Prelude to a Big Break

We try to party like it's 1999...

Nostalgia

This isn’t my first trip to Hollywood. When I went the first time, I came home defeated. The school was terrible and I realized – almost immediately – that it was an outrageous mistake. I arrived for the final day of classes with my car totally packed. Save for my friend Taylor – who found me on Facebook this week – I didn’t feel the need to say goodbye to anyone.

Coming home didn’t make things better.

From May through December of 2001 my parents separated and ultimately divorced; I got a job selling vacuums door to door; I let a friend of mine down when she really needed me in an ugly, deplorable fashion; I was reckless with my own safety and well-being; I ran out of money and ultimately did something that shamed my family and still haunts me to this day.

If I could wipe those eight months from my memory forever, I’d do it. But I can’t. So I’ve had to learn. Slowly.

Last night we had a bachelor party for my buddy Alain. Al and I haven’t seen one another since August of 2001 when I blew off work – again, selling vacuums – to drive up to his cottage in Port Sydney. Naturally, a bunch of dudes from our high school showed up. I see these guys a little bit, but not too much. When we get done retelling – and subconsciously embellishing – our high school conquests, the talk turns to what’s happening now.

Here’s what happening now: I’m going to Hollywood. Again.

In the end, it took me 9 years to circle back to what I was always supposed to do. The lessons learned in that time period present some solid evidence that everything (everything!) happens for a reason.

Overall, I was happy to see everybody and share my plans with them. Selfishly, I was delighted that my high-school yearbook quote was right on the money:

“Everyday things change, but basically they stay the same.” — DM

Go on... Try to figure out my movie.

Not a ton to talk about today, since I want to avoid posting just for the sake of posting… that being said, I have some thoughts.

The movie 1408 with John Cusack made me mad. Normal protocol here at PTABB is a link to the movie’s IMDB page, or maybe even the trailer on YouTube. Not this time. What a heinous film.

In the spring of ‘08 George Stroumboulopoulos invited me down to a taping of The Hour. I had mentioned to George when he was taping a guest spot on Rent A Goalie that my Grandfather was a big fan of his. So Strombo hooked us up. Good dude. In the chair that day was none other than John Cusack, who was doing the rounds for his flick, War Inc. — In spite of the films genre (it’s a dark comedy), the subject matter (war) meant that the audience got serious Cusack; philanthropist Cusack; I’m not going to crack a smile for 11 solid minutes Cusack. Whatever. That’s your priority, Johnny. But, I’d just like to say…

That song and dance rings a little hollow when you star in a flaming piece of dog shit like 1408.

This cannot be overstated: The movie has no point. It is pointless. It is – as a matter of fact – bereft of point. You were there to cash a cheque, which is fine, just spare me the mumbling meandering, feigned annoyance when Strombo asks you a question about anything other than the US Occupation of Iraq. Seriously. (You’re lucky that I didn’t hold a boom-box over my head with a pre-recorded list of creative obscenities.)

My Cusack impression. (Nailed it!)

When 1408 ended I turned to my wife and said: “Well, I guess Hollywood just ran out of ideas for horror movies with a beginning middle and end”. She nodded, I continued. “I honestly don’t know what happened… and he burns to death at the end without finding any sort of meaningful resolution that I could see.” (I am now officially talking to myself.) “I think they created 8 to 12 instances where they tried to frighten the audience only they forgot to develop any other aspect of the movie.” (Wife goes to bed.) “Are we sure that he’s dead? And why is he haunting Samuel L. Jackson? And what the fuck is Samuel L. Jackson doing here? Does he have a gambling problem in real life? Did the producers kidnap his children? I’m so very, very confused and upset.”

