. these christians know healthy support starts at home. bras-el tov!
macgyver-style, i fashion a maxi pad of toilet paper and slip it in my pants. i try to wash my hands. there is no soap. i check the entire bathroom. every liquid toiletry imaginable. no soap. i shampoo and condition my hands.
during the audition i sit on a white antique chair, hoping i don't leave a ring like a coffee mug. i take on the role of one radio host who suggests abortion, in some cases, is the best action.
afterwards they shake my hand and give me a novelty condom box labeled "just don't do it". as i'm hobbling out i notice my handmade sanitary napkin is gone. and my baby unchristened. won't you please help me by submitting a name to the post-mortem all-star name jam?

try outs

2006-08-22T01:46:00.000-04:00

my inbox clogged up with auditions this month. auditions are job interviews. i go on fifty or sixty of these job interviews a year. i shave if it's corporate.
you hear some dumb shit at auditions. and it's the same dumb shit everywhere you go.
"they said you all could go home."
a witty stab at clearing the room out. it only succeeds in begging a few people to scramble for another punch. my favorite snarky response to "forget it guys, i got the part":
"yeah, the one in your hair."
thank you, matt young.
today i had a job interview for an ESPN spot that features cheerleaders. the kid at the sign-in table suggested to the young ladies auditioning that they all stretch out because the script might call for some real moves.
thank you, kid at the sign-in table.
even i limbered up for my subtle portrayal of a bearded coach by cracking my neck bones. it's something i do often since in the 10th grade matt young dropped me on my head. you're right, it does explain a lot. not everything. but a lot.
meanwhile, the kid kept chatting up these perky girls. he asked:
"are you two real cheerleaders?"
smiling at each other, they fake-decided who was going to field it this time:
"used to. we're retired."
she seemed so wise at that moment. or maybe it was her moustache.

fix'n to

2006-07-28T14:30:00.000-04:00

guess what i auditioned for the other day. guess. go on. the character doesn't have a name, but is a form of human. something you might find smoking at a gas pump or stuck under a tractor. always holding a bottlerocket in its hand. pointing the wrong way.
need help?
they're found all over the south. maybe even exclusively in atlanta. cuz it seems like all i ever audition for is...
redneck!
made of buckshot and ropeswings. capable of pinning a dog on its back for 10 seconds. a fondness for trampolines and tobacco ensures he knows what the inside of a hospital looks like.
i witnessed one hurl a haymaker with the right arm and delicately cradle a tiny baby with the left. he missed his target, rotated a full 360° and, in the time it took for his world to spin around, had done some thinking and tucked the baby safely in to bed.
so here's to you redneck. i may never see the world through your half-crossed eyes. i probably won't make a pass at someone to whom i'm related. and i physically can't bring myself to eat souse. or look at it. but the next time i get a job portraying one of you heroes, i will definitely cash the check.
sa-loot!

indie! your my best frieeeend! wake up indie!

2006-07-14T10:11:00.000-04:00

it was. it was shot at barnsley gardens in adairsville. it was on a big wrap-around front porch replete with hornets. it was the interns housing. it was actually 3 old houses hammered together with planks. it was perfect for leslie's indie short too hot for summer.
the bathroom available to us was hidden in the civil war room. which is haunted by a ghost. so they took the doorknob off. the bathroom was criss-crossed with spider webs. scooby-doo was scared by the ghost, driven into the spider webs, and without a doorknob to get out yelled for raggy's help.
i was in my underwear nearly all day. as were leslie and maryk. not mine, theirs. too hot for clothes.
and when the rain came, not only were we refreshed by the coolness, but the tap-tapping on the tin roof made filmmaking impossible. it is possible that we didn't actually finish shooting the movie. it is possible something was missed. i mean, we got it all shot from at least one angle. when the sun was out. and parts of it from another angle. when the sun was blocked.
i'm in my underwear right now. ready for my close-up, mr. hooker.

2006-07-02T12:14:00.000-04:00

this photo came to me as a file named “pussy wagon.” the cold reality is this is a still from an industrial shoot last wednesday (seen are maryk and myself). the monitor is a hi-tech actor-monitor. those numbers are real-time statistics on how well the camera subject is performing. maryk is actually pausing in this moment, has about nineteen minutes before her battery runs out. the monitor has accurately measured the distance of the MF (motherfucker) in the background as 29.5 ft.

evil stench of white man precedes him

2006-06-30T11:44:00.000-04:00

mike watt once sang:
for everything revealed, something's concealed
and for everything concealed,
something's revealed
yo ho, eeyo ho....
a corporate audition is like a visit to information retrieval. here's the copy they send:
At Kiwi, we don’t sell computers. We sell personal technology devices with great form and function. People choose Kiwi not just for great looking products and killer apps. Customer service is what sets us apart from our competition. So this quarter we’re about to launch the Next Big Thing…The Wallaby. It’s Blackberry-meets-iPod. Calling, messaging, conferencing, surfing, music and video. It’s connectivity with productivity. Ultra-lightweight, 100 gigs of storage and a super-long battery life. Shockproof, waterproof, foolproof. This Wallaby hops like a bunny!
add on this description of the guy:
30-something man (Caucasian, British accent) with close cropped hair, black collarless shirt or mock turtleneck, jeans, minimalist black wire rimmed glasses. He’s all about image.
okay, got it. a caricature of steven jobs, and i'm selling a fake hand-held product. but what's with the british accent? it's obvious the guy, or at least the company is australian. i email them.
they email back asking why i think that.
dunno....kiwi. wallaby. surfing?
the producer says no, think brit.
stupid fucking white man.
i drive to the audition in my awesome mock turtleneck and wire-rimmed glasses. i go into the studio and
the producer is eating his goddam lunch. like a kangaroo. so i do the bit about the sale of this new product.
let's have an english lesson.
webster's 1913. context (n.): the part of something written so intimately associated with it as to throw light upon its meaning.
yeah, even in 1913, back before women could vote, people knew how important context is to writing.
they tell me, barely looking up from mouthloads of slurping and chewing, it's not a pitch. the brit is actually a 'real person' giving a testimonial as to how UPS shipping saved his company in a pinch.
for real?
that might be good info to give the actor.
see, what bugs me is how so many clients just sit in a room and wait for the perfect read. zero dialogue. by contrast, yesterday i did a VO audition and the writer and producer were there, working with me to get exactly what they wanted. little bits of direction here and there. slight adjustments. fuel for fire.
as doug martsch once sang:
and the cause of this is evident
but the remedy cannot be found
cause it's so well hidden
this history lesson doesn't make any sense
in any less than ten thousand year increments
of common sense

absens haeres non erit

2006-06-25T17:10:00.000-04:00

i use outlook express to organize my acting jobs. there's a folder called "auditions/jobs" and it contains 325 messages since the beginning of 2005. june's been a pokey month. only 3 auditions. one, a remake of a japanese movie was cancelled, another i bowed out of politely because i couldn't find a role, and the last one i had to drive nine hours to shreveport, la.
it's a reliable snapshot of how much PS2/PBR time i log in any period.
since i've come to know jesus christ so well, my bank account was blessed this month with an abundance of residuals ("pay matt what belongs to matt" - thanks, jc): a lottery spot from over a year ago, a made for tv movie from new orleans before the flood (thanks for nothing, god), and a teen drama appearance from a few years back.
now, that last one, the tv show dawson's creek, netted after taxes about five dollars. so i turned once again to jesus christ to find out where tha fuck my money at.
jesus shucked and jived, mostly about how the kingdom of heaven isn't full of rich playboys. i know for a fact heaven's roads are paved with gold teeth and every soul shits chunky monkey. i believe he put it this way:
it's a WB series, man, now enjoying syndication on the cheapest broadcaster of all, the superstation. get over yourself.
fair enough. katie holmes probably got a stack of five dollar checks on her gold teeth-plated dresser.

states of being

2006-05-27T23:26:00.000-04:00

a commercial actor named randall and i went to tennessee on that audition. he's an easy going type, so there was plenty of yammer. i spent the better part the road-trip to toronto not speaking. not because there wasn't anything to say. mostly, adam slept and, mostly, rene played music. for six days.
in nashville, while randall was getting ready and memorizing lines, i went to a taco bell on the same block as the hotel where the audition was being held. immediately, the woman at the cash register greeted me with "how are you doing, sweetie?" in fact, all of her sentences ended with sweetie. behind her, another employee (in that purple shirt and those black pants i knew so well in my days as taco expediter 'omesh') began laughing. the cashier asked him what was so funny. he told her how much he loved her. and hugged her.
i was inside a retarded taco bell.
the tacos were made to perfection and tasted as fresh as mexico. the service was unparalleled. but the place was a mess. one special employee attempted to straighten up the soggy fountain drink area. orange drink spilled onto the napkins, little wads of straw paper soaked in syrup. she was interrupted by a regular customer. they hugged and laughed and talked. for a long time. it was the most adorable excuse for not working imaginable.
walking back thru the lobby of the hotel, i stepped passed a man in a suit and his demonstration: two yards of grass plugged into frames, a pair of scissors, and unbagged clippings. he was selling something.
upstairs on the mezzanine floor i signed in. they asked us to do the script once and then improvise it in our own words. the director had a long pony tail, and his shirt was too small. actually it fit everywhere except his exceptional belly. as he turned his body, his cell phone, clipped to his belt like a satellite, knocked over a cup of ballpoint pens. there were rubber bands in his beard. maybe.
during my turn to tryout for the spokesguy, i read the words off a cue card that was fit over the lens of the camera. a hole was cut out in the middle of the card and, therefore in the middle of the paragraph. i was standing only a few feet away, so i couldn't really fake as though i were looking into the lens. i read the copy and when i got to the hole i said "hole".
in my improv, i simile-ically likened the internet to a lonely highway in the desert and their company as an oasis. it really felt like a hundred degrees. and there really was sand in the waistband of my underwear.

good-bye!

2006-05-22T13:04:00.000-04:00

3 days on amelia island, in a condo a bud-bottle's throw from the calming surfing calm. the gig was for an insurance company that made a gazillion or two over the past year's disasters. but this was a party at the ritz-carlton (a cup of coffee, a fresh juice and a muffin = $15) to celebrate their amazing sales staff. i had 3 lines. steve, playing the host, skipped 1 of them. after the hard slog, we kicked it back to the ATL in one of the filthiest dialogues ever heard in a rental car - ever. what's a man-sock? i uttered it, and i still can't be sure.
while eating at a restaurant last night with cruchic and bo-d, i caught the last few seconds of a georgia lottery commercial (you bet!) i'm supposedly in. didn't see me. and i narrowly avoided a lottery commercial audition on friday for the miniature state of connecticut. lotto blotto.
tomorrow i kick it back out of the ATL to nashville for a spokes-guy audition with suddenlink. their ceo is superstitious. maybe the raconteurs will be grilling out in the front yard of their rock 'n roll compound.
keepin' it digital in '06.
update:
when they hired me to play the cashier they said i had the JUICE. i thought that meant i'd killed a guy and gained skreet respect. well check it out. not only do i have it, it's printed on the wall over my head.

2400 miles.

