Insecurities & Roles

At peak pandemic, I would wake up hung over and drag myself to the bathroom mirror, and stare resentfully at myself. Why? Because I felt so awful, so depressed and frustrated at the world and my life, but my face still looked youthful and bright. It was so miserable to see a lie reflected at me. Now I feel a little better because for the moment, at least I get to dabble at trying to do what makes me happy. But conversely, I can see my face aging. Something about my skin and my hairline, somewhere in all of that, I feel like I look my age now, rather than the previous constant of five years younger. Or maybe I just look like I am in my late twenties rather than mid- to early twenties, and that is the frustration. Or I look fine. Or properly moisturizing my skin looks bad to me. Who knows. I am just unused to feeling insecure about my looks. In the past, I had assurance that my insecurities could be fixed. Bad teeth? Braces. Bad vision? Contact lenses. Bad body? Work out. I am not sure about the skin, but the hairline can be fixed, as can the worsening vision, and potentially the body can also be improved as well, but all of these things come with a price tag.

I have my first in-person audition in ages tomorrow. I have the lines mostly memorized, but I am struggling to pinpoint the mentality of the role, so we will see what I have settled on by the audition time. I also have two self-tape commercial auditions which, unlike the real acting roles, would be likely to pay a decent amount. And I have a trip to Costa Rica planned for next year, so decent pay would be great to allow me to get eye surgery while I am there, so I can fix one of my problems. The bad vision legitimately gets in the way of work when I have to put in colored contacts, which is the plan in three weeks when I play an alien creature.

Strikes & Need to Work

A historic strike in the entertainment industry has begun. It was looming for months, but now both union writers and actors are on strike. 

I have an audition for the role that I thought I had for eight months. This is the industry, and I have to remind myself to be thankful for the opportunity to audition. Auditioning is a privilege. I had my first callback in ages last week, which was nervewracking. I flubbed my lines a little after they gave me the usual note to tone it down. The adrenaline rush of actually talking to the director can make it hard to dampen that energy, but that is definitely something that I need to get over.

In three weeks, I have a role in a short film using my contortionist skills as an alien creature. The director sent me a script for it, and I immediately had notes. Generally a nice script, and my part has parts that I am excited for, but I asked if I could give suggestions, and told him one of them. He responded that he already has two writers, but then he saw my pitch and said I was right, and he would do some rewrites.

I have another audition, this one for a comedy series on what I just learned might be a kind of legitimate but small studio. And if I remember right, we would shoot in NYC and they would cover travel and lodging. Even if I hated the role, that trip alone would make me want to audition, but the role actually feels like a good fit. It is close to what my podcast character originally was, having to do a job and present information with an overly happy demeanor fighting through the terrible responses.

I have been drinking too much. That desire goes away when I am working. I need to work. I want so badly to work. Even my writing feels like it is stagnating some, because I need to feel it out on stage or camera since it involves so much physicality. But it is torture to go to open mics. Maybe it is not so bad anymore though, now, since I have done a real show. I am not desperate for open mic footage nor pressured to spit out all the words in a set.

Sick, Birthday, & First Standup Show

I finished up my time in Budapest with a stomach bug. It hit hard enough that I canceled my weekend in Paris. But I got the footage I wanted as my tourist character, then I did the same a little bit in London. I hung out with some fun strangers at karaoke for my birthday.

Then I got back to the States and caught a cold. So I rehearsed for my first paid standup comedy gig while fighting a cough, which is one of the worst symptoms to have for public speaking. Fortunately, I had just enough time to mostly recover and to get a solid performance on video. So now I am told that I can shop myself around.

As for the experience, I was well-rehearsed enough that it was a comfortable experience. There were only a couple paying audience members, but they laughed. I did my material with the appropriate amount of improvisation and audience interaction. Thanks to my recent karaoke time, my stage presence was fully engaged. And my material was practiced enough that I was already tired of it, which of course kept me from laughing at any of my own jokes.

So now the task is to get my other bits performance ready. And, of course, to try to write more new things.

I am still at something of a loss now. What do I do with myself to make money? I want to do entertainment, but opportunities feel lacking. Or at least, I do not know how to market myself.

I have auditions lined up this week, so that is something. One specifically wants me to have a reader, but I still only have family, which are people I do not ask because they want to make it their own show.

Apart from going jogging a couple times last week, I have not worked out for over a month, so that is next on today's agenda. Hopefully that will help kick me into a good work ethic as I try to search out opportunities.

Snog & Standup Show

Well, I finally did it. At the ripe old age of almost 33, I finally made out with a girl. After passing up so many opportunities to do so over the years, I was feeling increasingly anxious about any acting job that reqiured romantic interaction. But I went on a pub crawl last night and hung out with Irish med students throughout, and one kept gushing in comparing me to various celebrity actors. So we made out in the club, then again at the door after I walked her back to her hostel.

I was pretty unimpressed with the experience. Granted, I might have been a bad kisser, or maybe she was, but assuming that that was not the case, it makes me feel pretty okay about all those times I skipped over in the past. Previously, one of the reasons why I held back was because I did was afraid of how it would impact the other person emotionally. But fortunately, a pub crawl in Eastern Europe is a great place to find someone with whom to snog without significant consequence.