Less than a day later, I’ve figured out the lesson: I work in a silly business, where silly movies get made. John Cusack’s a nice enough guy, I’m sure. There’s an outside chance that he thinks his sweat has the same consistency as holy water, but that isn’t his fault. When you achieve any amount of celebrity the world becomes a surreal place where your words appear wiser, your sense of self-worth becomes distorted and it becomes impossible to actually pay for anything. (I’m astounded that this last factoid hasn’t spawned a reality show called Celebrity Perks.)

Today on Celebrity Perks, Taylor Lautner attempts to purchase a pair of sneakers in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

My poooiiint is… In an industry where weird things happen (like 1408 making $130,000,000 worldwide) there is no linear path to the top. There’s only hard work.

So, thank you, John Cusack. You taught me a valuable lesson, which I, in turn, shared with the world. I’ll never get those 106 minutes of my life back… But still, thank you.

Louis The Dog

This pose wasn’t working at all. Then Lou made the executive decision to drape his paw over the top step.

That’s when the magic happened.  Maybe it’s just me, but I think Lou looks like a young Bob Dylan, except as a dog.

On a related note, if there are any dog lovers out there, pick up a copy of The Art of Racing in the Rain.  It’s the greatest book with a dog as the first person narrator in history (small selection pool, but still).  If you read it and don’t like it, we can’t be friends.

Spielberg ruined it for everyone

Auditions are inherently disappointing, even when they’re awesome. Both of my auditions today were just that. Awesome. Concurrently, they left me wanting. Why? Steven Spielberg, that’s why! When Spielberg was auditioning a young Henry Thomas for the part of “Elliot” in E.T. he wraps up the proceedings – seconds after Thomas finishes – with, “Ok kid, you got the job”. (Wait until 3 seconds are left in the video)

Can you imagine? “Ok kid, you got the job.” Six words, seven syllables and zero hesitation. That’s what I want. I want an audition to end with some semblance of the following:

• Very good, Stephen. Works starts next Monday.
• Well… (Long pause, slightly effeminate tone) Sommmmebody came prepared.
• Your agent’s number is listed on your resume right? Is he going to be at his desk in the next five minutes?
• Ok kid, you got the job.

This isn’t just Steven Spielberg’s fault; though, it is fun to create a grudge against a famous director. We live in an era of instant gratification. We want, what we want, when we want, which is always right away. For that reason alone, solid preparation before an audition / job interview is paramount. You need to be at peace with the way you have prepared and executed, otherwise you’ll feel like a home-owner who goes away for the weekend but forgets to lock the garage door. You fret. You agonize. Ultimately (inevitably) you realize that your angst is the by-product of a nagging sense that you didn’t do everything within your power to get the job.

There are worse feelings, but they almost always involve something illegal.

I nailed my auditions today. So I wait, peacefully.

Charting a course for Hollywood

I’ve driven to Hollywood before. August of 2000… On the way down I did the drive there in 3.25 days. I could have made it on the Wednesday save for the following reasons:

1. I was 19 and scared shitless.
2. I had no idea where I was going to live in Hollywood, let alone how to navigate around it. Thus, I wanted to arrive mid-morning, as opposed to late night.
3. The finale of the first season of Survivor was on. I watched it in Barstow, California. How have we not seen a feature film on the first season of Survivor? Here’s one man’s no-brainer cast: Marcia Gay Harden as Sue, Phillip Seymour Hoffman as Rich (gotta get an actor with some chops to circumnavigate the great Richard Hatch), Kelly Clarkson as Kelly, Anthony Hopkins as Rudy, John Salley as Gervase, Chris Carpenter as Joel (they’re identical) and Jeff Probst… as Jeff Probst. Here’s a link to the original cast and the famous “if I saw you dying of thirst I wouldn’t give you a drink of water” speech. Memories.

On the way home I did the drive in 48 hours, with the following stops:

1. Subway Restaurants. (The Jared diet before the Jared diet was a marketing campaign designed to exploit fat people.)
2. A bar in Effingham, Illinois. It was Game 4 of the Raptors/Knicks series from 2001.
3. On the side of the road somewhere near Michigan. Not my finest moment.