2006-05-16T09:44:00.000-04:00

that's how far we drove, ATL to YYZ and back. we took the short way home. the last evening of the catch 23 found us, the suits (misprinted as the two suits in rhode island), in the finals with instant theatre and neat squared.
we served up fun simple fare, but the scenes are timed in catch 23 to the tune of 23 total minutes for each team. before our final round we were informed we had 22 seconds left. was our team's head that far up our team's ass? so rene and i attempted an episode of knight rider in 22 seconds. i referred to him as david instead of michael, which i justified out of deference/reverence to hasselhoff over the knight-mare. the truth is, i never watched knight rider. instant theatre won and really deserved to win. their longform killed.
the space, by the way, was a professional black box at an old distillery called...the distillery. beautiful in every way, it made for some incredible improv, and will look fantastic when we get the DV edited. super special thanks to adam pinney for riding with us the whole way and shooting the shows.
best line(s) goes to graham wagner hosting: "welcome to the catch 23 finals. it's the monster truck rally of improv, only instead of trucks it's skinny white guys."
and not-hosting.
kurt: "imagine if the earth were bounced a billion times."
graham: "it was. that's why it's that size."

you never rode the dream machine

2006-05-11T04:06:00.000-04:00

we got into toronto about 15 minutes after the show we were in began. a strange smell (name one) wafted up from the front wheel that wasn't worked on in providence (our brakes went out). yet we hit the stage with all the gusto and frere jaque of a feral rhino. kurt smeaton played with us, and we ended up winning the first round of the catch 23. yay, kurt-lanta!
toronto is an amazing city. think new york, but clean. i rollerbladed all over downtown yesterday. there's enough room for bicycles and bladers to share with street trolleys and cars. the rails are a bit of a trick.. in fact there's this rubber goo they use in between the rails and the asphalt which simply grabs the shit out of rollerblades. imagine skating on the beach for about 2 seconds. i almost broke my face, but then realized how expensive it is, and didn't.
the free train toots on this week: among the freebies count getting my brakes replaced on my blades (thank you sports checque at the eaton center), free tram for rene and adam who had no canadian money, i got a free coke at the casino-rama (adam did not), we got free drinks at the catch 23 tuesday, and our wonderful, kick-ass host, alex tindal, has been kicking out the free vegan food everynight after midnight. seriously, vegan chocolate chip cookies, vegan fajitas, and (lo-fi) popcorn. this guy cooks late at night, then refrigerates his food to delay the reward. duly noted.
there's a photography festival going on in toronto until may 16th-ish. i bladed to a gallery on west queens yesterday and saw some gigantic prints a dude did of a phosphate factory in calgary. also, there was a showing of photos a guy did of many exposures of people - some fully exposed (read as: nude) some not (read as: ghostly). some old (read as: flabby) some young (read as: creepy cuz there were nude adult genatalia right next to them).
tonight we watched a bunch of improv - groups from winnipeg and edmonton. our buddies kevin gillese and arlen from edmonton did a really fun two man show that rollercoastered thru four story-lines and mixed cheap 80's power pop with emotional montages. very funny. graham wagner (you know him from iron cobra but his beard is like charles manson these days) hosted and invariably tidied up the place.
i've taken two showers since i left home last friday.

i'm not santa, kid. just a guy in a wheelchair

2006-05-10T01:37:00.000-04:00

there's this scene in swimming to cambodia where spalding grey is having his perfect moment in the waves off the coast of thailand. suddenly, he has a panic attack thinking about his wallet and personal stuff on the beach. the way he describes it, something like a dark line connecting his forehead to the stuff, and the stuff morphs into a pile of hot shit on a steel counter, that he's inexorably tied to, that is pulling on him.
i think i felt a fraction of that here in providence. which is weird 'cause this is a hip, laid-back town. but within the first hour of arriving i heard an argument about drugs and secret police cameras, a man tried to sic his dog on me, i chased away a group of thug teens eyeing all the equipment in the car, i bought chapstick, a truck nearly careened into a telephone pole in front of us, a group of bikers met peacefully in the street, i nearly bought nail clippers, a man was accused of stealing at a gas station, and i generally got pulled from the waves of a perfect moment and worried about my hot pile of shit.
actually, providence is great. our host gave free accomodations, the space we played in was rad, they gave us free dinner (i had an orange soda with vanilla ice cream float and a bowl of spicy tomato soup with corn and bread), gave us free drinks all night, and then paid us for our gig! which, by the way, was fairly decent, except for one dude telling us to stop because we sucked. which we didn't. did we?
right now we're getting the brakes fixed on my car. $430. that does suck. but i forgive you providence. you gave us free stuff and paid us for our jackassery.
hopefully the car will be fixed in the next hour so we can make it to toronto by our 9 pm showtime....

beantown

2006-05-07T04:50:00.000-04:00

well, they traded joe thornton to san jose earlier this year. the frustration is palpable. we passed fenway, drove thru the big dig. it had some leaks. but the city is absolutely beautiful. i'm saying this without actually having seen it by daylight, but boston at night kicks ass. a year ago our host, dustin, totaled his car staring at the crazy architecture, and he's a bonafide artiste.
we attended a birthday party for some girl. the backyard had a small dj stage, and when we arrived husky and musky we're doing some freestyle rap over some shitty lo-fi funk beats. one keg, a bonfire, and two slathered bbq ribs later, i found myself in a dilapidated rv, watching a one-hitter get passed around and around, but never to me.
we dragged rene's dj equipment up a steep hill, and he quickly doused them with actual good music.
after being cornered by some aggro who wanted to hear us tell jokes ("you guys are comedians? you're not very funny.") i slipped indoors just in time to hear this dude flourishing on an old piano. he was obviously talented, which belied his jock frame. he let up for a second, took a breath and sincerely asked if anyone in the house was trying to sleep. no. he launched into something classical. i took a stab at a joke: "if they weren't sleeping before, they sure are now." he proceeded to pull the rug from under me, pounding away at this truly gorgeous, technically insane piece. then he rolled me up in the rug, dipped me in shellac and mailed me home to mommy.
tomorrow we play providence.

welcome to taco bell, would you like to join the marines?

2006-05-06T11:39:00.000-04:00

richmond, virginia. reminds me of chicago. artsy. on the drive in, we saw people in galleries actually looking at art. turns out it's first friday, and all the peoples are invited to check out the art and eat. also turns out there was an AC/DC coverband playing at a club called the nanci ray gun. the guy who sang as brian johnson told us his myspace account. blaxl rose.
these guys rawked.
richmond has a great wait staff. everywhere we've been. toodles til boston tonight.

catch 23

2006-05-05T09:54:00.000-04:00

we leave this morning (in about a half-hour, i better pack) for toronto. along the way we will be performing our two-man improv show "roadtrip" in providence, seeing an AC/DC coverband in richmond, and performing rene's improvised cartoon at the catch 23 tournament of wonders in toronto.
great folks and fanfare await.
check back each day for the next week or so for installments. i'll be attempting to brush my teeth daily, take pictures, and possibly see some playoff hockey somewhere.
miss you already.

oO$Oo

2006-04-11T13:53:00.000-04:00

a guy i know got me in to be seen for an industrial with a "revolutionary" carpet company. i talk a lot of smack about these client training videos. they wanted to make sure i knew how to use a teleprompter. what, you mean can i read? out loud?
i hope to god i can.
so i went and met the producers and they were super cool. they actually read my resume. and asked questions about work i had done. they hadn't heard of UCB even though they were a company from nyc. but still, they were super cool.
then i come to realize the carpet company is interface. they were profiled in the documentary the corporation because their founder and chairman is ray anderson. he is one of the shining examples of what happens when textile industry leaders take responsibility for their actions. they actually run analyses on sustainability within their industry.
when anderson realized that as the world's leading carpet manufacturer that they were too efficient at creating poisons he used his degree from georgia tech to devise a new type of carpet that doesn't use glue.
this is one of the few times that i could do a coporate industrial and actually feel 100% secure that the client wants to make the world a better place. although his maniacal "coast to coast carpeting" of the entire world scheme means we'll see a rise in static electricity zapping accidents.
if you haven't seen the movie (i know it's friggin 3+ hours long) you should check it out. it raises a lot of great questions about privatization of natural resources and the general advertising malaise that has settled over the world. and it was made by canadians.

and not a single drop to spare

2006-03-29T16:46:00.000-05:00

spent the last two days working on a cable show called 'good eats' with alton brown. he's a real driven writer/director/performer/culinary artist/motorcyclist/chemist. you know the type.
spent the last two days in a foam pill-shaped costume with a hole for my head, hands, and legs. i was an oxygen atom. then bonded with a couple of hydrogen gloves and became a water molecule.
spent the last two days eating great food. he's a cook with a crew of cooks cooking for his cooking show. and when they're not cooking for the show, they cook for the crew. and that's the good eats.
spent the last two days mostly clean-shaven. they had to change camera angles in one scene tho, because my "ugly gorilla back hair" was grossing alton brown out. he has a weak stomach. he told me he kissed a man in mesh underwear once. sure, it was for a theater production. but he shouldn't cry about my back hair when he's had some in his mouth.
i kid.
spent two days kidding.

i must subsist! after you!

2006-03-21T16:15:00.000-05:00

me and t-stolt interviewed for a job that would take us dozens of miles around the southeastern state-osphere. the chik-fil-a people want two guys like us to spotlight special team members who make the little mormon poultry parade a bit more...special.
we pretended like we were driving and improvised some dialogue about a team member in kentucky who braved a vicious storm to go make chicken sandwiches.

him: we're heading to elizabethtown, kentucky. ever heard of it?
me: used to be called elizabethopolis, but that was a mouthful!

the clients clucked out loud (COL for u l33t speakers) at our seat-clearing antics. they almost applauded. it was a golf-like smatter that didn't.
the kicker: they gave us each a prize! only check out the date.

bashful liar

2006-03-17T16:19:00.000-05:00

pretended to be the champeen of vidalia onion eating. said i mow thru 'em like apples. the poor nearest face then gets pegged by an onion core. if it's spicy it's on my menu. chicken wings? hell yeah. i order two dozen. i gargle two dozen. capsaicin mouthwash. big smile.
pretended to care. said i wring chicken necks like rags. the rich blood oils the floor. do a flintstone stumble and scooby doo out the door.
i guess it was a commercial audition for a restaurant that serves chicken. they wouldn't tell us the name of the establishment. usually they don't tell you a name because they're so damn famous. kenny rogers roasters is out of business. i bet big boi opened a chain.

testes testes , one two.....three?!!!

2006-03-17T10:43:00.000-05:00

3 balls.

'we don't share. we sell.'

2006-03-15T12:47:00.000-05:00

that's what the client said. i found it slightly hilarious during shoot when the cingular phones were having trouble getting reception.
i represented cingular at every level. therefore, the client said, i needed to improve my posture. lift my chin. and smile with teeth. when i showed them my teeth, they reneged.
i thought it would be funny to wear this outfit in a cingular store and test the employee's knowledge of their products. this story was regaled over a lunch of corner bakery chicken salad sandwiches and sugar cookies: a regional manager of cingular, we'll call him craig, went into a store. craig rushed up to a guy and tested his product knowledge, asking him the price of two phones. he then asked him why he should pay a hundred dollars more for one phone over the other. the man replied, 'i dunno.' craig told him 'you damn well oughta, you're fired!' and the guy left. craig was then told he had just fired a customer.
corporate.

how do you memorize all those syllables?

2006-03-09T15:28:00.000-05:00

so, all my bitching got me two jobs in two days. one for the good eats program starring alton brown. another for a cingular industrial. the characters of each are polar opposites, providing a shallange por mi. i wouldn't want my 'water molecule' character to get mixed up with 'JJ the sales rep'.... so how do i distinguish between the two?
here's an acting lesson: stick-on moustache.
also, how do i 'forget' i'm one guy and 'become' another?
acting lesson dos: dewar's on the rocks.
it's a fact. i auditioned for something i can't tell you about because i signed a confidentiality agreement. but i'll go ahead and tell you it has everything to do with this place. i signed my name as gomer pyle. bo-schneeky-schneeky.

beshirted and capable

2006-03-04T13:25:00.001-05:00

go here to check out the four one one on our totally dank improv hit. it kicked off last week with nevada caldwell as our guest storyteller. she told stories of crashing a car and taking a vengeful shit on a rooftop. she teaches children.
this inspired scenes of improvisation. did you know there's a minimum number of participants to qualify as a gang? or of the popularity of baby-piercing? also, i learned in DnD colossus is entirely made of stone and that rangers are gay.
speaking of rump rangering. a lovely mother of two or three named leslie got me an audition for a voice over last week. it was for a gay automotive commercial. they figured out gays got grands. here it is. me and steve coulter. we quit each other right after recording. i was paid $150 to affect a gay voice for 15 seconds. that's $36,000 an hour. gays got grands.

happy drinking day

2006-02-28T12:28:00.000-05:00

i am totally topless and 100% unemployed right now.

here's to phat tuesday. (clink, chug, vomit).

kick out the jamz

2006-02-17T11:26:00.000-05:00

i've been farting for about 32 years. solid. but now i'm in a show. THE show. it don't got a title. but get ready for the sharpest, most-dialed-in comedy event of the year. you have to be in atlanta to see it. and you have to pay us to sit down (free if you stand, awesome if you can stand it). it stars national cartoon personality clunkyrobot, international DJ babycourageous, father and movie star g-funk, interstellar overgirl maryk, the sports comedian mike brune, myself, and dan (search dan in first name, he's like the fourth one down).
oh and did i mention CELEBRITIES?
it's like dominic said (yes, he was at MY wedding): "don't fuck around."
no sir, we are not.

