Fresh on the heels of the preceeding philosophical bent, I'm back from another spiffy audition.
Paint me daft and run me down, but I love 'em.
If I get it, hooray. If I don't, hooray. I had fun.
It really helps to come home from that with a new sense of what I'm really after. It makes sense now that I can love a non-paying audition and not love a paying extra gig.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
I don't exactly know where I'm going with this one, so if it peters out after a paragraph, forgive me.
I got another audition for today. It's for a student film and it comes with a shiny toy inside. The CD also casts for shows on some major cable networks and one of the Big Three (the broadcast networks are the new applicable trifecta for that moniker, but really, I suppose there are four). I bring my headshot, do a one-minute, silent physical comedy routine that I worked up (on the list for today), and she keeps my headshot for other stuff.
I've been cleaning up a massive mental train wreck the last few days, and this audition kind of helps me focus my attention on something. The unstoppable force finally met the immovable object, so to speak.
The Unstoppable Force: my inexplicable, nagging, grinding, perpetual need to pursue an acting career. This noodling little worm of an idea has grown and grown and grown into a behemoth of epic proportions (Think: the massive worm that lives in the subway in the opening sequence of MIIB). I can't not do it. I can't decide to do anything else. I always come back to it. It never leaves me alone. "There's a lifetime of exploration here!" it says to me, "A biannual community theatre production isn't going to satisfy you!" I haven't got the theatre bug. It's the gat-danged theatre Spanish Influenza. It turns me back toward performing every time I look away. Every time.
The Immovable Object: the inevitable reduction of every career into cheerless drudge work. First, let me be clear: I have no evidence to support this massive fallacy, but it is my immovable object. I have forever assumed (by whatever incomplete anecdotal experience) that a career is a lever-pulling exercise. No matter what your path, ultimately where you go in the morning and from whence you come in the evening is a sap, a shunt, a leech on your joy. It is an incontrovertible fact that this is. A man who works is a man who trudges.
Welcome to the scene of the accident.
I am trying to make a career of the thing that gives me the most productive joy I've ever experienced.
See the problem?
And further evidence is heaped on this terrible conundrum when you consider these facts: We're basically broke, and the money is trickling in just fast enough to keep us from dying of financial thirst. I'm fighting tooth and nail for every chance I can get to stand in the background and watch other people do what I'm really interested in doing. Drill those two things into my subconscious, and throw on some icing that reads, "You're living your dream, stupid, what's the problem?" and we've laid the penny on the rails.
You see, I'm a study in contradictions this way. I believe I'm living my dream, but really, by loose analogy, I'm on the bench and I'm not even wearing my pads. I'm on the field, yes, but not in the game. But I'm living my dream! I automatically compromise. Somehow being on the field, not playing, is supposed to be equivalent to running every down. Are we still on the same page?
So here I am, facing the two irreconcilable truths that I have held, in unsynthesized dissonance, and facing them with no intervening confusion. There is no physical distance between me and my dream. There is no other job, there is no moral ambiguity, no insurmountable road block. There is merely this single collision:
I am deathly afraid that even my most passionate drive in life will be reduced to cold, gray, lifeless slavery.
Since the unstoppable force is dependent on my ability to allow it to drive me (contradictory, I know, but go with it), it is far easier to believe that the immovable object will win this battle...that I will persevere, receive great blessings, find my name in proverbial lights, and hate every second of it.
Now, mind you, this cataclysm has been playing out in the backrooms of my mind, not on the tabletop in front of me, where I can observe the obvious contradictions.
So I've paused, balked, reconsidered (driving my poor wife quite mad in the process) making both me and her wonder how much I really do care. The half-moon logic is this: If everything will eventually suck, why not withdraw, adjust, preserve what goodness there is, and let my dream live on unsullied, forever a fiction, but at least unproven to be drudgery.
Less poetically: why not move away, get a clock job, and let acting be the happy "what if" for the rest of my days, so that the imaginary Something can remaining fictionally joyful?
But what's the reality?
I'm scraping out a living on the almost. I'm so close to my aspirations that I can literally touch them (some days, be touched by them--my back still hurts, Mr. Radnor (still my fault, I know)). Every time I'm on set, or on location, I'm watching the ones that have succeeded do the job that I want. I'm not living the dream, I'm three feet from the water, it's 115 degrees, and I've got a rock on my legs. Of course that's going to be a trying emotional experience. This is why the magic of going to the studios has worn off. This is why the posts here have been so meatless and brief. Talking about it is wrenching in its own, special way.