This time I’m going equipped with an iPhone, 5,200 songs, podcasts and fuel efficiency.

Funny... It doesn't look that far.

Total damage on the trip is 4,065 km (2,525 miles for my American friends).

If I leave on the Tuesday, I should arrive on the Thursday evening. Think Iowa Tuesday night, Utah-ish on Wednesday and West Hollywood Thursday.

Smart Car should probably be filming this, right? I’m going to fire them an email.

During the drive I’ll be doing updates at the end of each day replete with photos and progress reports. Ideally, this would be a live stream via Twitter / Cover It Live but I wont have an American phone until I get to Hollywood. To get a decent roaming plan with a Canadian Carrier you need to sign over exclusivity of your liver, pancreas and brain stem. Alas.

If anyone has any ideas / tips for a cross country drive, feel free to drop me a note.

And of course… Thanks for visiting. Things are just getting started. SA.

Tough? Yes. Gangster? Sure. Inappropriate? Perhaps.

Somebody’s elbow took issue with my face last night in Jiu-Jitsu.  Yeah!

Off to teach a class, then I have two beauty auditions.  Thug life, indeed.

(And just so we’re clear…  I’ll try and limit the number of times that the Picture of the Day is a self-portrait.  It’s not as egotistical as Tucker Max twittering while being fellated… but it isn’t that far off.)

So many lines... Probably enough time.

The Audition Train

Most people should be familiar with the expression “when it rains it pours”. Well, in Toronto, with auditions… when it rains it pours. Much like sneezing fits and Seth Rogen features; Toronto auditions come at you in a furious wave of proximation. From yesterday through tomorrow, I have four.

Let’s break them down!

(For reasons that should be obvious, I’m going to have to be a little coy about the specifics around these projects. Like I said before, once the audition process comes to it’s conclusion – positive or negative – I’ll be more forthcoming and include any goodies, like audition tapes, that I collect along the way. For those of you who don’t know why the reasons are obvious… The acting industry is somewhat secretive about their process. Okay, they’re a lot secretive. Fine… they’re secretive to their detriment. Dick Cheneyian, even. Regardless, there’s a difference between being honest and being an idiot. I think.)

1. The MOW where I’m probably too young: Had this baby yesterday. I’d say more, but everything, right down to the atmosphere in the room, was blah. My reading was blah. There was no direction beforehand or afterwards. It was, I suppose, everything that vexes me about auditions. (Just a quick note: Please don’t read angry / bitter / disenfranchised / constipated / belligerent from the previous sentence.) Honestly, I can’t think of anything that was gained by having me in the room other than the fact that I was actually in the room. If you aren’t going to engage the actor beyond asking them if they’re ready then why spend the money to rent the space for the auditions when you can have the actor spend their own money on a self-tape? Wait a minute… Should I be the CFO of a production company? Let’s wrap this up.
2. The CBC Show that (apparently) got away: A few weeks ago I was at an annual party in Muskoka when I ran into somebody who works for the production company that runs this show. Long story short, she told me that I was (past tense) in the running for a series regular on this (relatively) successful show. That was news to me. As for the here and now, it’s a guest-starring role and the character looks like it has a little meat on it. Think somewhere along the lines of a poor man’s Don Draper but without the rape-ish moments. Sign me up!
3. The feature film that may or may not rhyme with Schmesident Fevil. It’s a lead. It looks awesome. The sides are good. The one off-shoot: The character description sounds a little bit like Christian Bale… in The Machinist. Call me vain, call me veiny or call me dumb… But I’ve been fasting (relative to the way I normally eat) for the better part of a day. Tonight, I’m going to exercise for three consecutive hours (weights, spin class and Jiu-Jitsu*). Whatever. At least I’m not an asshole when I’m hungry… (Shhhhhh…..)
4. An Untitled Short Film that falls under the category of ACTRA TIP. Good project, good system and you never know if it will turn out like this one.

