Hold on to your hats, here comes the next rant...

Let's say I drove out to an audition. Let's say it was a five hour drive round trip. Let's say the audition took all of five minutes. Let's say the director barely even looked and maybe mumbled a "thank you" on my way out. Let's say that was most of a tank of gas, parking, and general pain in the assedness of driving anywhere in Massachusetts on a Sunday.

Let's say that was last weekend. Let's say that this coming weekend was going to be rehearsals for this upcoming short/independent/non-paid movie. Let's say that in July there would be seven shooting days. Let's say that as a prospective actor I've held all those days so I won't have to cancel plans in cast I get cast. Nine days, haven't been able to say yes to anything.

What do you do when you've heard nothing?

Not being cast? No big deal. It felt like the part was already someones and they were waiting out the hours. That's fine. Maybe they didn't care for my audition or just felt I wasn't right for the part. I don't care about that either. That's auditioning.

Not being told I wouldn't be used? That's a Big. Fucking. Deal.

I would think it's basic common courtesy. "Hey, sorry we couldn't use you. Thanks for coming out." Is that so goddam hard? Hell, in today's world you do that in an email and you don't have to explain anything or have to listen to sobbing. Is that so fucking hard? I was doing this out of basic goodwill. People like you make me lose that a little at a time and I hate it.

I wrote about this a while back in my letter to independent filmmakers. I will also restate my severe ire at director's who never tell you about progress on movies you've completed shooting. "Hey everybody, this is my monthly email to the cast and crew of blank movie. Had to be at my day job/class/computer crashed so I haven't gotten any work done." Is that so fucking hard too? I hate HAte HATE pestering people, it makes me feel like I'm the one being the dick, and I'm not. It tells me that my time is cheap to you, director, and I'm not part of the process. This shit gets remembered.

A new one I've found is director's who finish the movie and never bother to tell you and/or need seven hundred emails and phone calls to get the fucking copy that you were promised before you shot the thing.

This was supposed to make me less angry. It isn't.

So, readers, the question I have for you is this. Do I email this producer and politely suggest that if ever a movie is done under him/her, it would behoove them to notify those that weren't chosen? Not in an angry email, no that would be far too satisfying. Something polite.

Does that make me the dick actor?

Worst medical-legal jargon I've ever read. Got every little bit of it wrong.

No, really, they suck.

I've had the displeasure of watching two movies that make me feel completely disgusted. The Strangers and Funny Games.

I'm getting a little tired of horror-type movies looking for the 'realness' of the genre. The Strangers, when not mindlessly boring, was nowhere near fun, mindless, offering little in the way of character development, and generally stupid. There was no point to the movie other than to watch innocent people be terrorized and ultimately murdered. There. I spoiled it for you. The good guys die, never had a chance. I have now saved you the nine dollars you would spend in a theater. I would rather watch Friday the 13th 2000 than this.

Funny Games I found even more disturbing. If you check out the discussion on the movie it's a statement about you the viewer. The director (who already made the movie in Germany but felt we would 'get it' better) wants you to believe that you can stop the torture at any time, just press stop.

Bullshit.

I rented this movie to watch a movie, not turn it off. Once again, no development, no reason for it to exist. There's easily a dozen shots that are longer than five minutes, none of which serve any purpose, unless the purpose was to bore me to tears.

Sorry, I rant.

(They all die in Funny Games, too. Just saved you two hours.)

Are These Really Milestones?

My face has finally met the Big Screen.

In September I wrote about my first Big Movie Extra Experience. That movie trailer is here and I am in it for about two seconds. Hold the applause.

I am now addicted to Slings & Arrows. If you do theater, you know all these people. If you feel Shakespearean actors are the most insufferable of all, you'll totally get it, then you'll want to read Hamlet again.

I can't shake this feeling of creative ennui. I'm in the trenches with two different scripts that are on draft two, so everything I wrote reads like complete shit now. I'm working on the shorter of the two just to get it done and out of my head so I can make room for the next great undertaking.

The movie I was supposed to do this summer has ended up not happening due to equipment failure. Several options were proposed but none seemed to be ideal for the production staff so they decided to scrap the whole thing. I think the overall feeling is one of relief. Everybody's got things on their plate, so there's one less thing to make time for. It's irritating that schedule wrangling ended up being for nothing but I don't mind getting those days back.

