Good Friday (no relation to Jesus)

Fred Savage gave me an invaluable piece of advice a couple years ago. Yes, "Wonder Years" Fred Savage. Random, I know. Focus.

He said (and this is a loose quote, but you'll get the gist):" "It's never about THAT audition. Just go in there, give a strong read, and even if you're not right for the role, they'll always remember you, and it will end up paying off."

Case in point: yesterday when I went in for producers for that ABC pilot, they ended up loving my read, but not thinking I was right for the part. My manager calls later in the afternoon to say that they want me to come back next week for the other female lead.

Cool, right? And a perfectly illustrious example of the point I was trying to make. Awwww-yeah.

So that set the tone for a lovely Friday, which only got better-- my beau took me on a date filled with surprises (dinner at Church & State...craveable goodness, a show at the Ahmanson, and a reminder of just how good it is....life, I mean.)

So yes, no pity party for this girl today.

Go have an awesome weekend guys -- I will be reading scripts, drinking vino, and thinking of you (whoever you are out there).

Confucius says:

Pilot season is up and running. The past week has been devoted to pick ups and offers to "names," and starting next week we're off to the races.

Tomorrow I go in for an ABC pilot that I adore. The producers asked me to read the script and choose which female lead I wanted to read for. Let me just say -- this is the first time that that's ever happened to me. And my oh my did I feel fancy.

So tomorrow it is, and I feel good about walking into a room with so much support.

Here's the thing, I have booked several pilots in the past 4 years. And with each one I have been convinced that that was the one. The right cast, the right script, the right timing -- I could just see it.

And despite whatever hopes (or delusions) I had, each year -- no pick up, no upfronts.

So this year, I'm going to just embrace the season and enjoy the process. No expectations. I'm not gonna worry about the future, or the money it will generate, or the years of potential syndication that could come from this one ever so perfect pilot. Nope, not thinking about any of that....

Don't I sound so healthy and positive?

OK --well, here's the reality. I want all of that stuff I just mentioned. I want it. I can see it, and I'm close to it.

So I am choosing to believe the wise words of my fortune cookie:

"You will be a winner."

And quite frankly, I don't think there's anything wrong with that.

Coin Toss

Sometime last year, I was working on a project and one of the execs came up and started complimenting my work.

Ego boost in effect, we kept chatting, and he finally said: "We're so lucky we got you, especially since it came down to a flip of a headshot."

Come again?

"A flip of a headshot. It was a dead heat between you and another actress, so we flipped headshots and whichever landed face up, got the part."

Here's my point with this story -- it doesn't matter how you got the part (unless of course you blew someone on a casting couch to get it....in that case my dear, you're a whore. sorry. it's true.) -- the point is, once you've gotten the part, embrace it.

You could've just been on the right side of a coin toss.

Happy. Thank you. More please.

So Sundance is going on. I'm not there.
SAG awards were Sunday. Wasn't there either.

I'm close...but not quite closeenough.

I have days where I compare myself to every other actress in her mid 20s who is booking the projects I want, and I wallow in what I don't have vs. what I do. Those are the days I put Debbie Downer to shame. Trust me, it is the most absurd display of self pity, that I sometimes just can't shake. I can intellectualize that it's silly, but this business/this hustle is really hard.

Some days my skin is just not thick enough.

Thankfully, out of nowhere come the reminders that help put things in check. Sometimes it's my best friend calling from NY to give me a peptalk. Other times it's the news reminding me of how incredibly small my woes are in the grand scheme of things. Or it's my agent, boyfriend, or parents. That network of support that knows just how brutal this industry can be, and see how self sabotaging I can sometimes become (ie, thinking the only remedy to a recurring role gone awry is to lay in bed crying, and subsisting on a diet of carbs and alcohol). Yes. That did happen.

This weekend the reminder came in the form of a Sundance film called "happythankyoumoreplease."

The film is brilliant, and so is the message.
Focus on what you have. What's right in front of you.
That you're auditioning. That the casting director loves you, even though you're not right for the part. That you're going after your dream. That you have a good heart. That you're breathing.
That ____________________. Whatever it is...