This high-end dose of Audtionry (not a word) combined with a self-tape that I did last week for the latest in the Cutting Edge franchise has allowed me to debut a terrifying running feature here at PTABB. I call it: The Audition Meter / The Job Meter for short, and, THE MOST TERRIFYING THING THAT AN ARTIST COULD POSSIBLY DO for long. You can check it out at the top of the sidebar.

There it is, internet. Let it begin…

SA

* – For my extended thoughts on Jiu-Jitsu, here’s a link to the post I wrote after my first class. This might be the best writing that someone with a bruised ego and an inflamed scrotum has ever done.

Family.

Had coffee yesterday with Zain Meghji to talk ACTRA, eTalk, blogs, hosting, exercising, his exciting new project, podcasts and the importance of pictures.  Unfortunately, we didn’t get around to discussing brand-limitation based on a peculiar assimilation of consonants.  Hope to do some more stuff with Zain in the future, for now, here’s his first piece of advice: “all posts need pictures”.

Okay.  Here’s a retro shot of the family.  Wife’s shoulder, Lou’s head, my leg.

If I’m really serious about what constitutes a successful trip to LA, I don’t need to look any further than doing well enough for them to join me.  Why?  You can’t have an impromptu cuddle on hardwood floor with just anybody.

SA

(Here’s a four-word urban-dictionary ready summation of today’s post if you’re running low on time: Don’t sweat the haters.)

Success and Failure

Acting has a much longer tail than most people think. No, acting isn’t a reptile. I’m talking about the “long-tail” of acting within the framework of Chris Anderson’s wonderful book (and blog) by the same name.

The movie-going and television-watching public sees most of the acting industry, but it only reads/cares about a very small portion. This isn’t news. What I’m trying to convey is that you don’t have to reach the upper echelon of acting – or any industry, for that matter – for your career to be considered a success. Less people understand this than you might think; which is odd when you consider it’s blinding logic.

What constitutes a successful 9-month trip to LA? If I’m really going to stretch my legs on that answer, then it’s a much larger post. For the time being let me just say… that I don’t know. The only thing that I can control is the amount of effort that I put forth.

Here’s what I do know: For the first time in a long time I’m comfortable underneath a layer of uncertainty. I might work my ass off and come up empty-handed. I might be overmatched. I might not be good enough. Being an actor forces you to confront these realities on a daily basis and that, my friends, is the main reason why people call this a “hard industry”.

“Hard industry”?… What a ridiculous, misguided statement.

Acting isn’t hard. Being a Veterinarian is hard. Mapping the human genome is hard. Acting, requires nerve. It requires that you put yourself out there and allow other people to judge you. Which is why when somebody seems dismissive of acting, or overly judgmental about it’s wisdom as a career-choice, I don’t get angry, I feel sad. They’re telling me – maybe even subconsciously – that they never had the nerve to pursue their ultimate goal.

There’s only one thing that can actually stand between you and what will make you truly happy within your profession. Everybody knows what it is; some people just don’t want to face up to it.

Podcasts

If this blog works they way that it should, one of the benefits for people should be an opportunity to learn more about the acting industry. This will happen through my experiences, through links that are relevant to the greater purpose and, much to my delight, on podcasts.

On my old website I started up a podcast that quickly devolved into what English Literature students call masturbating.

A lot of so-called journalism today is literary masturbation where, instead of researching a subject and writing an informed and stimulating article, the writer has a wank-fest of verbal indulgence expressing their personal opinion. This is forgiveable in the very young who may be playing with language and style and have lived so shortly their lack of experience absolves them from such a waste of words. You have to make mistakes to learn. The real damage occurs when this behaviour lasts past college!

Just take that paragraph and throw the warm blanket of me loving the sound of my own voice on top of it… You get the idea.

Naturally, I found myself gravitating towards personalities in the entertainment industry whom I would approach with a sports angle. Super idea, genius. If we’ve learned anything over the past 28 years, it’s that people LOVE getting out of their comfort zone.