march 1st. more to follow.

i just now farted.

that'll be six dollars have a nice day you filthy kike

2006-02-06T20:47:00.000-05:00

so, i've only worked one job so far this wonderful year of 2006. slim pickin's. i had one audition a few weeks ago for a sandra bullock thriller, premonition. i know how it ends. i'm clairvoyant. or maybe they sent me the ENTIRE SCRIPT.
tonight i auditioned. to play a bigot. for a news show. well, abc primetime. so, while i'm trying to grasp the idea of fake news, my wife reminds me i've only worked one job so far this wonderful year. i quit thinking about it and went.
the producer, chris, is an affable, professional anchor-type. he recently shot a hidden camera piece with a man verbally abusing a woman in a park. i guess to see how people would react. the man would get very close to hitting her. chris said many women passers-by had no problem getting between the man and woman. and i'm gonna bet those same women had no problem signing the release when they discovered they was on the tv.
of course, the bad man and victimized woman were actors.
chris showed me and a couple other local actor-types some footage. an actor driving a taxi, who elicits a response from the fare-riders by baiting them with racist dialogue. the actor was good, an easy going black guy. he talked about how arabs smell funky, and how he wishes they could put 'em all on a boat and ship 'em outta here. the reaction of several old white women was unsurprising: agreement. a shared "intense dislike" for those people.
after the viewing, i felt the humor seeping quickly out of the building. the discussion turned to "how tame do you want it?" which was goddam interesting. how tame, indeed. i was all ready to turn it up a notch. get some reactions.
the producer said, because of standards and practices, the N word was out. also no G word for asians. a college-aged PA looked puzzled.
what's that?
gook, the producer helped, you're too young.
i casually bowed out of the (forgive me) race for the part. the producer reminded me there'd be an off-duty cop trailing the taxi, and afterward it'd be made clear the racist was merely acting.
but i couldn't find any real, progressive idea in it. either i'd be making someone uncomfortable and maybe ruining their day, or i'd be strengthening someone else's suspicions with no consequence. i'd just feel frustrated either way 'cause i couldn't be funny. i'd wanna make up my own slurs.
check out those spoonbacks over there!
ever smell a vittle-lover?
no boil-diggers gonna take MY american job!
why do scribs always got a dozen kids?
moreover, i'd hafta to play the castrated version of the racist, not being able to say anything truly nasty, and a half-assed racist ain't no better 'an a dirty slant-hand.
plus i don't wanna drive a fucking taxi all day in savannah.
so i got home and checked out abc news primetime. one section is called 'are we prepared?' (guess what it's about), one called 'remembering peter' (i'll give you two guesses) another one simply 'the unexplainable' (guess all night, who knows.......)
oh, it's news. if you have some emotional pain in your family and want to share, if you've ever committed road rage, if your marriage is in trouble, there are primetime journalists standing by to exploit your need for national tv coverage.

by the way, googlism for kike. my favorite: is a chinaman as far as i know.

make you wanna holler hi-dee-ho

2006-01-30T15:07:00.000-05:00

fake letdown: baby courageous and i drove to biloxi on a last-minute, gamble-all-night roadtrip. on the radio we heard npr air a report from sundance '06. they gushed over the ten million dollar acquisition of little miss sunshine, a crowd-pleaser. and the one film they chose to highlight as a dud was hawk... heh. the best part came an hour later when my mom, having also heard the npr interview called to make sure i felt alright about it. that's what mom's are best at. and anyway, it's not my movie. i had one scene that i can't even be sure is still in the film.

a slightly real letdown: an adaptation of a play i wanted to do is on hold. i notified the agent of the playwright in the UK, and the agent said he would ask him, but in the meantime could i send a bio. but the theater i'm working with on it balked at this, citing numerous requests for the same type of work being rejected. their advice was to lie low for a while and continue to work on it without telling them.

i'm torn. the playwright is incredibly successful, an oscar winning screenwriter, and to date has worked on dozens of television programs in the UK. he ain't hurtin' for money. yet i feel the artist always comes first and if he's due a fee for a derivative of his work, i'll pay it. my buddy claims the playwright doesn't even own the rights to the play i want to adapt anyway. huh...
in the meantime, i've started to write something entirely original, but thematically similar. an improv comedy workshop made up of differing working classes. imagine a cake delivery boy, a robot programmer, a coffee shop cashier, two unlicensed private investigators all learning improv comedy in order to showcase for a talent agent.
i think it would look a little something like this.

painful letdown: what it is.

dying is easy

2006-01-24T11:57:00.000-05:00

i used to do a lot of improv comedy. for about 15 years solid. i have not done any in almost a year. in that time i've played bit parts on tv and in movies, pitched products on the radio. let's say my nights are freer.
the other night i did a murder mystery with some friends of mine. it's tests any actor's pride to do a show for people while they are partying.
we performed a delicious little school-pageant-murder-skit at a church recently. i was moving through the buffet with an electrician and his family, grieving in-character over the dead janitor "rotting in the kitchen." a guest's mom had just died that morning, it was announced. suddenly, it seemed nobody cared that our janitor had died. but we sure as hell did. we made those selfish bitches solve that crime.
a colleague commented that "a little part of your soul dies each time you do a murder mystery." so i've done maybe a dozen now. which roughly equates to 12 parts of my soul expiring.
i had a small scene in a film the hawk is dying which premiered at sundance this week. secretly hoping it would play on the big screens here in atlanta, i'm almost certain it will not. one reviewer saw no direction in all miserable two hours of it. a 'dance blogger (his abbreviation) noted many walkouts in the first screening. rumor has it, the 'dance has returned to its roots, is therefore very low-budget, and acquisitons are slim.
miles davis in 1975 proclaimed "jazz is dead."
to me, it's more about the forms. the forms aren't dead. the scene might be. maybe the style. some jazz really stinks like a rotting janitor. and some movies are miserably long and pointless.

one of the few good things about modern times: if you die horribly on television you will not have died in vain. you will have entertained us.
--kurt vonnegut

nobody move, nobody get work

2006-01-09T10:49:00.000-05:00

helluva holiday. one helluv-one. drove to wilmington for another "surface" audition. and went to charlotte once for a national advertisement. neither panned out. that's twenty hours of pure southern interstate driving. and nothing to show for it 'cept beef jerky wrappers, wendy's wrappers, chili cheese fritos bags, yoo-hoo bottles, sunflower seed shells, andy capp hot fries bags, taco bell wrappers, dentyne ice foil, and one tijuana momma red pickle sausage skin. baby courageous at least rode with me on one trip. we listened to lewis black, davids cross & attell, and some great driving music.
on the way to wilmington there was an amber alert issued for a young girl who was said to have been kidnapped. she ended up in a suburb of atlanta, so there's a really good chance i passed them on I-20 that morning. in many hours of driving through the carolinas, i didn't see one single state trooper. and while the system itself is brilliant, radio stations should allow someone other than the morning zoo crew to announce the details. the license plate of the vehicle they were looking for was 890MPG. the whiskey-soaked voice of the rock witch sputtered "eight, nine, zero, em as in mary, pee as in peter, and gee as in gamecocks!" nice.
this past weekend i shot a scene for a horror thriller called terminus directed by dave bruckner, jacob gentry and dan bush. three directors means three times the decisions. which generally means three times DOPE! yeah, we were the first two days of shooting and they're finding their sealegs. but how often do i get brained with a baseball bat in a film? the movie is about a signal coming through the tv that makes people go something something...CRAZY! i was hoping to do my first topless scene, but bruckner reminded me that i'm 55378008. for an entire shoot yesterday i played a dead body. for as many hours as i drove to charlotte and back, i lay on a hairy floor with karo syrup squirting from my head. but i'm starting to understand what jacob means when he says "i love movies. i love watching them, i love making them. i wanna do this the rest of my life."

peckish

2005-12-13T18:05:00.000-05:00

today i missed an audition for some sort of low-APR lender advert. i'm glad i did. instead i shot a scene for fake wood wallpaper's feature "blood car". click it, read about it.
i was a man-in-black, refusing to sacrifice my flesh to blood car. partly because i wasn't being paid enough by the government. but mostly because i found a marshmallow hamburger in the glove box. after three bites, i conclude the mallow burger tastes like a flip-flop.
mike brune chased us on a bicycle while swinging an axe.
fake wood wallpaper are idiosyncratic story-tellers. one of my favorites is a short called "beard arm". alex orr portrays a man with a beard. and an incredibly long arm, which he and co-star chris pierce use in an attempted robbery. they're foiled when --- oh, no way. i'm not spoiling it.

chance or chancre?

2005-12-05T11:13:00.000-05:00

yet another lottery audition notched on the old sell-out belt. i actually auditioned twice for one commercial. last week for the voiceover and this week for the on-camera. the campaign basically says play the lotto because...well, you never know...
many state lotteries have come under fire for being less than truthful in their advertising. in most states that have a lottery, it is touted as a benign form of gambling that as at the very least investing money into that state's education system. what has actually happens is this: the state's education budget is cut and the lottery makes up for that loss. no extra $ goes into education. even worse, in a minority of states the money is "sent directly to the general fund for their legislators to appropriate as they see fit."
yet the advertising often leads the citizens to believe otherwise. even more dubious are the myriad of campaigns that entice players to play fantasy games in their heads over winning. in fact, the commercial i auditioned for the name of the game is fantasy 5. while the slogan "today could be the day" seems innocuous here are some other state's temptations:
"All you need is a dollar and a dream" (New York).
"Work is nothing but heart attack-inducing drudgery" (Massachusetts).
"How to get from Washington Boulevard to Easy Street" (Illinois).
"His [Martin Luther King's] vision lives on. Honor the dream—D.C. Lottery"
(from the mackinac center for public policy)
they know upon whom they prey. i see these people everytime i get gas. the streets are littered with their scratch-off dreams. reams of losing numbers ticker-tape the gutters. poor minorities already have bad odds. playing lotto only seems to compound the statistical quicksand. isn't it crazy how often the winner is a fifty-something white guy? why is that? the national gambling impact study commission shows "lottery play falls with formal education." it's because it takes a lotta LUCK.
how does one check their personal quantity of luck?
check out chances of winning the lottery for dummies. this is about as bad as it gets. look at the examples the writer gives. picking 3 out of 4 numbers. i could accidentally pick that batting my eyelashes in a coma.
now i should also point out that I LOVE GAMBLING. i play cards. though luck plays a part, it demands skill. and organization. the very things that most people with no formal education lack.
for my part, the audition is a gamble. the drive to the studio. writing my social security number on the sign-in sheet always makes me edgy. and if i do get the part, there's the risk that i may be automatically disqualified for other acting jobs based on exclusive contracts.
but that's the gigantic, dangerous, mine-strewn actory chance i take.

why is atlanta booming with film and commercial shoots?