Another possible film project is working its way slowly to the surface. It has several things going for it. It's local, as in less than twenty minutes from my house, it's interesting, two thirds of the cast are already awesome, and it's local. I am tired of having to drive 2+ hours to shoot from one to eighteen hours just to have to get back in the car to do it all over again. Yes, of course I'll keep doing that. But I would like this one to happen to see what it's like not being ridiculously exhausted when on set.

I don't have much to say, but thought I'd pop my head in.

Really, I came to brag. I've decided to drop $ on concerts this year. I'm old enough and earn enough that I no longer need to accept nosebleed or lawn seats to see a show. So the concerts I have tickets for now are.

Coldplay
NIN
NIN
Radiohead

Yes, that's nine inch nails twice. I've seen them(him) three times in the past and that show has never failed to knock me off my feet. (Not literally, I never buy floor tickets for a show like that.)

Focus slowly returns

For the past couple weeks I haven't been fired up for much. Maybe it's a subtler form of post perfomance depression, but it wasn't at all bad. I watched movies, saw friends, got a ton of sleep. I just never really felt the itch to get creative.

For two reasons the juices are flowing. One, the script I've been writing (oh so slowly) has finally been finished. At least the first draft. I've been working on it since November and it's about four months overdue. For the last week I'd been pecking away, promising to write at least four pages but walking away after two. This past week the muse sat down next to me and we cranked out the last twenty five pages in three sittings. Now it's off to the guy I'm working on the story with and we can start hacking away at it.

Finishing the first draft is always a bittersweet experience. You've finally gotten all those pages down. The big push to just get it to the the end is done. Might as well jump. (Jump!) Do a funny dance. Drink something. I did all of these things and more. Then run away from it for a week and read it all back. I promise, it'll be crap. The real work begins now.

Of course, now that I've finished the first draft for this script I have to get into story meetings with the second guy I'm working with. This involves doing a remake of an old movie, obviously can't say which. Where the other script our intention is to raise financing and shoot guerilla ourselves (and the script is tailored to it) this one is a spec script, with some nebulous connection to a NY producer. I never get my hopes up about that kind if stuff, I'm far more interested in writing the script itself.

The second thing that happened was hanging out with the Martin & Silveira boys last night. Apparently I know a little more about wrangling ProTools than they do. I've been banging my head against it longer. Ran into the boys at the watering hole at the beginning of the week and they asked me to stop by. Had a great time listening to, discussing, and playing music.

My batteries are recharged.

Juno - and my reaction to it.

So recently the lady friend and myself set up on the couch to watch the courageously hip, Academy Award winning indie flick Juno. Allow me to offer my thoughts.

In the first fifteen minutes my hair blew back like the Maxell commercial from the tidal wave of hipness I was encountering. Every second, every word of this movie is a mathematically precise example of chock-full-o'-hip. The soundtrack crawled out of the speakers in its indie-unwashed-tattooed-protesting way and hung out right next to your left ear to say, "See?! We're
HIP GODDAMMIT!" In complete defiance of the fact that teenagers don't speak that way, that parents are never that cavalier about their children mouthing off in that way, ("I should smack her for saying that, but it's just so witty and clever.") Juno never breaks stride. I thought this was going to be a long trip.

From minutes fifteen to thirty, I watched with my mental arms crossed. I decided I hated this girl. I hated the boy who knocked her up. I hate the adoptive family. I am watching just to keep watching to keep my street cred up. (I have a policy of finishing almost every movie I start to watch, notable exception to this rule is Freddie Got Fingered, horrible.) Most of all I hated myself for seeing Diablo Cody accept the Oscar for best screenplay and know deep in my heart what this movie was going to be, but still wanting to believe.

After minute thirty something strange happened. I grew a callous over my over-hip sensor, immune to the pop-culture references delivered wryly and self-congratulatory. The acting went from brash and masturbatory to actually being characters that interact. Bateman I liked, personally I think he delivered one of the hardest roles, not because he was the coolest or most heroic, but because he was believable, completely.

(On one note of pop-cult reference I liked, this movie does have the best reference to 80's after school cartoons I've ever seen.)

In the end, I had to like it. I realized, again, that movies aren't supposed to be real life, they're only going for verisimilitude. I know why the 50-to-80 year olds who make up the Academy loved the S.P., they have no idea how false it is.

Oh, and the soundtrack that drove a pick in my ear? I can't stop listening to it. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

The Final Chapter of the Insanity

(I promise I've been working on this for a while.)

I'm trying to wrap my head around this one.