If you'd always dreamt of teaching and you showed up on campus to be the janitor, how would you feel? If you dreamt of being an architect and you clocked in as the pencil sharpener, would you not itch with unfulfilled longing? If you thirsted to write good fiction and wrote tag lines for movie posters forty hours a week, would you not pull out your hair?
I'm not justifying my dissatisfaction, I'm making the necessary comparisons to understand my situation in corollary. I need to do this, because I can be so blind and stupid, always looking to be the grown-up, slogging through the [inevitable] schleppy career and putting on a brave face. You see how it goes?
I have assumed, for my entire life, that I could not overcome the black hole of career depression, so when my "career" is depressing, I don't ask why, I just go, "Naturally," and try to convince myself that it's awesome in order to lift myself out of it...fully aware of the impossibility of this task.
Well, no more. I say, "No, damn it! This will not continue!" I will be an actor, God willing, and it will be fabulous. I will no longer waste countless hours rationalizing how a mediocre industrial picture or a day as an extra should be fulfilling to an actor. I will give my best to those days, certainly, as only is right to do, but at the end of the day, no more, "That's what I've wanted to do all my life, why am I not beaming?" It's not what I want to do, anymore than I want to be a secretary for a casting director. It's a part of Hollywood, and it gives me flexibility and income. That's all it is. It's not acting. It's not craft. It's not what I'm hurtling toward. It is not an immovable object. My life is not Revolutionary Road. I'm on the bench, and I need to remember I'm on the bench. The adrenaline of being so close to the field is wonderful, but I'm not on the field. I have to keep hold of some perspective. I do extra work, I ride the bench. I do auditions I suit up to play. I get cast, that's when my name gets called and the crowd looks to see who this new guy is, loping onto the turf.
I haven't been cast yet. I've been paid to talk in front of the camera, and once upon a time I convinced myself that this was the same thing. No. I was only kidding myself, dumbing down my ambition because I thought I needed to be realistic. When I play characters is when I thrive. Characters do not inhabit industrial films. Those folks are avatars, just the expressive representation of a broader, already definite entity. The mouthpiece. The person on screen has no freedom to deviate in their arc. A character can, does, should deviate, and has the freedom to do so.
I want the characters and nothing less.
I know what I want, and I know, for dead certain, that I don't have it yet.
And that, boys and girls, is satisfaction in itself.
And it only took me 25 years.
I guess that didn't peter out, huh?
I got another audition for today. It's for a student film and it comes with a shiny toy inside. The CD also casts for shows on some major cable networks and one of the Big Three (the broadcast networks are the new applicable trifecta for that moniker, but really, I suppose there are four). I bring my headshot, do a one-minute, silent physical comedy routine that I worked up (on the list for today), and she keeps my headshot for other stuff.
I've been cleaning up a massive mental train wreck the last few days, and this audition kind of helps me focus my attention on something. The unstoppable force finally met the immovable object, so to speak.
The Unstoppable Force: my inexplicable, nagging, grinding, perpetual need to pursue an acting career. This noodling little worm of an idea has grown and grown and grown into a behemoth of epic proportions (Think: the massive worm that lives in the subway in the opening sequence of MIIB). I can't not do it. I can't decide to do anything else. I always come back to it. It never leaves me alone. "There's a lifetime of exploration here!" it says to me, "A biannual community theatre production isn't going to satisfy you!" I haven't got the theatre bug. It's the gat-danged theatre Spanish Influenza. It turns me back toward performing every time I look away. Every time.
The Immovable Object: the inevitable reduction of every career into cheerless drudge work. First, let me be clear: I have no evidence to support this massive fallacy, but it is my immovable object. I have forever assumed (by whatever incomplete anecdotal experience) that a career is a lever-pulling exercise. No matter what your path, ultimately where you go in the morning and from whence you come in the evening is a sap, a shunt, a leech on your joy. It is an incontrovertible fact that this is. A man who works is a man who trudges.
Welcome to the scene of the accident.
I am trying to make a career of the thing that gives me the most productive joy I've ever experienced.
See the problem?
And further evidence is heaped on this terrible conundrum when you consider these facts: We're basically broke, and the money is trickling in just fast enough to keep us from dying of financial thirst. I'm fighting tooth and nail for every chance I can get to stand in the background and watch other people do what I'm really interested in doing. Drill those two things into my subconscious, and throw on some icing that reads, "You're living your dream, stupid, what's the problem?" and we've laid the penny on the rails.
You see, I'm a study in contradictions this way. I believe I'm living my dream, but really, by loose analogy, I'm on the bench and I'm not even wearing my pads. I'm on the field, yes, but not in the game. But I'm living my dream! I automatically compromise. Somehow being on the field, not playing, is supposed to be equivalent to running every down. Are we still on the same page?