2005-11-29T13:35:00.000-05:00

oh. ah-oooo. that's because it isn't. there's been a definite lull in act-ivity around here this last month. the tax incentive passed by georgia has not attracted filmmakers. in fact, more films are shooting in louisiana (in post below, factory girl is shooting in shreveport). despite new orleans' recent demise, the money is still better there.
today i have an audition for tv's 'surface' again. it shoots and is set in wilmington, n.c. i have the script for episode 113. the word 'hell' appears four times, as in:
'what the hell'
'scary as hell'
'who the hell'
and 'what the hell'
it also appears in the word 'hello' twice, and in 'shell' as in:
'hello'
and 'what the shell'
the word 'creature' occurs nine times. mostly in descriptions.
the word 'surface' appears five times in the script of the show by that name. all on title pages. no one actually says it, as in:
'check out that gay surface tension'
the big winner is 'critter' of which there are twenty-two instances in the script. the character i'm auditioning for actually holds an egg containing a critter. i would eat a critter omelet. this is how i propose they solve the problem. place the eggs in foam containers. label them with the words 'cage-free' and 'vegetarian' and 'slurp'. our health-conscious population will do the work.
just look at us. saving the world and staying fit! us!

swim for your wife

2005-11-18T12:13:00.000-05:00

yesterday i auditioned for a movie about model & muse-to-andy-warhol edie sedgwick. it's called factory girl. my contribution might be a one-liner role. also i read for a role that is featured heavily throughout the film but has no lines. no lines. i read for it. i said on-tape "hi i will be reading for the part of elmo."
this morning i was rudely awakened at 11 am. it was clunkyrobot and his boss, matt thompson. they wanted me to audition for a voice on an upcoming adult swim cartoon for the guys at 7030. i can't say anything about it. if i do, then legally matt thompson could be assassinated. at which point i could speak freely about the show. which i know nothing about. except that there's this guy. with a voice. who if it sounds like me, then it probably is. and only then will you say you remember when i knew nothing about what we all now know is that show. i've said too much. i hope matt thompson's in a safe place.

troof be toad

2005-11-10T14:37:00.000-05:00

i left monday night to do a job for lexington medical. lexington, kentucky is the horse capital of the world. with a population of just under a half-million, lexington boasts over a dozen colleges and universities, and blue laws that keep liquor from being sold on sundays.
but that's not the lexington i visited. lexington, south carolina has a population of about ten thousand, hosts a horse show every April, is near a university, and has blue laws to ensure liquor is not consumed on sundays.
luckily i used a map. i'd hate to get those two lexingtons mixed up.
i left atlanta and stopped for gas. the credit card swipe at the pump asked for my zip code. i punched it in, waited a few moments, and read these words on the quartz crystal screen: PLEASE SEE ATTENDANT.
i walked in, handed him my credit card and by the time i had walked out saw that someone had tried to steal my car. it has been stolen once already. it has thick skin.
after an hour, an atlanta cop showed up. he seemed annoyed that i even reported the attempted theft.
"what's your deductible?"
i don't know. are you trying to talk me out of making a report?
i began morphing into my alter-ego: the furrow-browed asshole. this charmer comes out any time someone in a uniform acts like a talking uniform.
on top of that, it happened in my neighborhood. as a thirty-year-old fart, i'd appreciate something being done about kids (or adults) who think stealing a car is a flippant leisure activity.
the next day in south carolina, i went to maurice's bbq (thank you, horgan). it was clean. very clean. it had a fireplace. and powder-blue kountry-kitchen kurtains. and these books. one of them is by the now-dead proprietor. it's entitled defending my heritage. a mom and her son ordered the big pig. they only use a "superior white meat" platter with a yellow sauce. and it is DEE-licious.
the commercial shoot was at a very large house on the 6th hole of a golf course. the man who owned it used to be in the FBI.
i did the refrigerator bit. it's kind of a signature of my mine. standing still with zero expression. aka 'the coma' or 'the michael caine'.
if you'd like to hire me, please add one liter of gin to three hours of driving and call the police.

green acres

2005-11-05T17:36:00.000-05:00

sunrise.
i drove 53 miles south to milner, georgia. on a farm. we shot the e-fan-gelist spot for SEC football. it's a well-written spec with a small crew, including an 'actor's director'.
the farmhouse was built in 1865. presently the farm is 50 acres with a grove of pecan trees, which stand about 60 feet high. they haven't produced a crop of nuts in years. the pond has several 14 pound catfish. unfortunately, it's also skinned with some green weed that threatens to suffocate all the fish.
we shared a dressing room with one small possum. it lives on the top shelf of a bureau. after lunch, several people fed it grapes and white cheddar cheese. i refused its adorable fangy smile. i did not allow it to claw around cutely over my shoulders. the costumer, tracey, did. it took a dog-sized shit on her.
our characters tried to get propane from a big 10 foot gas tank into a little 2 foot tank. jaime played our ring-leader. as a gag, he smoked a cigar while we fiddled with the tank valves. the real comedy was the real propane seeping from the valves. perched like an owl on the big tank, i pictured riding it like a rocket above the pecan trees.
propane gas smells like the entire island of manhattan farted at once.
so do farms.
we all had our backs to the kraft services table. two horses proceeded to eat apples, cheese on wheat, and brownies.
as the sun went down we got one final shot of us hanging around the tank-rocket, the sky a beautiful mix orange and dark blue.

carpet bomb

2005-10-27T00:10:00.000-04:00

Figure it out

Two thousand Americans are dead. Fifty times that many Iraqis are dead; 300 times that many human beings are injured. One million times that have been indirectly affected by a barbarous act of inhumanity (Casualties of a war a world away, October 26). War is about numbers. The small number of humans who have much to gain by war. The large number affected. The small number who sit home and rally the large number to send their kids to die physically or mentally. The largest number who say nothing. The financial numbers are so huge that millions aren't accounted for, and millions more are paid in bonuses.
I'm a Vietnam infantry veteran who has taken the time to peel away the onion of war. Strip off the uniforms, the flags, the nationalities, the slogans. War is, at best, the failure of leaders to solve problems. At worst, war is a massive money-generating machine with no regard for life. It's all in the numbers.
Arnold Stieber
Grasslake, Michigan

schlitzkreig

2005-10-26T15:42:00.000-04:00

seven auditions in 2 days. so far i've booked one called "e-fan-gelist" and am on first right of refusal for another i'm calling "the lexington medical refrigerator bit".
in "e-fan-gelist" i am a mostly silent wingman to an SEC-manic. he preaches the gospel on time-honored traditions. sneaking booze into SEC football games. running nude quietly down the sidelines. affording pity on the ACC. my agent said they asked not to shave.
the fridge bit is tight. open refrigerator. sniff food. decide it smells okay to eat. BAM! medical coverage logo. the director and writer were there. i did the above scenario five or six times. they laughed at their material. outside in the waiting room sat eight very old women. all white-haired. all wearing a sweater and the same "can i get you anything, dear?" smile. if LA's cookie-cutter models are ripe grapes, these were their raisins.
i got in the car to drive home. i got almost home. my cellphone rang. the wanted to see me again. this was 4 pm. on a friday. i got gas and drove back. there were 2 accidents on the connector. back at the casting agency now were a dozen or more of the same child actor (grapeseeds). i stepped over a few of them drooling on the carpet and did the fridge bit ONE MORE TIME. this time they really laughed. not hard enough to book me tho. i spent 2 grueling, brutal hours in traffic spitting nails and gasping.
this morning i recorded five more spots for ford auto. same set up as before. except i was wrong about jon facenda. facenda is dead. our voice is earl mann, one of the three new voices of the nfl. apparently campbell's soup was sued by the late jon facenda's son for doing a similar campaign using mann's voice. we did five spots today. me playing different fans. i'll try to get copies of these to post.
the kick ass news is this: one of the sound engineers at riot came into the studio.
"anybody here like hockey?"
i did not wait to see if anyone said yes. i was not polite. i did not care if anyone else was a fan. i am a fan. frankly, i answered his question. it would have been stupid to feign non-chalance.
"what're you doing this saturday?"
i had already planned on going to the thrashers home game. but now with his two tickets in the rich guy's section, i will enjoy every forecheck, puck on net and especially the gallon of beer.
thank you. oh dear christ in a cardboard box! thank you.
post data: i just booked lexington medical refrigerator bit. 2 in one day. in LA they call it vicodin.

HUGE CIGARETTE OUTLET

2005-10-18T21:57:00.000-04:00

Say what you want. North Carolina is pretty. I’m in Charlotte. An actual city. They have football, basketball and hockey.
I’m staying in this upscale hotel/shopping plaza with its own movie theater. After a bowl of noodles that could smother a little league team, I checked out a scary movie, The Fog. Part hilarious/part real-bad but mostly just bad, it has some of the low-fi-est special effects I’ve ever seen. Lots of victims getting thrown through windows. John Carpenter must think broken glass is terrifying. It’s what you do in case of emergency.
I saw it by myself. There was one couple also there. We all laughed. We laughed at the foot-long fish hooks that hung in the most dangerous places imaginable. We laughed at the limpest shower scene in the history of horror. We laughed at every one of the seven times someone asked “What the hell was that?” That’s a total of nine laughs by three people. Twenty-seven laughters.
The fog itself killed off relatives of a group of men who ripped off some lepers in 1871. Sometimes though, the leper-breath rolled in and killed people who had nothing to do with the scandal. This is never explained. Still, just know if you’re drinking beer on a boat while wearing a bikini and dancing for dudes holding a mini-dv, you’re as good as dead.
Afterwards I tried desperately to have “uh beer” before bedtime. Finding your way around Charlotte is tasking. None of the roads stay the same name for longer than one block. After two full hours, I finally found this Irish pub called Ri-Ra or something. The bartender was super cool, he even let me order a beer. We watched Pujols smack that monster homerun in the ninth inning. Pujols. Pu. Jols.
This little, tiny pot-bellied Mexican guy sat next to me. White paint brush strokes on the right side of his face. One tooth missing. He kept laughing at something on his cellphone then looking around to see if anyone concurred. I know Spanish un poco pollo, so I said, “Whaddya playing, Tetris?”
I’m gonna keep this short. Turns out he was sex chatting on “Chh-otmail” and wanted my number. After I told him I was here to be in a movie, he related that his cousin, the bartender, was “like this” (hands about a foot apart) and made porn movies. Then he bought me a beer. I excused myself, and only myself, but he followed me to the bathroom. I stayed back and hit the trivia machine. By the time I had returned he and his cousin were Audi. Yessiree, an actual city. They have football, hockey and a gay Mexican sex trade.
Right now, I’m in sunburnt make-up getting ready to do a comedy scene with Matt Besser from UCB. We are at Lowe’s Motor Speedway. United we stand.
We did the scene. Besser was hilarious. Really jamming. I played a straight man for the most part, but McKay was trying to get me to say some ridiculous stuff, feeding some silly lines. No point in me trying to top that guy.

draft the dodge

2005-10-11T15:43:00.001-04:00

man, was i sad when i lost this job. see there, how sad i was? now, wait a few seconds...here it comes...eff yeah! i'm happy. i just got rebooked for the will ferrell movie high wide and handsome. at least one day. not with a large jungle cat. but rabid is a keyword.
note: gary cole is also in the film. playing ferrell's dad. i did a made-for-tv movie with cole in new orleans last year. hey, the old gang is back together again.
now i could go on a week-long drinking binge without a hint of guilt.
i hafta remember to use my blinker this time in south carolina.

i'm a fool to do your dirty work

2005-10-11T13:09:00.001-04:00

this week at pushpush friedrich schiller's the robbers opens. billed as a 'movieplay' the production is largely video with only 3 live actors performing on the stage.
i cameo as a... hmm..a unique -- one man struggling against... ah, hell i don't know what. i got a call to be in a scene at atlanta's supra-dive: lenny's.
you think the clermont lounge is nasty? lenny's doesn't even have nudity. in fact, the last time i was there, a man dressed like a police officer threatened to kick my ass. the bar was closing. my wife was inside. i attempted to gather her. when i opened the door this hulking dude grabbed my arm and twisted it behind my back. he had a gun. i called the atlanta police department and they said there should not be a cop working there. they'd check it out. the securi-fake had left. i had not yet been back to funland lenny's since.
the movieplay scene had me being thrown from a wheelchair to the floor. my face made contact with booze-hardened worn carpet and broken glass on every take.
for free.
that candy machine to my right had a nickel stuffed in the quarter-slot. i snagged it.
that was my payday.

graey mondaey

2005-10-10T12:19:00.000-04:00

i auditioned for a spec this morn. specs are normally shot to either sell an idea to a client or else pad a director's reel. this one is of the latter ilk.
i arrived exactly on time, toppling two curbside garbage cans with my bumper. the air was misty with light rain. this casting director's waiting room, usually swollen with hopefuls, was empty. twelve director's chairs line the walls. so close to the walls in fact that i always wrack my back-head-neck into the window sill. i yanked my chair out a few inches and waited.
coming from within the other room were two familiar voices, casting agent melissa and hopeful jamie. i listened to this exchange:
"jamie, you farted."
"i did not!"
"it's unpleasant."
"it's coming from over there, melissa. nowhere near me."
"hoo."
jamie continued the audition, playing a reverend. a real fire and brimstone delivery. an overabundancy of effort.
before i went in melissa left the door open, airing the space out. i'm a sort of a connoiseur of stink. it was neither butt nor armpit. decay. an unfortunate squirrel in a wall. that's my guess.
i ran into my buddy george afterward, and we talked guns. he competed in a target event. his favorite was the IPSC. i sat down to chat about this and nailed the small of my back against the molding. george went on about moving targets, highlighting the mime with 'bang'.
outside a steady drizzle. that monstrous, toothy cat they care for was splayed out on the hood of a car. it didn't give a fuck about the rain.