The end is bittersweet, sometimes more one than the other. I'm really glad to get my life back. It's funny how everything else just seems to stop for a while when I'm in the run of a show. At the same time, I'm usually incredibly depressed for a few days after knowing it's all over. Any actor can tell you about post-show depression. Just ask them.

This time around, I'm not. I'm exhausted, that's for sure. Even without a rip roaring party at the end of the run, I still managed to sleep til almost two in the afternoon Sunday. Monday, pretty much the same.

But I feel okay with letting McMurphy wander his merry way off my path. Being him was definitely like slipping into a well made suit, (Friends comparisons: "He's a hard partying wiseass who bristles at authority, REAL stretch.) but for some reason this time I feel no need to cling to it. Together we said all we wanted to say, and we bounced on a high note. How many times in your life do you get to say that? Maybe I'm becoming more mature about it, or maybe it's that I have so many other things to turn my energy back to. Either way, I finish this chapter with new friends, came full circle on a few personal issues, and got to play one of the best characters written.

I feel we accomplished something that hasn't happened in the area for a long time. We put on a show that no one really thought could be done, or done very well at best. We had a pretty drama-free (offstage) run from casting through to strike. People came out to see it, people that usually don't do thea-tuh. We had huge crowds who were incredibly interactive. For two weeks we became a small spot on the area map. The show brings out quite a few generations who are all interested in seeing it. You can take that attendance as a given, but the second weekend obviously told us we were doing more than 'putting it on'.

I wanted to write some of the things that were said to me after the show, but I just realized how incredibly arrogant that is. A lot of people said a lot of nice things, and people I've never met made it a point to stop and say hi. I was very grateful for their praise.

There were a ton of funny 'woops' moments during production, I think these moments are the ones we actors remember most. I could tell you about the final night when McMurphy is supposed to make his first entrance like a tornado, all energy and laughter, but for some reason a frog jumped down my throat that moment so he entered like a British police officer 'whatsallthis'-ing. Or the night when my 'funny' boxers are supposed to be next and I drop my pants and...they...aren't...there. Or the poor kid playing the aide who I've never messed with, until he opened the door during my offstage rendition of 'F$ck you, I'm drunk.' You get the point.

There were some holes. We were so well rehearsed that when an audience showed up, people got excited when the audience responded. Some of the guys wanted to give them more, sometimes it took away from the action at hand. I don't think it ever pulled too much attention away from the spine of the show but it damages the work that the other actors put into making it the experience we all wanted the audience to have. I spent a lot of head time making sure the play honored all the characters, not make it a 'McMurphy' show. Everyone should have had their moments to shine.

The biggest question in the aftermath I heard was, "What are you going to do next?" The first was that no, uh-uh, no way am I doing Oklahoma. Sorry folks, less than no interest. I have a rule about the theater I do just for enjoyment: I should enjoy it. I do not enjoy that show, no matter how good I'd be at this or that character. Dracula, maybe. For reasons I can't divulge right now that's way too close to me personally right now, and I had a bad enough time soaking up three different versions of OFOtCN. Another group is doing a locally written show, a musical no less. I saw the original production and I liked it. Schedule can only tell.

I thought I had a lot more to say on the subject. Ah well, let's get to pictures. Apologies for the formatting, I still haven't figured it out.

l to r: Harding, Cheswick, Billy, and Martini. As fine a group of psychos as you can find.

There was a better pic of this somewhere, but I can't find it. McMurphy meets the residents. On the floor is Scanlon, back in the nurses station is Nurse Flynn.

McMurphy meets the Chief. I'm not a small guy, so you get the idea. Wonderful actor.

Martini.

I have no idea what was going through my mind at this moment, but I love this picture. It looks like I got him.

McMurphy confronts Harding. I'll pretty much work with this actor any chance I get.

It would take too many words to explain why, but this is one of my favorite moments in the show. There's no feeling like having an audience CHEER for your character.

The end of Act I, the World Series. This is an early rehearsal photo, but it's as perfect a shot as I can get. It's currently my wallpaper.

The basketball game. Good times.

I like this picture for two reasons. One, it's great moment between the Chief and McMurphy. Two, I look almost buff.

After the shock treatment. This is my other favorite moment. It says everything about this show, this character, more than I could ever say.

The amazing, incredible cast.

A much longer, incredibly verbose post about the final weekend of the show and my reaction to it will show up soon, once I've finally wrapped my head around the whole thing.

And there will be pictures.