(Hey… That’s neat. My antagonistic sub-conscious finally made an appearance!)

This time around the idea will be to find innovative, smart, successful people in the entertainment industry (actors, writers, producers, tech geeks, business people, directors, agents, lawyers, entrepreneurs) and find out what brought them to where they are. One of the nice things about podcasts – in the words of Adam Carolla – is that you can go “long form”. If one person a podcast finds a little nugget to nudge them in the right direction… Well, wouldn’t that be lovely? (I can see you nodding.)

I’ve already reached out to a few people, and they’ve been super receptive about coming on. Now, I turn to you. Who would everyone like to hear from? You can drop me an email stephenamell@gmail.com – hit me up on Twitter, or leave a comment.

Have a good weekend everybody.

SA

Auditioning

Did anyone else just feel a chill come through the room? Everyone has an opinion on auditioning, not just people in the business, everyone. Why? Well, because people audition everyday. Whether you’re trying to win over a new group of friends, fit in at your job, find a mate, or succeed in a world where you pretend for a living, people are constantly auditioning.

Take my wife, for example. As I write this she’s downtown giving a presentation to her board of directors. She’s trying to convince them to be more involved in the long-term planning of her business. When we spoke on the phone before the meeting began she sounded exactly like I sound before I have to audition. Excited, a little sleepy and in need of remedial conversation that will allow her to focus on the task at hand while not actually speaking about it. You get the point, I think. The process of auditioning is unavoidable, omnipresent even.

Here’s how the majority of Toronto auditions work:

• You arrive at 10:30 for a 10:45 audition.
• You sit in a room with a bunch of people who sort of look like you. Nobody speaks. Invariably someone shows up (10 minutes late) and whirls through the room like Robin Williams on cocaine. This person is an insecure asshole.
• At 11:00 the casting assistant comes out to let you know that you’re next. Before s/he retreats back into the room one of the other actors talks about an appointment (that exists only in their mind) and passively buds in front of you while stringing together 8 consecutive fragmented sentences.
• 11:2o rolls around and you walk into the room.
• Casting houses exist in weird places. They are never (ever) contextually similar to the setting of your audition scene, and this is because the casting room is an entity unto itself. It is a room with several chairs that do not match. It is always 5 degrees from it’s optimal temperature. It is either far too small or way too big. There is a direct correlation between the familial atmosphere and the number of people in the room, though, oddly, the more people you have the less friendly the room becomes. (I remember an audition for George A. Romero’s Diary of the Dead with roughly 13 people in the room. I felt like Jerry Maguire in that moment right before he launches into the “you complete me” speech.

By the way, my eyes welled up with tears when I watched that clip. What can I say? I’m my mother’s son.

• Somebody asks you if you have any questions. If you surveyed a group of 60 actors and asked them what to do in this situation, 30 of them would say “ask as many questions as possible”, and 30 of them would say “do your best not to breath”. Personally, I like to ask questions, but only ones that pertain to technical aspects of the scene that I don’t understand because the script wasn’t made available.
• You do the scene with a reader you have never met. Once it’s finished (and again, we’re talking about the majority of auditions) someone will say “thank you”, you’ll say “is there anything else that I can do?” and the producers / casting director will lie to you (politely) before telling you to have a nice day.

There are exceptions and we’ll cover those in a moment.

Does that process (I swear to god, I’m not exaggerating) sound productive to you? Does it sound conducive to finding the best actor for the job, or does it sound like an incomplete model that will find the person with the audition technique closest to the preconceived notion of the producer / casting directors?

You can’t see me, but I’m raising my hand for the latter. At the risk of sounding like an embattled curmudgeon, the system – by and large – is an abject failure… when you compare it to the system in LA.