i've been on some other planet

2005-10-05T12:15:00.000-04:00

i did a photo shoot. for a medical magazine. the night before the shoot i stayed out late. very late. the wee hours. i woke up late. very late. the more than adequate hours.
my agent rang me. it's not a fun feeling. so skipped a shower. ran to my car. i had a flat tire.
i called my good friend linnea. she drove to my house, picked me up and took me to the studio. i was bleary-eyed.
the producer/photographer was super cool. afterwards, since i had no car, i walked 5 miles to the MARTA station.
come pick me up i've landed.

hash browns

2005-10-04T13:31:00.000-04:00

mother's day celebrations are scattered the world 'round. moms are smothered in loving cards, breakfasts in bed, and hugs. any gambler's mom knows her bet is covered.
today i recorded voice-overs for macy's big mother's and father's day sale. the origins of mother's day are said to lie in the greek celebration of rhea, the mother of gods. u.s. presidents enacted laws validating ours: woodrow wilson in 1914 for moms, and tricky dick nixon for dads in 1972.
the idea behind the advert was folks sitting around reciting parental cliches.
"eat your veggies."
"if you don't have anything nice to say..."
"i'm so proud of you."
this last one was followed by several different recordings of me gushing "awwww.'
we added "semper ubi sub ubi" for good measure.
for the dad's:
"measure twice, cut it once."
"righty-tighty, left-loosy."
a lot of tool humor.
we added "no crystal meth in my garage. use the school lab." followed by "awwww."

cablebody

2005-09-28T18:24:00.000-04:00

recently i was 'put on tape' for director/writer jay alaimo's latest project. it's called chlorine. david arquette and demi moore star (tho the imdb lists julianna margulies). michael rappaport was listed for the role i read for. the imdb is not frequently updated.
they sent me a pdf of the entire script for chlorine. one hundred seventeen pages. generally one page equals one minute of screentime. i read 30 minutes worth of it.
it has an american beauty setting and tone to it, but told from the pov of the teen-aged daughter. occurring in the thick of the me-decade 80's, there's loads of drugging and upward mobilizing. one scene contains an overt line about all the spending leading to an economic implosion.
i read for the part of a pot-smoking groundskeeper at a country club. no gophers. no kenny loggins. one ray liotta.
my friend philip read the other sides for me. this is key. often my agent will try to read the other side, turning pages while simultaneously running a mini-dv camera and vcr. it's like eating BBQ ribs, tapping a party ball keg and shifting into third through a late-night roadblock. kinda nerve-wracking.
so we got a rhythm going. had some flow. i improvised one line in a fight with a girl. instead of just plain old 'bitch' i came up with this nugget:
me: "that is so retarded"
her: "you're retarded."
me: "you're a gay bitch."
heh. 80's cutdown. high five.
by the way, jay alaimo's last film was slingshot. the only review i read for it (10 seconds worth) glowed "slingshot will surely land a slot on cable."

access wilmington!

2005-09-20T12:31:00.000-04:00

the percentage of jobs i land from auditions is low. maybe 20%. which is relatively good. imagine going on several job interviews a week. rejection pervades the career choice. it sounds silly to hope the people at chik-fil-a like your smile enough help you pay your bills.
there are advantages to the steady snubs. you get to read scripts for episodic series ahead of everyone. take today's audition for the nbc series 'surface' premiering tonight. me and brandon read a scene as nerdy air traffic controllers trying desperately to finish a game of stratego while ET activity sucks a plane into the sea. now i couldn't tell you they didn't deserve it. could be the previous episode this pilot burned a church down. or perhaps everyone on board worked for the GOP.
what i love is the narrative that goes with the dialogue. the description of what writers expect to be produced. in this scene, the flash to the plane includes:
"as it spirals into the sea there are - yes! rainbows, all swirling transcendently in a beautiful orgy."
incidently i would fucking love to be on this show. i got bills 2 pay.

schablazzle

2005-09-14T23:46:00.000-04:00

back on april 11 i did a promo. here it is.

deep drive to splinterfield

2005-09-14T00:24:00.000-04:00

yesterday i auditioned for a commercial. the client was a radio station. they have a sports talk show. it's called 'the zone'. for four hours beginning at six in the morning they host a segment called 'mayhem in the a.m.' designed for the sports addict.
i auditioned for the sports addict. he's hired a hooker. taken her to a seedy hotel room. here, instead of hanky panky, the john gets off listening to the calling of game 7 of the 1992 nlcs braves versus pirates. 'sid bream falls into a hole, he's chugging, a glacier moves in from left field...bream stops for a smoke etc.' only their version was verbatim the game call. and i bet there is someone who actually gets off on this.
the sweet painted lady i auditioned with came dressed for the role. it was 9 am. she was wearing fishnets, hotpants, a wig and enough make-up to make her face totally irrelevant.
the clients, a young woman and a bespectacled dude studying a laptop, did not laugh. more often than not, you get clients in love with their ideas (as they should be) laughing not at your performance, but at their words coming back to them. it validates the spot.
if anyone ever takes the time to step back and look hard at a commercial, no matter how high-concept or brilliant it is, they see it's still just a pitch. but get 30 or 40 people invested into it and it becomes an honest day's work. truthfully, the science behind filmmaking is astounding. the social benefits can be lucrative. and while everyone pretends to be behind the product and clients and the agency's creative marketing, after a day or two you forget who-what-when-why. because it's an ad, a temporal coax, meant to get a response quickly and efficiently.
so this spot is actually pretty funny. i doubt i'll get it. being skinny and nerdy, i wouldn't be the type of person to 'join the guys and gals from mayhem and vitaminwater at eatzi's in buckhead!' and i certainly don't ever want to 'c'mon out and enjoy vitamin water with zone girls.'

mighty low

2005-08-30T14:07:00.000-04:00

my agent called the other day. she was very disappointed. i was unbooked from the will ferrell movie, now titled 'high wide and handsome'. seems an executive at columbia pictures reminded them if they wanted to keep their tax break status, they had to hire north carolina residents.
bummed am i.
it's like getting that skateboard for christmas. it's shaped right in the gift paper. but when you opened it, that's all that was right. while yer buds got powell-peraltas and tony hawks, you got a wal-mart brand deck. with shitty soft wheels and a lame deck with appropriate graphics approved by some corporate jack-ball.
adam mckay is my unwitting parent in this craptastic metaphor. he didn't know. all the other kids were from georgia. columbia pictures is kyle lapinski. he does not deserve powell-peralta. they do not deserve me. i am the skateboard i never got.
i'll never work in this town again.

of note

2005-08-23T14:03:00.000-04:00

my agent called yesterday. she was very happy. i booked a guest role in will ferrell's new nascar comedy. i have been calling it a cameo. technically, that is incorrect. a cameo must be uncredited. peter jackson appeared in each of the lord of the rings trilogy. spike lee and alfred hitchcock were in all of their own flicks. did you see dan aykroyd in indiana jones and the temple of doom? i didn't.
credits are stuff you put on your resume to get agents. the better the credits, the better the representation. they are space tokens in the poker game of the entertainment industry.
i know not the role i'll inhabit. i hope it's the license test scene. i read for the driving instructor. there will be stunt driving oh yes. and a large jungle cat oh yes. i'm not shitting you oh no.
i have yet to pay my improper lane change ticket.

i like the cut of your giblet

2005-08-22T00:27:00.000-04:00

it was about 100 degrees when we shot the bojangles 'digging to china' ad. the neighborhood was pristine. i was not. makeup and wardrobe rubbed dirt and grass in my hair. i apparently was not sweaty enough and spice (her parents hated her enough to name her that) was content to spray water on my armpits and rub it in with her bare hands.

sam the director had occasion to be joyous. we collaborated on a joke: we pop up in communist china and the neighbor still has his coffee mug. it said 'made in USA' on the bottom. guffaw!
the bluescreen will be cgi'd with rickshaws and pagodas.
the special fx team showed up around lunchtime. i campaigned for an image of a man confronting a chinese tank in tiananmen square holding up a defiant drumstick.
we also talked about how high the suicide rate is in china. a steady diet of industrial pesticides. no mention of chicken, but bojangles really has opened a restaurant in the city of 'china'.

a.m. = anti-matt

2005-08-16T09:42:00.000-04:00

an MOK* voice over audition in my basement for hasbro's reintroduction of the furby. 8:30 in the morning. the client needs it by 9.
the directions read:
Upbeat MALE....
25-40...
FUN!! Energetic!!
A little quirkier than usual....
Vince Vaughn meets Yogi Bear.
Will Farrell as "Elf."
"Bender" from Futurama without sounding too ethnic or accented.
But naturally...not over the top like someone's trying to "act."
Dazzle me.
click here to hear my truly undazzling gravel-vox. sort of a vince vaughan vomits into a megaphone while will farrell grunts in bender's hollow torso.

*mit out klothen

pshaw-ditions

2005-08-12T15:12:00.000-04:00

this week started out like a black snake and ended up a real m-80. i'm one of only a handful of lucky thespians called back for the bojangles spot. a guy digs a hole. his buddy wonders, 'hey what's with the shovelin', digger?' guy counters with 'they've opened a new bojangles in china!' hey big brain, help the boy dig! forget the fact that you'd have to start in chile or argentina. bo-jingley-jangles, ya'll!
at the autotrader.com audition i was asked to be footloose and fancyfree with the script. it's an internal video to get their employees buzzing over customer satisfaction. somebody there believes you can grab blue-collar attention with a comedian dressed as a chef putting 'ingredients of success' in a bowl. zut alors! their version starred 'chef rolay'. yuk. i wrote my own script, with full-on fun-tastic puns and culinary quips! check it out:
It takes a lot of ingredients to cook up a hot plate of success.
With me, Chef Paul Kudbuggle, as your guide, you’ll be out of the failure pan and on the expert plate in no time!
I always like to start with an Empowerment Snack-a-teaser. Begin with an entire package of trust. It may sound like a lot, but you can use too much of this. In fact the more you give, the more Empowerment there is to go around. Add a pinch of admiration with a dash of respect. This dish can go a long way. It not only whets your appetite, but it really gives those around you a taste of worth.
We know the English enjoy their afternoon spot o’ tea. Here in the States, our success comes from drinking Integri-Tea. You say, Chef Paul Kudbuggle, How do I make a pot of Integri-Tea? The basic ingredient is Truth. A gallon of it. It can’t be served in an unpredictable cup. Why? Take a look at this pasty fellow with food stains covering his shirt. He spills his Integri-tea. So always provide it in a mug of Reliability.
We’ve all heard there’s no I in Team. There is an M and an E. And an A and a T. That spells MEAT, the centerpiece of any profitable entrée. Meat doesn’t cook by itself. It’s seasoned with group dynamics such as cooperation, it’s grilled on an open communication flame, and rarely is a meal as satisfying unless it’s eaten with friends.
i was asked to immediately go back to the script. and this time, could i do a character. other than the twat I just portrayed? oh, you mean do a funny voice...
"it's always better with a funny voice."
i'll file that one away in my comedy 'don'ts & seriously...don'ts'
so i did it with a marvelous french accent and made milquetoast adjustments to their 'gazpacho dedication soup'...
i also had three voice over auditions, which i did from my own basement without having to put pants on. one for (surprise) ga lottery, one for dr. paul bearer's funeral spectacular (i'm lying), and the last for a nerf football that actually works better in mud.

do you exist?