So here I am, facing the two irreconcilable truths that I have held, in unsynthesized dissonance, and facing them with no intervening confusion. There is no physical distance between me and my dream. There is no other job, there is no moral ambiguity, no insurmountable road block. There is merely this single collision:
I am deathly afraid that even my most passionate drive in life will be reduced to cold, gray, lifeless slavery.
Since the unstoppable force is dependent on my ability to allow it to drive me (contradictory, I know, but go with it), it is far easier to believe that the immovable object will win this battle...that I will persevere, receive great blessings, find my name in proverbial lights, and hate every second of it.
Now, mind you, this cataclysm has been playing out in the backrooms of my mind, not on the tabletop in front of me, where I can observe the obvious contradictions.
So I've paused, balked, reconsidered (driving my poor wife quite mad in the process) making both me and her wonder how much I really do care. The half-moon logic is this: If everything will eventually suck, why not withdraw, adjust, preserve what goodness there is, and let my dream live on unsullied, forever a fiction, but at least unproven to be drudgery.
Less poetically: why not move away, get a clock job, and let acting be the happy "what if" for the rest of my days, so that the imaginary Something can remaining fictionally joyful?
But what's the reality?
I'm scraping out a living on the almost. I'm so close to my aspirations that I can literally touch them (some days, be touched by them--my back still hurts, Mr. Radnor (still my fault, I know)). Every time I'm on set, or on location, I'm watching the ones that have succeeded do the job that I want. I'm not living the dream, I'm three feet from the water, it's 115 degrees, and I've got a rock on my legs. Of course that's going to be a trying emotional experience. This is why the magic of going to the studios has worn off. This is why the posts here have been so meatless and brief. Talking about it is wrenching in its own, special way.
If you'd always dreamt of teaching and you showed up on campus to be the janitor, how would you feel? If you dreamt of being an architect and you clocked in as the pencil sharpener, would you not itch with unfulfilled longing? If you thirsted to write good fiction and wrote tag lines for movie posters forty hours a week, would you not pull out your hair?
I'm not justifying my dissatisfaction, I'm making the necessary comparisons to understand my situation in corollary. I need to do this, because I can be so blind and stupid, always looking to be the grown-up, slogging through the [inevitable] schleppy career and putting on a brave face. You see how it goes?
I have assumed, for my entire life, that I could not overcome the black hole of career depression, so when my "career" is depressing, I don't ask why, I just go, "Naturally," and try to convince myself that it's awesome in order to lift myself out of it...fully aware of the impossibility of this task.
Well, no more. I say, "No, damn it! This will not continue!" I will be an actor, God willing, and it will be fabulous. I will no longer waste countless hours rationalizing how a mediocre industrial picture or a day as an extra should be fulfilling to an actor. I will give my best to those days, certainly, as only is right to do, but at the end of the day, no more, "That's what I've wanted to do all my life, why am I not beaming?" It's not what I want to do, anymore than I want to be a secretary for a casting director. It's a part of Hollywood, and it gives me flexibility and income. That's all it is. It's not acting. It's not craft. It's not what I'm hurtling toward. It is not an immovable object. My life is not Revolutionary Road. I'm on the bench, and I need to remember I'm on the bench. The adrenaline of being so close to the field is wonderful, but I'm not on the field. I have to keep hold of some perspective. I do extra work, I ride the bench. I do auditions I suit up to play. I get cast, that's when my name gets called and the crowd looks to see who this new guy is, loping onto the turf.
I haven't been cast yet. I've been paid to talk in front of the camera, and once upon a time I convinced myself that this was the same thing. No. I was only kidding myself, dumbing down my ambition because I thought I needed to be realistic. When I play characters is when I thrive. Characters do not inhabit industrial films. Those folks are avatars, just the expressive representation of a broader, already definite entity. The mouthpiece. The person on screen has no freedom to deviate in their arc. A character can, does, should deviate, and has the freedom to do so.
I want the characters and nothing less.
I know what I want, and I know, for dead certain, that I don't have it yet.
And that, boys and girls, is satisfaction in itself.
And it only took me 25 years.
I guess that didn't peter out, huh?
Saturday, February 21, 2009
I'm sorry, Mr. Radnor....
Fun day yesterday.
Got in on an episode of Lie to Me (technically ep. 102...which will air out of sequence) and it started at 1400. I was a camera operator, so I was expecting to be given a prop.
Not, however, a 30 pound prop that would act as a meat mallet to my paltry little shoulder. Not terrible, it's a bruise, I'm not gonna cry, but I'm stiff this morning.