People in my shared room in my hostel have been sick for days. And yesterday, I was having chills, just laying in bed between trips to the toilet until it was time for the pub crawl. Going out was admittedly not the most ethical thing I could have done, but fortunately, I did feel better once I had a buzz going.

I have reached the point in this trip at which I am kind of tired of being here, which was one of the goals. I have seen enough of the city that I have little excuse to avoid working on writing. This is critical because I booked my first standup comedy show, and it is scheduled for a week after I get back to the States. And they want me to do 15 minutes, though they said it was not strict with regard to timing. I should have plenty written, but now I am also writing the delivery, and having to add checking in with the audience to prevent it from feeling like a monologue.

In Budapest

I have been in Budapest for six days now, and it is wonderful. I did some fancier activities and food with my mom for the first few days before she flew back to England for a cruise, and have since finally been able to think about what I want to do, rather than managing her things.

The ratio of pretty people here is highly disproportionate, with a walk down the street typically being very pleasing to the eye. It has been nine years since I last had an extended stay in a European city, and one aspect I have noticed is that I have some insecurities about my age. I gave up my 20s for medicine, and an aspect of this reality is that if it comes up, I am no longer regarded as a fellow young traveler, but rather am asked things like whether I am there on business or for pleasure.

The weight of age and my current professional insecurities all weighed upon me yesterday when I went on a free walking tour, but I fortunately got drinks with some Australian travelers afterward, and it was a day well spent, with us drinking our fill of the local beer and discussing cultural, linguistic, and geopolitical differences.

Tomorrow, I will likely head north to a smaller town that, like Budapest, is a melting pot of a few very different cultures. Then I will potentially hop over to Bratislava, because Slovakia is quite close to here, and I am told that one day is plenty to spend there.

Second Try at Standup

I realized this week one reason why that potentially career-making project has been so quiet. The writers strike had been looming and is now happening as of this past Tuesday. Last time this happened in such a big way, it ruined shows like Heroes. I remember it well. It apparently only lasted for four months, but it had a big impact. We all know that the union will win this, so it is just a matter of waiting. So hopefully everything will be full speed ahead once the strike ends.

Speaking of writing, I have been working on this standup for close to a year now, and I finally went to an open mic again for the second time. I hated it, but I achieved my goals of staying under five minutes and getting it on video with decent audio. But it was after 2 1/2 hours of mostly bad standup, so the remaining audience was understandably not happy. If I had been in the audience, I would not have been easy to win over. I got some laughs, but they they were sometimes at the parts that I did not think were as funny. Rather than pause for these laughs, I was nervous enough to push right through them, which likely cost me future laughs in the set. So we plan to review that footage tomorrow with a critical eye, and hopefully I will give it one more at an open mic next week before I go to Europe.

Just as when I went to Europe last year, this trip will be surrounded by financial insecurity. The hope is that I get some good writing done while I am there, along with some inspiration with all that comes with new cities and countries. And possibly hit up an open mic there to get another video.

Poor Limbo

Well, the only word from that project is that they will let me know when things are finalized. All this talk about an upcoming table read, about things finally happening, and then my inquiries requesting an update are all met with something like "we are working on it and will let you know."

Meanwhile, I am trying to plan this trip in Europe, but am hesitating at the nonrefundable things. Because what if this thing finally happens then?

I have two auditions sitting, waiting for my response. One of those has shoot days that overlap with this international trip. and the other one, well, who knows. I like auditioning, but these self-tape auditions are awful because for a minute-long audition, it takes an hour or longer to get it right by myself with the camera, lighting, memorizing the script, memorizing the delivery, then editing in voiceover responses for the other character responses.

Meanwhile, I feel at least a little productive if I am writing. But every time I go to a coffee shop to do that, it's a $5 cost. When you do not have an income, that adds up. So I at least need to consider donating plasma again, and possibly try to get a normal job too. Of course, if a pilot I am in gets picked up, that would solve so much. If this (hopefully) upcoming one gets picked up, I get to act on camera for it. If the comedy I am in gets picked up, I could have a chance at writing on it.

At the least, our podcast now has a trial run with a sponsor. It is a skincare company that markets to men, and since I had been dealing with dry skin for awhile now, I wanted to try something anyway. And this one fixed my issues overnight. If we get eight people to buy with our code over the course of the month that we run the ads, we get to talk about a longer term partnership. The company seems ethically sound, which has been a constraint for me. My guess is that I could have gotten a supplement sponsorship by now, but I would feel conflicted about such a thing, since most of those are a waste of money. In any case, we spent 45 minutes recording the four ads other day and I think that they are all good and funny enough to be their own social media posts. Once we have those edited and ready, I will go hard posting it around. Even if people do not listen to the podcast, they might want our discount code for a good skincare product.

Another potential source of income would of course be standup comedy. I have enough written that I should start hitting up open mics. The main reason why I had not done so in the past month is that I was without a car. Now it is because if production on this pilot finally starts up next week, I would feel pretty stupid if I caught COVID. Then again, if I wear an N95 mask at all times when not performing, that would be decently safe.

I would put the pressure on myself for standup now, but next week, unless I hear back about shooting something, I will be traveling to Arkansas to be a guest speaker for the photography class my friend teaches at our alma mater. I will be there specifically to help them learn what things are like from the model's perspective. Apart from very specific things like "move your chin up and to the left," I do not know what insight I can add. But it will at least be fun for me!