Thursday, January 20, 2005

I'm going to Los Angeles!

I'm hitting the City of Angels this weekend for a college buddy's wedding.

I'm not doing anything industry related, per se, but this is where the magic happens!

OK, technically, I'm supposed to "make the magic happen", but LA's a magical place, so I'm hoping for a little magic-on-magic action.

Maybe I'll hit Disneyland while I'm out there, for some magic-cubed wonkiness. Or something ...

Monday, January 17, 2005

Just started a new ongoing 10-week coaching class with Van Brooks, for the "Working Professional Actor".

Van knows to get stuff out of me, and the caliber of folks in this class is humbling ...

Tuesday, January 11, 2005

I had a fantastic acting workshop last night with Will Wallace (feel free to insert Braveheart jokes here).

Will is an incredibly talented and personable actor, coach, producer, writer, and director (not necessarily in that order), and last night was a great opprotunity for fun and learning.

Be sure to check Will out in Sonny's Last Shot, running at the State Theatre (719 Congress). The play runs Thursday through Saturday nights (and a Sunday matinee) January 6 through February 5. Call 512-469-SHOW for tickets.

In class, I did a piece from Sexual Perversity in Chicago (David Mamet). It was the "singles bar scene", and I was Bernard Litko. You can actually read the scene on Amazon.com. For those who are worried, we stopped the scene on page 12 (though it's actually page 15 where things get interesting; if no more family-friendly) ... ;-)

By the way, Mamet wrote The Untouchables, one of my two favorite all-time movies. Now you know a little more about me ...

One of the in-class scenes (that wasn't mine) I most enjoyed was one from the sitcom Dharma & Greg, with talented classmates Frank Brantley, Chel Simon, and Adam Powell (dude needs his own website). These three absolutely nailed their roles, and it was a pleasure to watch.

We also did a "get-to-know-you" exercise where the men/women in the class paired up and cycled through 1 minute, 1-on-1 conversations, and wrote one-word "first-impression" summaries anonymously on notecards stuck to our backs.

The summary I netted?:
  • Sensitive
  • Intelligent
  • Leader
  • Well-rounded
  • Beautiful (never got this one before; I wanna know who wrote this)
  • Enthusiastic!
  • Funny
  • Family Man
  • Very Nice
  • Engaging
  • Awesome!

Awe, shucks ...

Seriously, I was encouraged by the diversity of reads I got by just being me, and talking and listening to other people.

What else did I learn in class? A bunch of stuff that it never hurts to hear over and over again. just a couple of examples:
  1. Don't "mock" actions in an audition (opening doors, driving a car, etc.), unless specifically asked by the auditioner.
  2. Don't try to "justify" the scene -- let it work on its own.

On a more sober note, I learned some of my fellow actors don't "connect" unless it's "necessary" (like for a class scene, audition, etc.). When we finished with the class, while I was trying to chat with a few folks who I didn't know, they kind of brushed me off as they waited in line to try to get to Will. Bummer.

Folks, it's about the relationships -- it's not about the networking. At least for me ...

Luckily, I've been blessed with genuine relationships with a number of authentic actors, and enjoyed chatting it up with them.

Special thanks to actor extraordinaire Adam Langley who organized and coordinated this whole thing, and gave up his birthday to attend and make sure it ran smoothly.

Also thanks to CastingWorks LA for generously hosting the whole thing! With special, special thanks to Leigh for hanging out late to lock up afterwards ...

Friday, January 07, 2005

Ooh -- another toy!

My discipleship mentor just got me one of the new Toybiz Marvel Manga Twist 'ems -- Captain America. And he has "shield attack" action.

If he sees the Captain, he gets it for me. It's kind of like a comic book sugar daddy thing. But wholesome. Or something.

Anyway, this thing totally rocks, and the whole Twist 'ems line is really cool.

Tuesday, January 04, 2005

This just in from things-that-make-a-full-body-skin-graft-look preferable:

So, while running around my old stomping grounds in Idaho Falls over the holidays, I was doing really well until my last day there. That's when -- while out to coffee with my mom, one of my sisters, and my current -- I ran into my ex.

Yeah. Awkward. Coulda done without that.

While driving back to Texas (a treat in itself), we were iced in in Kansas. That was better than that whole awkward situation ...