In the process of humping around with that camera (during a particularly chaotic POV shot with a real steadicam in the middle) I managed to cut in front of the camera, as I was supposed to, and had a split second of, "This ain't gonna work..." CRAAACK! That was the sound of my whale of a prop smacking the real camera...probably punching the poor camera op right in the face. Nobody yelled at me, and I didn't get fired, but good gravy. Who hits a camera that's worth more than my life net earnings...at a dead run?
ALSO
as if that one massive goof wasn't enough, I pulled another bone-head play ealier in the day. We were on the Fox lot, and shooting on stage 21...except we weren't on stage 21. We were shooting in the alley outside stage 21. Apparently the back alley spaces on the lot are fair game. Well, they were hosing down the pavement, because it was supposed to be wet, and so I moved off to the side...directly in front of a door. I thought it was (or, more accurately, didn't stop to think that it might not be) a door to stage 21. It wasn't.
No, it wasn't.
Just as a smallish Phillipino security was going to politely suggest that I not stand in front of the door, BAMMO! A hood installed to block the big red light on the door caught me right in the back. I stepped away and peeked in the door (along with the security guy) and saw a slightly confused face obviously done with shooting makeup (not, like, I've been shot, but the heavy cake of make-up you need for sound stage lighting) and I hear, "Yeah, my trailer's that way."
It was Josh Radnor, aka Ted from How I met your Mother. I imagine he wasn't expecting the door to bounce back in his face.
So, yes, I fiddled with TWO shows in one day.
Woooooooo-oooooow.
I'm a professional.
Got in on an episode of Lie to Me (technically ep. 102...which will air out of sequence) and it started at 1400. I was a camera operator, so I was expecting to be given a prop.
Not, however, a 30 pound prop that would act as a meat mallet to my paltry little shoulder. Not terrible, it's a bruise, I'm not gonna cry, but I'm stiff this morning.
In the process of humping around with that camera (during a particularly chaotic POV shot with a real steadicam in the middle) I managed to cut in front of the camera, as I was supposed to, and had a split second of, "This ain't gonna work..." CRAAACK! That was the sound of my whale of a prop smacking the real camera...probably punching the poor camera op right in the face. Nobody yelled at me, and I didn't get fired, but good gravy. Who hits a camera that's worth more than my life net earnings...at a dead run?
ALSO
as if that one massive goof wasn't enough, I pulled another bone-head play ealier in the day. We were on the Fox lot, and shooting on stage 21...except we weren't on stage 21. We were shooting in the alley outside stage 21. Apparently the back alley spaces on the lot are fair game. Well, they were hosing down the pavement, because it was supposed to be wet, and so I moved off to the side...directly in front of a door. I thought it was (or, more accurately, didn't stop to think that it might not be) a door to stage 21. It wasn't.
No, it wasn't.
Just as a smallish Phillipino security was going to politely suggest that I not stand in front of the door, BAMMO! A hood installed to block the big red light on the door caught me right in the back. I stepped away and peeked in the door (along with the security guy) and saw a slightly confused face obviously done with shooting makeup (not, like, I've been shot, but the heavy cake of make-up you need for sound stage lighting) and I hear, "Yeah, my trailer's that way."
It was Josh Radnor, aka Ted from How I met your Mother. I imagine he wasn't expecting the door to bounce back in his face.
So, yes, I fiddled with TWO shows in one day.
Woooooooo-oooooow.
I'm a professional.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Two basically unrelated observations from two different working days:
I noticed how long I've been "off the market". I struck up a rather pleasant conversation with a girl who happened to be a Missionary Kid who'd spent time in South Africa, Sweden and Scotland, and was on a scholarship to the little seminary down the road from where we live. We talked about a bunch of random stuff, and it was fun. It did not even begin to cross my mind to try and impress her.
It did cross my mind that it hadn't crossed my mind when, about a half hour later, another guy started to talk to her and was so obviously flirting with her that is was almost physically painful to watch. She's an attractive woman, and it's not like I didn't notice that, but the idea of taking a "relationship" somewhere (whatever the variety) was non-existant. Probably not a shocker for an "old married guy"...but just weird.
Observation two:
On an add shoot for Rascal Flatts' new clothing line "American Living" most of the younger extras almost had a competition to see who knew the least about this "Rascal whatever band". While not necessarily surprising, it confirmed this sneaking suspicion I have about country music. There is something about it that is powerful enough to drive people to ravenous sectarianism. Like, if it was a religious conviction, there'd be wars fought over it. These pretty people (I'm always the runt, pretty-wise, at these commercial shoots) seemed like they would shamelessly admit to a career in porn (vanilla, kinky, bestial, or otherwise) before they would admit to even knowing the band's entire name.