In LA they recognize auditions for what they are: They’re workshops. Auditions are an opportunity for the casting director / producer to see “something” in the performer that inspires them, to find a trace of the character, even if it only comes across in a couple of lines. Once they spot it, they POUNCE on it. Casting directors will stop you right in the middle of the audition and give you a positive affirmation. They’ll tell you to build on a specific beat in the scene that you knocked out of the park. In other words, they try and get the best out of you.

How do I know this? I’ve auditioned in LA at least 50 times. I’ve auditioned in Toronto approximately 200 times. The contrast is startling. And then there’s this…

On no less than 100 occasions my agent has phoned a casting director to obtain feedback from an audition where I haven’t been cast. In this instance the following response is not uncommon: “We were hoping that Stephen would bring a little bit more (insert: comedy / darkness / charm / etc.) to the character.”

Here’s the thing – and this is really important – I have not received that direction in the room.

Why even have the audition? Seriously?

You didn’t have this notion after the fact. I read the scene and it left you wanting; so why not take the time to give me the note in the room? How do you know that I wouldn’t have taken that direction, absorbed it, considered it and then proceeded to knock it out of the fucking park?! Short answer: you don’t. Long answer: you aren’t doing the job to the best of your ability.

And again… How do I know this? Because every time I audition for Clement Virgo I either get hired or submitted to network (which means I’m a top 2 or 3 choice).

Clement Virgo doesn’t audition his actors. Clement Virgo auditions his actors. When he has me in the room the camera never stops rolling. Clement gives me a specific, instructed motivation before every take, of which there are several. Let’s imagine that you’re doing a scene where you are confronting your estranged father. Clement will tell you to do the following things:

• Don’t let your father see any emotion out of you.
• Let all the emotion and anger pour out of you.
• Try to hold it in and succeed.
• Try to hold it in and fail.
• Show him affection even though the dialogue is negative.

In a sense, Clement allows you to get some reps. You get warm, you get involved and most importantly your nerves disappear right around the second take. When I leave the audition, I know that my best foot was put forward. Honestly? That’s all that you can ask for. (I’ll give you one guess who directed the episode of Regenesis where I won a Gemini.)

Why is the system constructed as such? I don’t know. What I do know is I like the prospect of auditioning and LA and self-taping for Toronto projects a whole lot more than my current predicament.

Before we go, here’s a seminal piece of writing on audition technique from first-time producer Nils Parker. Nils co-wrote I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell, which I auditioned for last May in New York City.

If you are an actor, or if you have a job interview (of any type) on the horizon you are doing yourself a disservice if you don’t read this post. Twice.

The Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

Here’s an excerpt:

An actor comes in the room and does a cold reading of the first side completely off-book. Something in his performance shows real potential but is not quite there, so one of us (usually Bob or Tucker) gives him a series of notes about the character’s personality and approach and motivation. Invariably, we are met with a quick “Yeah” at each of those pauses. The quicker and more frequent the “Yeahs”, the more certain I am that he is just waiting for us to stop talking so he can have the floor back and show little or no improvement in his second reading.

It should be no surprise that the actors who’ve done the best have taken the opposite tack. They are generally off-book, but they have the sides with them for reference. Despite what you might think, it’s not an issue of insecurity or lack of confidence. They’ve probably just learned a few lessons in professional humility. No matter how much you prepare for an audition or how certain you are that you’ve got the character all figured out, you can never be sure that your take jives with the views of the director, the writers, and the producers. Knowing that, when these actors get notes after the first reading, they do this really interesting thing–I think it’s called LISTENING–and they spend a minute absorbing the information, looking at the sides, figuring out how those notes create points of adjustment, then gathering themselves and delivering a second read that is almost always appreciably better than the first–which was already good to begin with.

Exactly.

If you’re wondering, my audition went well. Playing Tucker Max is a tricky proposition. I can honestly say that I simply didn’t understand how to tackle the first scene. Pretty sure that I nailed the second scene, but by that point, as Tucker would say, “the die was cast”.

SA