2005-08-05T13:25:00.000-04:00

john facenda is the voice of nfl films. he was hired to do some comedy voice overs for ford auto. i provided the character voices for three of them: the sports professor, the high school football hero, and the shirtless guy trying to start the wave.
i did this after getting in from LA at 5 am. i then had a callback for the will ferrell nascar movie (as yet untitled). it was in charlotte, north carolina, about 3 hours away.
i got about 2 hours into the drive, mason jennings keeping me company on the cd player. my agent called. if i couldn't be there in 15 minutes they couldn't see me. i was late.
they could see me tomorrow.
i relented, ate a bean burrito and turned back for home. outside greenville i was pulled over for an "improper lane change". the cop, a huge gap-toothed man, asked me to step out of the car. i was positioned in front of the camera on his dash. the litany goes like this:
where are you going? really. do you own this car? really. what do you do for a living? really.
this is the fourth time this has happened to me. in alabama i was told my tag was expired. it wasn't. this cop attempted a similar maneuver:
"where'd you get the tag?"
from the tag office when i registered the oldsmobile 88.
"well, this tag is registered to a lincoln town car."
i shrugged.
by this point, three more cops pulled in. two with drug dogs.
any illegal items in the vehicle? really. are you carrying large sums of cash? really. can we search your car?
i said no.
i'm no lawyer. i know a little about civil liberties. i thought this would be the end of it.
no way.
immediately, a german shepherd was led around the 88. my wife's grandmother's car. i didn't see it give a bark or jump up or do anything. yet, the stunted-growth cop opened the doors to my car, allowing the dog in. he began searching through everything.
six marked and unmarked cars now lined the interstate. i turned to a round-faced cop chewing tobacco. i asked do i fit the profile? he deadpanned:
"nawsir. a profile does not exist."
a fantastic solution to any problem.
"by the way, watch those ants don't git in yer shoes." a line of ants stretched across three lanes of i-85. i was hypnotized. the line remained unbroken despite rush hour traffic.
the cop spat a wad of brown dip on the ants. a war of attrition.
"tough little 'gunners."
nearly an hour passed. cops on their backs under the 88 with flashlights. ice scraper, spare tire cover, guitar amp, comic books dotted the brown grass outside greenville. i'll always cherish that time a cop of the bucktoothed variety pat me down.
"you smoke marijuana?"
no.
"do you do any drugs?"
no.
"why is there a box of sandwich bags under the front seat?"
hold sandwiches.
"have a nice day."
i got a $77 ticket for improper lane change. against my gut feeling, i went back to charlotte the next day. i auditioned for adam mckay (pictured with will ferrell). he had me read two parts. his comment was:
"that's it, perfect read. you're very funny. thanks it was nice meeting you."
i told him how we'd met a couple time before about 10 years ago.
"dude, i remember you. you guys did shakespeare in austin. it was awesome."
i was flattered. fuckin'-a right it was.

hit 'em up style

2005-07-26T11:41:00.000-04:00

i haven't been getting much voice over work this year. i miss it. it is the best money in this industry, bar none. here's why:
a basic non-union going rate for a studio session is $250 per hour. readers of technical writing can expect to charge 50% more. on a national union scale, one radio spot may earn a voice over talent a $20,000 return. pro's do it from home studios without having to comb their hair.
inasmuch as advertising clamors for attention, skews self-image, and generally irradiates brains, it is very difficult to argue with $250 per hour. their products may be trivial at the least, life-threatening at the most. yet, i offer myself as a commodity jesus.
i was very happy when my agent asked if i was available for a macy's radio spot. it's back-to-school season. i don't sound like a 10-year-old (or so i've been told), but i do have a young men's nautica jeans, polos and attitude tee's voice.
at 3 pm i sped to doppler studios, slapped the headphones on and cranked out the first script in about 5 minutes. in moments, another script was put in my hand. then another and another etc... at 3:55 pm we were finished. less than an hour. my invoice read $1250.

i am school on a saturday

2005-07-25T20:08:00.000-04:00

about a week ago, i auditioned for a simple promo for a cable network. the previous auditioners took their time. it was a very thorough interview, i thought. i entered the small studio space with the casting director. there i found the director i was auditioning for was one of my best friends. he had told me about the project. still i forgot.
i was funny. i was more or less relevant. in fact, i was so creative, the clients couldn't see me in the role. they wanted something more real, with hints of 'accidental' brilliance. i gave them a velvet box full of precious gems. they didn't want that. they wanted a cardboard box full of rocks which might be taken for treasure.
my friend relayed this to me: "i gave them a list of ideas. they poured over them for a day or two, and when they came back...well, they were the exact same ideas. some of them less so."
this was yet another client asking for improvised testimonials. this gives a less-scripted, fresh approach. unfortunately, without a script writer entering the process at any point, the final product, full of essential ingredients, often bakes for half the time. this is how advertisers contract trichinosis.

ricky bobby and the day he met a passenger on a bus

2005-07-17T13:04:00.000-04:00

last thursday i went to birmingham, alabama. on purpose. auditions were being held for small cameos in a new movie starring will ferrell. as of this writing it is an untitled movie.
on the door at the holiday inn conference room a sheet of white 8.5 x 11 paper read:
"untitled movie" auditions
the actor sign-in desk was helmed by one woman about 60 years old and two local boys about 14 years old. they sized me up and gave me sides for these two roles:
manager
pasenger (sic)
the two scenes i read displayed anchorman-like wit. this new story casts will ferrell as nascar driver, ricky bobby.
several auditioning children sat around with hopeful parents. a thick, dark gentleman on a cellphone paced the lobby with a tiny blonde 7 year old boy in tow. he was upset:
"this is totally unacceptable."
he was an attorney. he had invested in a movie about the scottboro boys, and was also auditioning with his son.
"highway robbery, plain and simple."
he may have actually been referring to a robbery on a highway.
i waited for 75 minutes to be put on tape. the casting director had me read one line for the passenger. ricky bobby delivers pizzas before nascar. afraid to drive, he delivers them via city bus. my character stares at him. he offers an explanation:
ricky bobby: "i lost my license. i deliver pizzas."
me: "i really don't care."
the casting director said i was very talented. this tape would be going directly to the director, adam mckay. i told her i met adam in springfield, missouri, while he was on tour with second city and i was on tour with my improv group. the second city actors drank an entire liter of vodka straight with no chaser. they were having a rough tour.
"well, adam's married now with kids. i'll put it on your resume. maybe he'll remember you."
she wrote my little story down. if it shakes his memory, and he casts me, you may catch me in will ferrell's upcoming "untitled movie".

quakey breaky part

2005-07-13T13:17:00.000-04:00

today i auditioned for a captain d's commercial. there was no copy. i didn't have to improvise any lines. it is called 'bite & smile' part. you take a mouthful of tasty product and react as if it's uncharacteristically good.
i love batter-fried fish. it is one of the few fastfoods i will drive thirty minutes for. i keep a stack of coupons for captain d's in a kitchen drawer. i will be smiling for realsies if i get the job.
this one has a catch. no pun intended at all. when i bit the new crunchy fish sandwich, i was to react as if an earthquake hit the restaurant. assumably it's the resonance of crunch which causes tremors.
what really causes earthquakes is a mystery. there are theories about tectonic plates and stresses along fault lines. artistotle, for all his empiricism, hypothesized there were winds beneath the earth's surface that moved the ground. before his 'scientific' theory, people held the belief that giant snakes, spiders and catfish lived underground. captain d's revives this charming explanation with their new crunchy fish sandwich.
either way, it's nice to know you can still get 10 fish fillets, 2 lobster tails, 9 hushpuppies, a half-gallon of slaw and 3 stuffed crabshells for $2.99... add eleventy-two shrimp for only 99¢.

eternal marketing4life

2005-07-11T16:54:00.000-04:00

i did not go to an audition today at 1 pm. my agent said it would be intense. it demanded tears. if i could not reach that degree of acting, they'd understand if i said no.
i read the script. a college-aged dude with all the pressures of success weighing on him so hard he can't cope. he has a gun in his lap.
this was something i should do. a psa on getting help. cool. my mom related a story only yesterday about a schoolmate of ours committing suicide last week. my big brother, my grandfather, grandfather's uncle, all did themselves in for various reasons. i've wrestled with it. yes. this would be a helpful, selfless acting gig.
it's about an hour before the audition. i take another look at the copy. it says teen-aged college student. out of concern that i don't look that young anymore i check out their website for the "who cares" spot. let's find a bit more info. on their demographic.
a smiling middle-aged white guy? smooth voice. talking about a campaign. click thru the tv ads on sex and drugs. no mention of education, rehabilitation. before i ever saw the word 'mission' i knew:
this is a campaign for christ.
it's mostly ads. a multi-tiered company here in atlanta called inovaone is the go-to headquarters.
all they really have to say about the "who cares" campaign is this:
we need everyone's help to make this the greatest media campaign ever delivered to north america to reach people in need.
those are pretty high goals: the greatest media campaign ever in north america? how about a suicide hotline? see any links to drug clinics or women's shelters? herm...
i called steve sanford at inovaone to find out how to get involved. there was no answer.

bitrate bit part

2005-07-07T13:04:00.000-04:00

this morning i improvised an auditioned for a bellsouth industrial, usually internal videos companies make to train employees. this one is aimed at their customers. i'm not sure how it'll be distributed.
everything played directly to the camera. 2 guys unable to confront a friend directly, instead record a statement on video to tell him he has a problem: he doesn't have dsl, his friends, bill & carl, do. i played carl.
"this is tough love. a divine 'intervention' dude. yer always downloading on my computer, bidding on golf bags you never win. you think charles babbage, father of the modern computer, woulda thought it was cool for you to be leeching off his difference engine?"
though the du jour was improvisation, there actually was a script. it contained one bit that was worth building on. carl made a chart. statistically it showed the number of times our friend promised to pay for dsl versus the real number of times he paid. the actual prop in the auditon was poster board used to white balance the camera. it was blank, save for a small swirl where someone had tested a pen for ink.
"see this chart? this twister represents you browsing on our internet. this large white void is what's left. like gentrification."

how innocent the moon

2005-06-29T12:39:00.000-04:00

i spent a few days recently at mercer university. they host the national criminal defense college. my job was to portray clients and witnesses for public defenders from around the u.s.
i played a homosexual framed for murder in chicago's grant park, a c.i.a. special agent guilty of impeachment in an espionage trial, a cross-dresser being cross-examined over a double-crossing client, and a bad cop willing to say anything to prosecute for a tidy reward. all without changing my hair or wardrobe.
the participating lawyers learn how to move for impeachment, how to move away from an overtly affectionate client, how to stand their ground in the face of contradictory testimony. they also explore the process of voir dire:
jury selection.
based on themes present in each case, defenders weed out jurors with a bias against their client. on a panel of three prospective jurors were myself and two locals. they answered an ad in the macon telegraph promising $10. ed is a white 72 year old retired military man, tall as a tree, stark white hair. lakeisha is a black 23 year old paralegal, smart and articulate. voir dire means "to speak the truth." we all did just that when pooled and questioned for each case.
one particular case was this. a black man with a very low i.q. is charged with the rape of a white co-worker. they were cleaning a hotel room together. evidence points to consensual sex.
the lawyer asked what we each thought of pre-marital sex.
ed: "i don't care much for it, but the kids these days seem to have an appetite for that kind of behavior. i can't do nothin' about it, i wouldn't speak on it, but i don't support it."
lakeisha: "i think what people do in the privacy of their own bedrooms is their business. the moral implication is that waiting for marriage is a healthier, safer choice."
me: "i'm all for it."
the lawyer then asked what we'd think if we saw a white woman holding hands with a black man in macon.
me: "i'm from atlanta, the city too busy to hate. that's nothing out of the ordinary."
ed: "i think it's downright stupid. what's she trying to prove? that's not right. she obviously showin' off, or has some kind of self-destructive notion."
lakeisha: "uh....well...."
around the room, lawyer jaws flopped open. one guy laughed.
afterward, we were walking in the halls, ed blithely struck up a conversation on local politics with lakeisha and me as you would anyone at a bus stop. the out of town lawyers were convinced honest ed was the actor out of the jury panel.

fillum up

2005-06-01T16:55:00.000-04:00

yesterday i auditioned for a show. my agent said it is a tv pilot. for a tv pilot, it was well-scripted. the scene number at the top of the page was 128. that's a lot of scenes for a tv show. more likely, it's an independent film. it's called crystal river.
i read with the writer of the script. it was a very emotional scene. she actually cried. i drove 6 hours from vacationing in florida, changed shirts and went to the studio. i smelled like a wet dog rolled in musk. could be why she was crying.
she played the part of the town's "bad girl." i was the town's new young reverend who has an inexplicable crush on the bad girl. being a comedic character actor, i don't usually read for sensitive members of the cloth.
the bad girl was having bad boy trouble.
"remember, there is grace in the river and on the bank."
any crystal river with a hardness of 7 or more on the moh's scale should be approached with a hardhat. crystals such as agates have magical properties of protection against loneliness and depression. bad girls ought to dive head-first into such a river.