It's as if cosmopolitanism has some kind of messianic redemptive benefit in itself, and any hint of the taint of rusticity risks the loss of one's urban sanctification.
Never mind the fact that the number of people in America who would have gladly paid three times as money money as we received to be in similar physical proximity to this band is probably greater than the population of Los Angeles proper.
Musical factionalism is the new ethnicity.
These guys have won Grammys, for God's sake. Somebody thinks they're worthwhile.
P.S. Apparently "rusticity" is a real word, and "there'd" is not. Thanks blogger.
I noticed how long I've been "off the market". I struck up a rather pleasant conversation with a girl who happened to be a Missionary Kid who'd spent time in South Africa, Sweden and Scotland, and was on a scholarship to the little seminary down the road from where we live. We talked about a bunch of random stuff, and it was fun. It did not even begin to cross my mind to try and impress her.
It did cross my mind that it hadn't crossed my mind when, about a half hour later, another guy started to talk to her and was so obviously flirting with her that is was almost physically painful to watch. She's an attractive woman, and it's not like I didn't notice that, but the idea of taking a "relationship" somewhere (whatever the variety) was non-existant. Probably not a shocker for an "old married guy"...but just weird.
Observation two:
On an add shoot for Rascal Flatts' new clothing line "American Living" most of the younger extras almost had a competition to see who knew the least about this "Rascal whatever band". While not necessarily surprising, it confirmed this sneaking suspicion I have about country music. There is something about it that is powerful enough to drive people to ravenous sectarianism. Like, if it was a religious conviction, there'd be wars fought over it. These pretty people (I'm always the runt, pretty-wise, at these commercial shoots) seemed like they would shamelessly admit to a career in porn (vanilla, kinky, bestial, or otherwise) before they would admit to even knowing the band's entire name.
It's as if cosmopolitanism has some kind of messianic redemptive benefit in itself, and any hint of the taint of rusticity risks the loss of one's urban sanctification.
Never mind the fact that the number of people in America who would have gladly paid three times as money money as we received to be in similar physical proximity to this band is probably greater than the population of Los Angeles proper.
Musical factionalism is the new ethnicity.
These guys have won Grammys, for God's sake. Somebody thinks they're worthwhile.
P.S. Apparently "rusticity" is a real word, and "there'd" is not. Thanks blogger.
Sunday, February 15, 2009
The last post gives birth to this one.
There's a lot of discussion in professional articles (Hollywood profession, that is) about "branding". Like any commercial endeavor, the brand you're marketing is critical. I had been accepting of this precept up till now, however a bit dubious of it as well.
I didn't want to limit myself, which has been what branding seemed to me to be. I want to do whatever comes my way.
I think yesterday and today (especially that spiffy audition) turned that skittishness on its head.
Everybody loves to play characters with levels, complexities and conflicts. It's what good drama is all about...I like, I've discovered, going a little farther than that. The criminal minds attract me. The aberrant, the twisted, the dark and labyrinthine people that might seem normal enough at first, but wind up soulless or downright creepy underneath. It's the people that do heinous things that interest me. I want to understand. I want to build the logical (or fatally illogical) bridge that takes them where they go. I love the challenge of getting into these people...the kind of people that everybody loves to hate...and giving them life without judging them. Hitler didn't wake up in the morning thinking, "How can I be a little more evil today?" And while we can certainly understand that he was a dark stain on history, I don't mind (read: I love) going there and messing around with the kind of personality that can advocate the death of millions.
There's a safety in it, playing pretend. With terrible, believable antagonists on film, we can learn from our mistakes before we make them.
Also...as an addendum, I believe I'd like to stay up in this area, even if (hopefully when) I'm working more and more. I find I like the half-hour to and from Hollywood. It uses a little gas, certainly, but that's nothing fuel efficient driving doesn't soften, and it gives me a fabulous chance to focus going into a job and reflect coming out.
The Santa Clarita Valley is probably home for a good, long time.
There's a lot of discussion in professional articles (Hollywood profession, that is) about "branding". Like any commercial endeavor, the brand you're marketing is critical. I had been accepting of this precept up till now, however a bit dubious of it as well.
I didn't want to limit myself, which has been what branding seemed to me to be. I want to do whatever comes my way.
I think yesterday and today (especially that spiffy audition) turned that skittishness on its head.