Be happy about it. Be grateful for it. Ask for more of it.

Whether it's to your God, or to the universe, or your journal, or just to yourself in the mirror -- say it:

"happy. thank you. more please."

Don't let 'em take the fight outta you

I love this song. It is inspirational. Especially during pilot season. Hang in there. We're all just one audition away.

Hope you enjoy it as much as I do:

Ben Harper - Fight Outta You - Watch more Music Videos at Vodpod.

The "ho hum" of auditionless days

The past two days I have been slammed with rain...auditions, not so much.

I know I'm fortunate to go on auditions all the time -- but it raises the question, what do you do when you don't have auditions?

Let me tell you:
-workout
-read scripts for interest
-run errands
-twiddle my thumbs
-write

You can only meet friends for coffee so many times, and in this weather the reality is that snuggling up in bed with a glass of wine and big bowl of soup sounds more amazing than any of the aforementioned busywork.

Even better if my boyfriend was here. He, by the way, is a gem. It takes a special breed to support the roller coaster of emotions that come with being an actress. And no, I'm not talking about the emotions in scenes. Those are nothing compared to the barrage of bullshit I bring home with me everyday after an audition. Bless his heart. He's a good egg.

I'll give you more specifics on post audition insanity a bit later. Trust me, it deserves its own post.

Back to thumb twiddling...

Rain, rain, go away

LA is experiencing a deluge. Mud slides, vicious wind, a downpour like I've rarely seen here (and by the way, I'm born and raised in LA).

This weather does not make it so easy to shuffle from one audition to the next. Especially when the casting note is: LOOK HOT

After driving 40 minutes to Sherman Oaks (no, it was not an audition for porn), and braving the weather for the two blocks it took to get from my car to the office, I looked like a wet rat.

A crazy, sopping, wet rat.

Keep you posted on how that one works out -- who knows, maybe the producers find the soggy, disheveled rodent look "hot." Stranger things have certainly happened...

American Idol, you've done it again.

I'm not a singer. That's not a talent I possess. So my love for American Idol has little to do with the actual music.

But every year when I watch the audition process on that show, and see these people rush out of the room so overjoyed that someone said YES...well, it just makes me happy.

When the bulk of my auditions end with knowing it may very likely be a NO, I love coming home and watching someone tell another dreamer YES.

It makes my heart go pitter pat.

Cheesy, I know. Just go with it.

If I can make one suggestion:

Never ever read any blogs about yourself. Don't google yourself. Don't read the imdb message boards. It will make you crazy. Good or bad. It's not worth it.

This is advice I was given a year ago, and while I have momentary lapses in judgment and sometimes choose to torture myself, I still believe it is the best advice to follow.

This is probably why I enjoyed this skit so much from SNL.

Golden Globes

So Sunday night was the first big night of award season. Hours of red carpet prep, stylists and publicists clamoring to figure out how to handle the deluge that was taking over LA. All encompassing madness. It was crazy!

For the A listers, I mean.
It must have been a nightmare for them.

For me - a different story. Now don't get me wrong, a designer did loan me a dress, and an amazing stylist did help me figure out my "look" and "poses" a week in advance, but the night went a tad differently than expected.

The buttons on the said designer dress fell off as I was getting ready at home, there was no red carpet at the after party I attended, and my boyfriend and I took a good old fashioned cab with a driver who reeked of severe body odor to the event (we're talking epic proportions). Oh, and he had to let us out two blocks from the Beverly Hilton (where all of the after parties were). In the rain.

So yeah...not so A list. But awesome nonetheless.

I ended up wearing I dress I bought on sale down the street, and doing my hair and makeup in my bathroom with shitty lighting, and you know what? I felt like a million bucks.

The party was star studded: Pierce Brosnan, the kid from Twilight (the wolf one), Jodie Foster, Robert Downey Jr., the cast of "Lost," and more. I feasted on dim sum and champagne, got checked out by the guy in "Hurt Locker" ( hey-O!), and hob nobbed with the best of 'em.

Not too shabby for a Sunday night, right?

Reality check #2

So remember when I mentioned that the dressing room on the pilot was the size of 2 bathroom stalls combined?