a-cross-tic

2005-05-25T17:36:00.000-04:00

the puzzle that is acting. you are yourself, yet you are someone else. you are embodying the spirit of someone who may or may not have ever existed. you represent something, perhaps a typical customer in an advertisement, or a specific historical figure, like kenneth branagh playing FDR in HBO's recent "warm springs." it isn't really FDR. the limp is affected. i represented a boy scout leader. the one who invites him to stay for lunch and wash up. he proceeds to splash his face with water that inflicts him with the polio virus. since filming, no one has blamed me for leading a boy scout camp brimming with contaminated water, or held a grudge for giving a future president a debilitating disease. it's all symbolic, like a dream. moving pictures are manifestations of our dreams.
recently i auditioned for a role in an industrial film. it was a union buster. living in a "right to work" state means you may sign a union contract and earn union pay. but the union can't force you to join. in this overt short, i played a union rep. sent to keep cingular employees (they are almost completely union-free and like it) in line.
"look, mike, i'm your rep. when you go straight to the boss it undermines my authority."
the cingular employee asks if they're allowed to talk about anything.
"sure, go ahead, but when it comes to wages, job safety or hours, you gotta go through me!"
the character then did a little victory dance. the writer based this character on a local celeb named david cross.
"he can be a real asshole."
but he's not mean?
"no, he does it with a sincerity that is agreeable."
are we talking about the same david cross?
"try pretending to be a jerk."
my friend dan got the role. he's representing a union representative based on david cross, symbolic asshole, in a non-represented union-busting movie, that is itself a manifestation of a dream.
before there were movies, what did people say their dreams were like?

dive right off the cars and splash into the street

2005-05-17T19:01:00.000-04:00

two auditions in the last two days. one for a company called advance america. is it a bank? a friendly bank-like institution that does a solid when you're in a pinch?
i sat in profile with another gentleman dressed in a suit. i calmly asked him
"why does overdraft protection cost anything if it's free?"
"well, it's free if you don't use it."
haw. this echoes the sentiment anyone has felt when they were spiked with a surcharge for over drawing their account. this draws tv viewers who hate banks to empathize. but hold on. what's the advance america solution? they will give you a cash advance in the amount of what your typical paycheck earns...against your bank account! which means if you're already in the position of paying for overdraft fees, you're gonna be double-dizzy. here's what their website says about this:
Q:What happens if I don't have the funds necessary to repay the advance on my due date?
A:Just like you, we hope this doesn't happen. But if it does, Advance America is committed to collecting past due accounts in a professional, fair and lawful manner. If your check is deposited and returned by your bank due to insufficient funds, Advance America may charge a returned check charge if permitted by applicable law.
not only that, but one glance at their APR on cash advances is enough to make even me get a job: 456.25%. i'm not making this up.
the other audition was for the georgia lottery. i'm starting to wonder if i emit a certain lotto pheromone. winners get $1000 a week for the rest of their lives. i played the role of a winner cheating the character of death. we played rock, paper, scissors. only i cheated. i showed "paper" but when death showed scissors, i changed my top hand of paper to upper jaw of alligator. as we all know, alligator eats scissors. and as long as i simply stay alive, i collect.
many of the gentlemen who went before me worked very hard to improvise this audition. i know because i could hear them. they were very loud, as if on an outdoor stage surrounded by a baffled deaf audience. i also heard the casting director tell them to "subtle it up" which is an industry term for "this is a small room and you're using all the oxygen."
sigh. i auditioned for two big scams. one promises cash for sticky situations, the other promises nothing, but if you do win, they remind you in a wink, it and you will soon be gone.

dangerkind

2005-05-11T15:58:00.000-04:00

today was no ordinary go-see. to prepare, i did not shower. i have not shaved in 5 days. i arrived with four other gentlemen who ranged from drifter to psycho.
we were photographed to be the coverguy on the promo's of a new original turner show: WANTED. they needed diversity, so in addition to my rat-faced expression, they got a biker, a pedophile (fat w/glasses), a black man, and a hispanic gentleman.
the photographer, mark, softened the occasion by asking the black man what he did for a living. he was in commercial real estate, and seemed the least threatening of us all. but when he gave the camera his psycho look...well, he looked like that guy you copped all that commercial real estate from, who'd just burned the roof his mouth on hot pizza.
production seemed a little nervous about the liability. three different people explained the program, and showed us a mock-up of the final WANTED ads.
"look, the word WANTED appears across the eyes here, so no one will recognize you as the subject."
"we can't see your eyes, so all the acting is in the mouth and forehead."
"there is an elite task force in california searching for LA's top 100 suspects. they shouldn't confuse you with the real guys."
i'm going to LA in june. i hope i get the job. i hope i meet an elite bounty hounter. i hope, i hope, i hope.

footagefootagefootagefootagefootagefootage

2005-05-06T11:38:00.000-04:00

in reference to posting april 24, 2005 cobra jet creepin'....CLICK HERE for the finished product.

hmm...
yahoo is making things difficult. try cutting and pasting this link into your browser.
http://us.share.geocities.com/brainbucket2000/tundra.mov

marsupial campaign

2005-05-04T11:38:00.000-04:00

I auditioned for the part of Jimmy Tech. He's an auto tech at Express Oil. When I embodied Jimmy for the client and director, I played him as deadpan as they come. I had to play straightman to a little possum. His name is Otis and he's a longtime customer who wears a hat, smokes a cigar and deftly maneuvers a car.
The director had me improvise the script. I wonder why they pay copywriters anymore. It was an interview with me concerning my recent repair of Otis' brake pads.
"He's always been a loyal customer. So, it's important that he be able to stop his car at Express Oil."
The director asked if I thought Otis' meticulous attention to detail was overbearing.
"I don't mind if he points out things that need attention. It just makes my job easier. Strange, though. Possums aren't really known for their eyesight."
And to the question of whether Otis gets special treatment.
"Please, I'd treat anybody at Express Oil with the same 5-star quality service as Otis. Of course, possums have litters of 6 to 10, so I look at that as a continuing customer base. If they all survive."
I am not certain why they chose an animal as their new spokesthing that has a violent history with the automobile industry.
I hope they hire a Redd Foxx type for the part of Otis. Jimmy Tech could be a real breakout role for a character actor like me.

cobra jet creepin'

2005-04-24T11:54:00.000-04:00

I just got back from Omaha, Nebraska. Terence and I were hired to portray park rangers who stumbled upon some strange tracks. Either too scared or simply unwilling to understand the full impact of these tracks, my character, whom I named William Dewberry, asked a lot of questions:
“What’s it mean?”
and
“What it is going on?”
and, finally,
“What’re we going to do?”
Terence played the older fella. He’d seen this kind of thing before. The way Moulder always had some insider info on a recent cow disembowelment, Terence (he named his character Terence) knew that IT had come back, and IT was bigger than ever.
The alien tracks were made by a Toyota Tundra. The fine people at the Nebraska Lottery were giving them away again like they did before, for the very first time. The tracks were really made by rolling a spare tire off a Chevy S-10 owned by the boom operator. I named his boom mike Veal Diamond.
We shot on a beautiful state park outside of Omaha. Lunch was cooked on a grill at a lodge on the lake. One girl, Donna, was wardrobe, make-up, set design (props), and my personal assistant. She constructed our uniforms. She sewed badges on the brownshirts that looked like park ranger stuff. One said "Trailhiker" and another had a tornado on it. The pins we wore were silver earrings.
So, now I’m in lottery spots for Georgia, Kentucky, and Nebraska. 36 states have a lottery, 21 share some kind of mega-pot. Here are the winning numbers from last Friday’s MegaMillions jackpot worth $205 million:
23 - 25 - 43 - 46 - 49 - Mega: 26
I don’t think anyone has won in over a dozen weeks. What is going on?

reality tv

2005-04-17T13:32:00.001-04:00

the other day, i was interviewed for a documentary. the subject is a friend of mine, joel, who composes music for films and theater improvisations. he's also a high school teacher.
the entire crew is a 2-man producer/director team. they are mike and randy. they came over and set up in my living room one beautiful afternoon with a nice digital camera (was it 24-fps?) and some lights.
i gave opinions like:
'joel's an integral part of the story-telling process...'
and
'i think all award shows are bullshit...'
i'm intrigued by the idea of friends doing documentaries on one another. approaching your buds with objectivity, yet having to remain sensitive to the picture you paint. you can easily manipulate the footage to present a one-sided story.
'joel is a very deep thinker...'
that's what a documentary does. can't afford to have many plot lines. it would be hours long. but maybe documentaries should do that. try and tell the whole story.
'this is the wrong industry if you're in this to make friends...'
attempt to cut hundreds of hours of action into one succinct struggle to accomplish something.
'uh, i think i was out of town when that happened. what was the question...'
mike and randy have a rich environment to pull from. peter brook once wrote "Anyone interested in processes in the natural world would be very rewarded by a study of theater conditions. His discoveries would be far more applicable to general society than the study of ants or bees." there will be loud arguments, confessional whispers, and all the while costumes and music. built-in production design. there's drama in the story and the making of it.
'the most important thing to remember about joel is he carries a gun.'

edjucated burrito

2005-04-12T10:56:00.000-04:00

yesterday i shot a promo for the learning channel. they are doing a special on magic, i think. it was all improvised (they're tag is life unscripted), so i never saw a script. me and this guy jody sat on a couch and did magic for each other. i showed him the rubber pencil trick.
"oh look, what's this? a normal #2 pencil? or a paranormal #2 pencil? look it's rubber. it's a rubber pencil. check it out. made of rubber."
suddenly, jody knocked it from my hand.
"yo, why you gotta illusion hate?"
later, jody did the magic thumb. repeatedly, he disconnected then reconnected his thumb from his hand. just when i thought it was gone for good, he pulled the thumb from my nose. i was astounded.
much later, these two characters were still at it. only now, we had a girl named tristan. and a big box. we tried to get her into the box. i promised her i could make her disappear. she wouldn't do it. as an incentive, jody clumsily pulled a bouquet of flowers from his armpit. tristan still wouldn't bite. in fact, she left the room. voir la! "i told you i could make her disappear."
this was late in the day. they wanted to wrap by 7:30, which by this time it was. and they needed reaction shots from tristan. there was 30 feet of film left. that's about 15 seconds worth. somehow we got 30 seconds of reactions from 15 seconds of film...magic.
spoiler: the box was a real disappearing act box, too. i'll tell you what i learned on this learning channel shoot. there's a false bottom to the box. only it isn't on the bottom. there really isn't a bottom. it's a fixed flap on the side. so when decepto turns it over for you to see, the girl is behind that same flap.

fast actin' tinactin

2005-04-04T11:27:00.000-04:00

no commercial auditions for a while. one of the last i did was for a country music collection. you've seen the hour-long spots late at night. the address is always atlanta. i was paired with my "wife" played by mary kraft, and i had not been told prior to this what the content of the spot was. we then had to improvise dialogue as a married couple who were happy that this collection was now available:
"if the voice of an angel comes through the speakers, i will turn it up and listen to it all night."
"we honeymooned in nashville."
"it's great to hear classics. and so easy now that they're all on one disc!"
"favorite? well, we saw kenny rogers on our honeymoon, fresh off his 'roasters' tour, so i guess he's our de facto favorite."
"i boot-scoot, she toe-taps."
we didn't get a callback. the casting agent snickered so loudly that mary and i had to ask her point blank what was so funny. we were a real couple and these were honest-to-goodness replies. aw heck.
i have gone on two film auditions in the last week. a read for a role in the hardly-anticipated sequel big momma's house 2.
the second read was for what could possibly be a good film. the script seems tight and funny, written by tv writers. and it's being produced by scott rudin who did rushmore, i heart huckabees, royal tenenbaums, life aqauatic with steve zissou, closer, team america: world police, the school of rock... you get the picture. actually, i hope i get the picture.
it's called failure to launch, and it's about a 30-something guy whose parents set him up with his dream girl to get him out of the house. really, i'm telling you the scenes are funny. it stars matthew mcconaughey and sarah jessica parker. ay, there's the rub. well. if i even get a one-liner i'll be happy. not satisfied. just happy. happy ain't all that.

float right

2005-04-01T16:51:00.000-05:00

i'm going to try something. here it goes:

why should anyone get married? it's a shortcut to finding out if you're capable of compassion and listening. staying married is a different animal altogether. one may remain attached after realizing she can endure and ultimately enjoy his company for a lifetime. for similar reasons boys linger in college through middle-age.

this was my paltry attempt at writing. i used kurt vonnegut as a model. in school i worked alongside a grad student who tried to get all us writing novices to consider authority in literature. what it was, which writers had it, and how did they come by it. the whole semester i never got past what it was. and the thing about authority in writing is this: it's like the concept of time, only you needn't anyone else to agree. you simply tell the time. present things as they are without apology and, like magic, what follows has extraordinary say-so.
the passage above has authority, i'd say. it presents an idea, follows with a definitive (but not too definitive) answer. the next sentence presents an obvious, linear issue that springs from the answer. and finally ends with a bland abstraction, which i bet would be a whole lot cooler as a metaphor. let's see:

does the misanthrope suspect his shadow?