Everybody loves to play characters with levels, complexities and conflicts. It's what good drama is all about...I like, I've discovered, going a little farther than that. The criminal minds attract me. The aberrant, the twisted, the dark and labyrinthine people that might seem normal enough at first, but wind up soulless or downright creepy underneath. It's the people that do heinous things that interest me. I want to understand. I want to build the logical (or fatally illogical) bridge that takes them where they go. I love the challenge of getting into these people...the kind of people that everybody loves to hate...and giving them life without judging them. Hitler didn't wake up in the morning thinking, "How can I be a little more evil today?" And while we can certainly understand that he was a dark stain on history, I don't mind (read: I love) going there and messing around with the kind of personality that can advocate the death of millions.
There's a safety in it, playing pretend. With terrible, believable antagonists on film, we can learn from our mistakes before we make them.
Also...as an addendum, I believe I'd like to stay up in this area, even if (hopefully when) I'm working more and more. I find I like the half-hour to and from Hollywood. It uses a little gas, certainly, but that's nothing fuel efficient driving doesn't soften, and it gives me a fabulous chance to focus going into a job and reflect coming out.
The Santa Clarita Valley is probably home for a good, long time.
Well, that was fun.
Really.
No sarcasm intended.
Not, "Well, that was fun..."
Rather, "Well, that was fun."
I got the notification yesterday to come down to Hollywood today (North Hollywood, really...or, as it's labeled by the locals, absurdly enough, NoHo) for an audition on a student film. Good times.
I didn't really know much about the project, but I did know I was auditioning for a sadistic infantry captain.
The audition itself consisted of a prepared monologue, and an improv. There were sides to be had (sides=the part of the script that's pertinent to you) but when I got in the room, they went out the window. It was, "Here's this guy, you're about to kill him, but you want to ring some sadistic pleasure out of it first. Go!"
Awesome.
This exercise followed the first use of my new favorite monologue, from Squirrels by David Mamet. It plays as well to real auditors as it does in my head. That was also awesome.
When an audition is fun like that, it's compensation in itself. I got to play around. If I get the part, it's even better.
So thank you, Mr. Mamet for a great monologue, and thank you Dr. Allen, for all of those twisted improvs we did in advanced acting.
Really.
No sarcasm intended.
Not, "Well, that was fun..."
Rather, "Well, that was fun."
I got the notification yesterday to come down to Hollywood today (North Hollywood, really...or, as it's labeled by the locals, absurdly enough, NoHo) for an audition on a student film. Good times.
I didn't really know much about the project, but I did know I was auditioning for a sadistic infantry captain.
The audition itself consisted of a prepared monologue, and an improv. There were sides to be had (sides=the part of the script that's pertinent to you) but when I got in the room, they went out the window. It was, "Here's this guy, you're about to kill him, but you want to ring some sadistic pleasure out of it first. Go!"
Awesome.
This exercise followed the first use of my new favorite monologue, from Squirrels by David Mamet. It plays as well to real auditors as it does in my head. That was also awesome.
When an audition is fun like that, it's compensation in itself. I got to play around. If I get the part, it's even better.
So thank you, Mr. Mamet for a great monologue, and thank you Dr. Allen, for all of those twisted improvs we did in advanced acting.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Learning Curve
I got that paying gig I mentioned in my last post.
It paid $200 for the half day. That was awesome. What is not awesome, but rather intensely thought provoking, is what follows.
Let's get the basics out of the way first. This was an internal instructional video for the Church of Scientology. I didn't know that when I submitted for the role. By the time I was called back, I'd discovered this fact. I knew this when I was cast.
Instead of following Internet tradition at this point and launching into a raving tirade about the evils of Scientology, I'm going to go through the ups and downs and ins and outs of the moral debate that I went through in the process of doing this job.
At first, I didn't reject the project out of hand. My logic went something like this: This is a video aimed at willing participants of this religious/science of the mind system. I'm not actively participating in the propagation of a religion other than my own, but rather simply facilitating the creation of material that people who've already chosen this belief system will use to do their thing. Analogously: I might not like potato salad, but it doesn't hurt to play on a script on how to make potato salad.
I was sent a lot of material the day before going into this project. I mean a lot. Five attachments explaining the basic concept of Dianetics (the Scientologists understanding of the mind) the "correct" procedures for actors according to L. Ron Hubbard, the "correct" focus on diction and delivery for the actor according to L. Ron Hubbard, a summary sheet of the procedures of a Dianetic auditing session (which, in Scientology, is supposed to subplant all other forms of psychological treatment, and elevate the human to a higher level), and the simple sheet containing directions.
I read this material. Aside from being slightly bamboozled that this religion has accepted, standardized procedures for everything, I was troubled by the summary of Dianetics. Before I read this, it had seemed as though Scientology was just a different approach to psychology. It's a bit more than that. I won't go into gory details, but here are the important points in terms of this post.