Well today's debacle certainly eclipsed this, but I still wanted to share the picture with you.

*Please note the radius of the toilet paper roll to the "lounge area" (squint and you can see it....there in the back, next to the doorless bathroom. Sexy right?) -- puts a whole new meaning on 'shit where you sleep.' *

So one minute you're feeling high and mighty...

And the next minute, you are holed up on a stage on a foldable chair for 10 hours, being treated like a human prop, as you wait to shoot a commercial.

Yes, that was my day.

So the commercial I booked was one that I was excited about. Great audition with lots of material. Great campaign. Great spot for "actors" (meaning: talky, actor-y, heavy dialogue spots). Not just some girl running through an f-ing field telling you how great her tampons are, so you go and buy some. No, those are not the spots I go out for.

Well something went wrong today. And while I was paid my rate to be the aforementioned talky actor, I literally said nothing in the spot.

Not. A. Word.

This would have been fine if I knew that going into it, but it was a massive curve ball to be thrown. Especially since I was treated like shit. The feeling of being corralled, ignored, overlooked. People on set assumed I must be an extra since I wasn't speaking, and I have to say, the difference in how you're treated is shocking. Background actors work their asses off, and they deserve just as much respect. They're working toward their dream, just like I am. It's just a different version of the same hustle.

Here's the thing - only in this industry can you be fancy enough to go straight to producers on auditions, and walk the red carpet at Golden Globe parties (like tomorrow night), and have designers loan you clothes.....and then in the next moment, just be the "girl in the blue sweater."

Ego swallowed? Check.

Ready to let this day go and feel like a rock star tomorrow? Double check.

A glass of wine...or two? A resounding check.

You know you're immersed in the industry when...

So I'm talking to my mom today, and the conversation goes something like this:

Me: "How's your day going?"

Mom: "Good. Just driving off the lot."

Me: "Oh really? Which lot? I was just at Sony."

Mom: "What? No. A lot. A parking lot."

Me: "Oh."

Um....wow.

*This is a symptom of pilot-season-itis. Somehow the normal world and its vernacular no longer translate. I am trapped in an industry bubble. God help me.*

A major start...

Ten days into the new year, and we're off to a good start folks.

I'm shooting a pilot for a cable network (it's single cam and hilarious), and I just found out I booked a national commercial today.
If you need an excuse to drink tonight, let me be that excuse. Cheers!

Now, let me explain a couple things:

1. Booking pilots are awesome, but they're also a crapshoot...you have no idea if they'll get picked up or pan out at all. So as fun as they are, I've learned by now that you have to take them with a grain of salt. Sad, but true.

2. Commercials are not something that I consider a barometer of my acting abilities. Obviously. But they are a meal ticket like no other. Think of Christmas, or Hannukah (whichever -we don't discriminate around here). That feeling of waking up to an amazing gift that makes your heart go pitter pat. OK -- well commercials are like that. But every month. Every month, a big fat pitter pat inducing residual check that reminds you to swallow your acting school ego, and book some commercial that most people will fast forward through with their Tivos, but will give you enough money to feed a family of 4 for a year. Seriously.

So to say that this year has started out with a bang is an understatement. I am blessed. I am working, and at least for the time being I don't really care about the fact that my trailer on this pilot is about the size of two bathroom stalls put together.

It's the "working actress glow" in effect -- the minutia just doesn't matter, and the ball it is-a-rollin'.

welcome. to. my. world.

Allow me to introduce myself:

I am a working actress. Not a star. Not in tabloids. The kind of girl who is sometimes recognizable-ish.

Operative suffix being "ish."

I don't wait tables. I don't have a side job.

I am in the club of the fortunate few that somehow make a living playing dress up.

When it's good, it's f-ing awesome. The other 300+ days, it's harder than most would think. Humbling. Greuling. Sometimes mind numbing.

But at the end of the day, it's all worth it.

People often describe actors who pop onto the scene as "overnight success stories." Here's the reality -- it's more like years of hustle + a night.

Welcome to the hustle.
I am a working actress. And I don't have an entourage.