not a great one. but it is interesting to start and end with questions.

in much the same way, the earth, whose orbit is elliptical, is only moving away from its colleague the sun one ten-thousandth of a centimeter a year. they're going to be roomates for quite a while.

this one is way off topic and a real stretch. it has nothing to do with compassion and listening. worse, putting things in term of astrophysics feels like a cheap attempt at sounding like kurt vonnegut. it's just as well. i'll keep practicing:

since compassion means "with suffering" being married ever in one's life merits a nod from the buddhists...

man this is hard.

fun with wards

2005-03-28T14:19:00.000-05:00

terri schiavo. it's pronounced SHY-vo. thanks wikipedia. the state of florida tried making her a ward of the state, thus becoming her legal guardian and then the state could reinsert the feeding tube. the state failed.
now, many people have made the difficult decision to remove a loved one from life support. why george bush feels it necessary to get involved, the lord only knows.
two ironies i've read. maybe true maybe not. the first, some doctors believe terri has hope. after several years of stem cell research. but as we all know, george bush nixed that one. maybe he feels guilty?
the second irony i've read is that the reason the girl had the heart attack that put her in a coma 14 years ago was that she was bulemic. now they're fighting over whether to force feed her.
i get this way about music. i insert a metal tube into my ear and force feed the auditories. in 2 weeks, m ward has not left the cd player. his latest is called "transistor radio" and it's sublime. the m stands for matt. he's playing here at the earl on april 6. there is so much going on in the production. one track has a full drum kit rolling on high gear. ward put it so far in the background, it's like when a radio station tunes in to your lonesome speaker, coincidentally playing rhythm for your soul.
there was this guy, jeff ward, a builder in the turner scene shop that everybody called evil jeff. i think this was because he hung out with jeff davidson and they needed a distinction. funny tho, jeff ward called jeff davidson evil jeff, thus throwing the system into chaos. truly evil.
and, finally, close friend and drinking buddy chris ward (aka mc chris) will be here at the mjq's drunken unicorn wednesday. i miss spending hours and hours drinking beer and whiskey with him, but i must admit things have quieted down since he went on the road. he's a whizbang with the words. i find that the irish are born lyricists and balladeers.
i wonder if jeff tweedy is irish. where does that name tweedy come from? scottish? perhaps he is the real evil jeff.

jog left at greenland

2005-03-25T15:25:00.000-05:00

a couple weeks back we were in toronto for the catch23 tournament of wonders, a first time festival of improvisational theater. it was attended by an amazing cast of characters from around north america. also, they had the baddest of the bad ass logos, which unfortunately you can barely make out on their website. it's a unicorn's head mounted like a trophy and spattered with blood. maybe it's still alive?
one approach that i've seen a few times recently that i'm dick van dyke-ing over a coffee table for is this: 2 person show with 1 person on guitar. now, the couples (theater*in*a*box, crumbs, catch23) are so fluid and funny, i wonder how can it get better. add a guy on git-box to underscore and segue every few beats with poetry and lyrical abstractions in and out of context, that's how.
rene and i went to a strip club downtown called the brass rail. yeah, it's famous, and yeah becky said ecch when she found out we went. but! i left rene for a few moments and when i came back a young, vibrant girl in stripper gear was hitting him up for lapdances. rene politely, almost ashamedly, said "no thanks." to this she replied, "that goes against the rules of improv, you're supposed to say 'yes, and take me in the back room and get me hot.'" only in toronto would you find a stripper who's completed the first four levels of second city classes.

heroes

2005-03-20T10:14:00.000-05:00

a few weeks back i got the call every short actor (i'm five eight) gets. the offer to play a costumed character. around children.
this was a promotional shoot, so it runs only a few weeks, and they agreed this type of work is hard, so my agent negotiated $750 for a few hours work.
turns out, i'm playing a teenage mutant ninja turtle.
the costumes were incredibly well-made, numbered and licensed. and made for someone five four. the rules were i wasn't allowed to talk or remove the head.
so it was hot as hell, kids were punching me almost as much as they were hugging me and telling me (well, michelangelo) how much they loved me.
it got me to thinking about heroes, mythology. i'm pretty much selling out as an actor by doing commercial work. it doesn't feed the intellect, there's little to no craft about it. anybody and everybody will have done some kind of advertising at some point in their life.
how could a guy like me be on the path to be a hero?
i'm in the midst of an identity crisis, and have been for many years. both of my father figures committed suicide in the last ten years, thus taking away my objective to "kill" my father and atone with him. in recent days i've departed from a theater company i started that is now run by a devisive, cunning business person. the whole of my ego was attached to the endeavor and i'm only now starting to feel the effects of abandonment, loss of identity, etc.
well, this is it. a hero does not hear the call, but eventually faces these odds with blind ambition and overcomes them, many times unwittingly, as an unlikely hero.
hunter s. thompson, though brilliant, was called an unlikely hero, yet he traded that moniker when he took his own life a few weeks ago. many of his fans would have punched him as much as they hugged him too.
so, scrunching my skinny manframe into a short girl's TNMT outfit was humbling. cartoon network produced it, and afterwards they opened a giant box of toys and let me have as many action figures as i wanted. i gave one to my buddy (ironically he works for sealab2021), and another to my buddy's kid.
does that bring me closer to hero status?

winners. all of them.

2005-03-17T09:14:00.000-05:00

the state of kentucky just agreed to start a lottery for its good citizens. my friend daniel pettrow and i were hired as actors in a commercial for this legalized gambling adventure.
we embodied two convenience store clerks doing a sports play by play of a man by the cash register trying to decide which numbers to pick.
we shot this in franklin, tennessee, about 20 minutes outside of nashville.
the evening before daniel and i spent in nashville bowling, playing galaga and the addam's family pinball. we missed all the honky tonk, and forgot to buy cowboy hats. we did get lost trying to find our hotel for quite some time. we talked a lot about my future as an actor in the atlanta scene. daniel is great for dialogue on this topic, but he also dudn't eff around when it comes to doing what you discuss. i get the feeling he and i will continue working together for a long time.
during the shoot, at the request of the agency, we improvised a bunch of dialogue as what the industry calls "wild sound." some of my favorite lines are:
"it's just a man with a coin and a dream."
"the indians call this becoming a warrior."
"i'm reminded of '69 the summer of love."
the agency then politely asked us not to go off script. too late! we already won the attention of a PA who is shooting his own feature, and asked us to be a part of it.
daniel and i agreed on the ride back to atlanta to do the movie for paid travel expenses and cowboy hats.

ad man

2005-03-10T09:03:00.000-05:00

i spent two days on a cattle ranch in rural north georgia shooting a promo for the country music awards. jeff foxworthy is hosting and the artist was on set with us. he talked into a microphone that was never plugged in.
there were three parts to the spot(s). in the first, we shot watermelons from a catapult in the back of a pickup truck. it was made of heavy lumber from lowe's and the slingshot effect was acheived with a straight-6 engine block chained to it. we almost nailed calves running to their cows on several occasions. oh, and the faces of country music award nominees are on the watermelons.
the second part had me and 5 others harnessed to and spinning around on a wheel of death. there was a man in his 50's that threw up on it. he was at the very top. strangely, no vomit made contact with anyone underneath him. he said he drank 2 cups of coffee before we climbed into the harness.
the third part had four guys (count me in!) riding a mechanical bull at once. homo. erotica. not to mention the "stunt coordinator" thought it was funny to molest me and make "oh baby" comments in my ear. i said my ear.
i got ringworm from the farm.

geddit?

2005-02-16T17:34:00.000-05:00

gee bush on social security...

At his rallies, the crowds cheered his words against terrorism as though it were a nostalgic re-enactment of his campaign, and then fell into befuddled silence.

His convoluted explanations on social security were so confusing that Bush confessed: "Does that make any sense to you? It's kind of muddled. Look, there's a series of things that cause the... like, for example, benefits are calculated based upon the increase of wages, as opposed to the increase of prices. Some have suggested that we calculate ... the benefits will rise based upon inflation, as opposed to wage increases. There is a reform that would help solve the red if that were put into effect. In other words, how fast benefits grow, how fast the promised benefits grow, if those ... if that growth is affected, it will help on the red. OK, better? I'll keep working on it."

today is the greatest!

2005-02-16T17:18:00.000-05:00

february 3, 2005 (post data)

i went on 2 auditions today. first, this morning, i auditioned for an
outdoor channel commercial. i played a deer. i was also what is
known as a reverse engineer. i was concentrating on decoding the new
duck calls from primos calls. they are the best.
i was interviewed in an improv and asked if i had ever encountered a hunter. i told them i joined a foursome at augusta. not until the back nine did i notice all three had rifles in their bags. by the 16th hole, they smelled my musk. i sliced a drive into the trees and pretending to look for it, i hoofed it back to my neck o' the woods.
this commercial would pay me $1200.
the second, this afternoon, was for a movie. i think it was called
"things that dangle from trees." in this one i played a lazy deputy
sheriff. i brought a bag of doritos in with me and ate them while i
delivered these three lines:
"i'm eatin'."
"she dead?"
"i ain't gettin' up in that tree."
that would pay me $450 per day for several days of work.
all of this is true.

li'l cysta dontcha

2005-02-16T15:48:00.000-05:00

january 20, 2005 (post data)

i've had this bump of scar tissue over my right eyebrow as long as i can remember. a month ago i was knocking my head against a brick wall we call acting, and the bump filled up with pus. it stayed taught with promise, but without an escape pore.
i got a shot of cortizone, the needle stuck right in the middle of it. boy we angered it. a little blood came out, but over the next few days, the steroids dissolved most the scar tissue. since then, i've had a puddle of pus under the skin.
like a feral wart, i had to let it out.
twice.
fountains of blood, cheesy flotsam riding waves of white blood cells, chunk cannons firing hard strings onto the wall, and always more blood, blood, blood.
i wish i had taken pictures.
anyway, i shot a ford commercial in north carolina yesterday and they had to put a hat over it. i told them i got hit in the head at a fencepost brawl. they didn't buy it.
by the way, they've "hip-cool-funkified" the ford focus. i was s'posed to represent the slacker demographic who would buy one. as the tye pennington-clone spokesman said "they told me you were perfect for this, a guy who looked like he could be stoned all the time."
i get sleepy when i smoke pot. is that a demographic? the sleepers.
yawn...super fuckin' yawn.

2005-02-16T15:47:00.000-05:00

december 31, 2004 (post data)

this guy, he's being kept an eye on. blindfolded. one step down. this girl, she's standing over him about to backhand the shit out of his face, already screwed up in terror.
it wasn't a girl with which he cheated on her. it wasn't even human. what could he say to satisfy her tiny mind, to relieve its delicate swelling? what if she simply witnessed a sentient end table fellating him? words would escape the room and she would get it.
no such luck now, boyo. this guy, he's ductaped to a chair. tightly. this girl, she's one step up, the potential about to go kinetic, and she has no idea he's now being entered anally by the chair.

and so it goes.

2005-02-16T15:45:00.000-05:00

december 27, 2004 (post data)

children these days. they get it. they know they get it. parents who don't get it have kids that innately get it, yet have it slowly squeezed out of them, a la the play-doh fun factory.
a 12-year-old girl named amelia defined mellifluously. then, upon deciding desever was a better choice than decapitate, noted that the former is "more frequently used in old english, as in 'the soul desevered from its ancient body.' "

♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦

a couple weeks ago i filmed a movie for three days in florida with paul giamatti. it's called "the hawk is dying" and should prove interesting to both giamatti fans, and florida movie fans. it's directed by julian goldberger and is keen on doing florida movies, since the only director with dibs on the state seems to be victor nunez.
we had a blast by the way. i play a character pressured into allowing giamatti in to see his autistic nephew played by michael pitt . ironically, michelle williams is in the flick, and, as you dawson's creek fans know, she and i had a scene in one of the last regular season episodes. a persuasive girl.
things i learned on this shoot:
1. go with whatever happens
2. continue the scene after it ends on the page
3. don't ask, just try it
4. wherever you are is the place to be
5. it's not how it should be, it's what it is