1) According to the religion, it's a scientific fact that man is good. It's not a belief. It's a fact.
"The Clear [the elevated human], the goal of Dianetic therapy, can be created from psychotic, neurotic, deranged, criminal, or normal people if they have organically sound nervous systems. He demonstrates the basic nature of Mankind and that basic nature has been found uniformly and invariably to be good. That is now established scientific fact, not an opinion."
2) According to the religion, a person can reduce their problems and graduate themselves toward the "Clear" status by effort, commitment and participation in Dianetics (which is represented as a discovery of an ancient and universal truth about the mechanics of the mind and body).
My issues with these...
Not only is it irritating and academically irresponsible to toss around ideas as scientific facts without appropriate references, on a broader level, this assertion of proven innate goodness flies in the face of what I strongly believe about the nature of man. My assertion (the Biblical assertion) was created good, but rebelled against God, spiritually dying in the process. Something that is dead cannot make itself alive. So in a bit of a nutshell response, not only is it a fallacy to instill false hope in people that we're good, it's a deeper fallacy to insist that we're good and then insist that all we need to do to achieve more good is to try harder. On top of that, not only is it, "we can be good if we try harder," it's, "we can be good if we try harder at this thing that we just discovered in the last hundred years...and there's no other way to really do it."
Okay, I hear the alarm bells ringing for everybody out there, saying, "Christianity says there's no other way, too, hypocrite!"
Let me [briefly] draw the distinction and move on. If we can save ourselves from ourselves, it's patently ridiculous to insist that any one person or group could have a monopoly on the procedure. This is Scientology. If we cannot save ourselves from ourselves, and need to be made alive by God, it's perfectly reasonable that said God could engineer only one way for it to work. If that doesn't make sense or pisses you off, email or comment, I'm moving on.
These fundamental conflicts between my beliefs and Scientology's canon were disturbing, but I didn't back out of the job. I was still on the, "I'm not telling people to do it, I'm helping them understand how to do it, because they've already decided they want to," track.
Then, sometime in the middle of waiting to go on set after wardrobe and make-up, it occurred to me. If I was in Germany in the 1930s, I could say, "I'm not telling people to believe in the doctrines of the NSDAP (Nazi Party), I'm just taking their money and helping explain the minutiae to those who are already in."
Let me be very clear: I AM NOT comparing Scientology to National Socialism. The analogy applies insofar as it speaks to the fundamental conflict between my beliefs and theirs. I find the tenets of Scientology false, and whether I'm encouraging new converts, or instructing the "faithful" in how to perpetuate their religion, I'm still solidifying a religious belief I find false and contradictory to the discovery of the only True God. I can't do that in good conscience.
I did the job, and I'll take the money, and I'll tell you why: I went into this project ignorant. I learned as I went, and I know what I need to know in order to make an informed decision in the future. If I did one of their projects again, it would be dirty money (for me).
I titled the post "Learning Curve" because it applies in more ways than just the one I've described. Not only did I learn enough about basic Scientology to hold a conversation with a Scientologist and not get lost (a good thing), I learned the limits of what I'm willing to ideologically sacrifice (or endanger, perhaps) for the sake of acting. It was nice to realize that I wasn't so happy about getting a paying job that it didn't matter that what I was doing flew in the face of my spirituality.
I'm pretty sure this whole experience was a part of The Plan so that I could wrangle up all of this self-understanding before I got deeper into the culture. There's a lot of Scientologists out here, and, while I'm sure I risk making enemies of a few just with this post, I'm comfortable with their presence, far more than I was when I had no idea what they believed.
At the last: It's funny to me that some Christian churches can be just as demanding and legalistic about procedures for every little thing as Scientology is. It's even funnier that this kind of Christianity (the kind that insists learning about other belief systems is somehow "giving up") is exactly the Christianity that paralyzes the individual's ability to evangelize.
It paid $200 for the half day. That was awesome. What is not awesome, but rather intensely thought provoking, is what follows.
Let's get the basics out of the way first. This was an internal instructional video for the Church of Scientology. I didn't know that when I submitted for the role. By the time I was called back, I'd discovered this fact. I knew this when I was cast.
Instead of following Internet tradition at this point and launching into a raving tirade about the evils of Scientology, I'm going to go through the ups and downs and ins and outs of the moral debate that I went through in the process of doing this job.
At first, I didn't reject the project out of hand. My logic went something like this: This is a video aimed at willing participants of this religious/science of the mind system. I'm not actively participating in the propagation of a religion other than my own, but rather simply facilitating the creation of material that people who've already chosen this belief system will use to do their thing. Analogously: I might not like potato salad, but it doesn't hurt to play on a script on how to make potato salad.
I was sent a lot of material the day before going into this project. I mean a lot. Five attachments explaining the basic concept of Dianetics (the Scientologists understanding of the mind) the "correct" procedures for actors according to L. Ron Hubbard, the "correct" focus on diction and delivery for the actor according to L. Ron Hubbard, a summary sheet of the procedures of a Dianetic auditing session (which, in Scientology, is supposed to subplant all other forms of psychological treatment, and elevate the human to a higher level), and the simple sheet containing directions.
I read this material. Aside from being slightly bamboozled that this religion has accepted, standardized procedures for everything, I was troubled by the summary of Dianetics. Before I read this, it had seemed as though Scientology was just a different approach to psychology. It's a bit more than that. I won't go into gory details, but here are the important points in terms of this post.
1) According to the religion, it's a scientific fact that man is good. It's not a belief. It's a fact.
"The Clear [the elevated human], the goal of Dianetic therapy, can be created from psychotic, neurotic, deranged, criminal, or normal people if they have organically sound nervous systems. He demonstrates the basic nature of Mankind and that basic nature has been found uniformly and invariably to be good. That is now established scientific fact, not an opinion."
2) According to the religion, a person can reduce their problems and graduate themselves toward the "Clear" status by effort, commitment and participation in Dianetics (which is represented as a discovery of an ancient and universal truth about the mechanics of the mind and body).
My issues with these...
Not only is it irritating and academically irresponsible to toss around ideas as scientific facts without appropriate references, on a broader level, this assertion of proven innate goodness flies in the face of what I strongly believe about the nature of man. My assertion (the Biblical assertion) was created good, but rebelled against God, spiritually dying in the process. Something that is dead cannot make itself alive. So in a bit of a nutshell response, not only is it a fallacy to instill false hope in people that we're good, it's a deeper fallacy to insist that we're good and then insist that all we need to do to achieve more good is to try harder. On top of that, not only is it, "we can be good if we try harder," it's, "we can be good if we try harder at this thing that we just discovered in the last hundred years...and there's no other way to really do it."
Okay, I hear the alarm bells ringing for everybody out there, saying, "Christianity says there's no other way, too, hypocrite!"
Let me [briefly] draw the distinction and move on. If we can save ourselves from ourselves, it's patently ridiculous to insist that any one person or group could have a monopoly on the procedure. This is Scientology. If we cannot save ourselves from ourselves, and need to be made alive by God, it's perfectly reasonable that said God could engineer only one way for it to work. If that doesn't make sense or pisses you off, email or comment, I'm moving on.
These fundamental conflicts between my beliefs and Scientology's canon were disturbing, but I didn't back out of the job. I was still on the, "I'm not telling people to do it, I'm helping them understand how to do it, because they've already decided they want to," track.
Then, sometime in the middle of waiting to go on set after wardrobe and make-up, it occurred to me. If I was in Germany in the 1930s, I could say, "I'm not telling people to believe in the doctrines of the NSDAP (Nazi Party), I'm just taking their money and helping explain the minutiae to those who are already in."
Let me be very clear: I AM NOT comparing Scientology to National Socialism. The analogy applies insofar as it speaks to the fundamental conflict between my beliefs and theirs. I find the tenets of Scientology false, and whether I'm encouraging new converts, or instructing the "faithful" in how to perpetuate their religion, I'm still solidifying a religious belief I find false and contradictory to the discovery of the only True God. I can't do that in good conscience.
I did the job, and I'll take the money, and I'll tell you why: I went into this project ignorant. I learned as I went, and I know what I need to know in order to make an informed decision in the future. If I did one of their projects again, it would be dirty money (for me).
I titled the post "Learning Curve" because it applies in more ways than just the one I've described. Not only did I learn enough about basic Scientology to hold a conversation with a Scientologist and not get lost (a good thing), I learned the limits of what I'm willing to ideologically sacrifice (or endanger, perhaps) for the sake of acting. It was nice to realize that I wasn't so happy about getting a paying job that it didn't matter that what I was doing flew in the face of my spirituality.
I'm pretty sure this whole experience was a part of The Plan so that I could wrangle up all of this self-understanding before I got deeper into the culture. There's a lot of Scientologists out here, and, while I'm sure I risk making enemies of a few just with this post, I'm comfortable with their presence, far more than I was when I had no idea what they believed.
At the last: It's funny to me that some Christian churches can be just as demanding and legalistic about procedures for every little thing as Scientology is. It's even funnier that this kind of Christianity (the kind that insists learning about other belief systems is somehow "giving up") is exactly the Christianity that paralyzes the individual's ability to evangelize.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)