I had an audition on Saturday for a horror movie called "Dead Stop". It was a cool situation as the director sat in on my acting class and called myself, Jeff and Mitch in direct to callbacks. So that was about as cool as it can get, other than just getting outright offered the part.
I was literally trapped in the Valley as I fought through insane traffic (my fault for not anticipating the rush hour-like traffic at 2:00 in the afternoon on a Saturday...what was I thinking?) and get to my 2:00 audition at around 2:30. Luckily they were very cool and were heading to lunch, so it gave me time to shake the road off and chill.
The casting director, director, AD and producer were all in the audition and they couldn't have been warmer or nicer. One of the ladies was convinced she saw me somewhere, so I offered that I had done some comedy spots on Comedy Central and she figured that was it. I don't think it was, but if she was convinced she knew me (and apparently I killed on this phantom set) I'm sure not going to argue with her.
I had a great read it was a lot of fun but the part I read for was for a young dude...we're talking 18-20 year old young. I mean, I look young and can pull off college aged if I have to...but that's with other people around my age who look young as well. Put me next to a REAL 18-year old and I look about 90! One of my lines was literally me being scared that my mom found out about the party I was having. As I was joking about this in the waiting room, the woman auditioning to play my Mother (who was only in her 40's so maybe if she had an accident at around 16, could possibly be my Mom) asked how old I really was.
"I can't tell you that, but I can tell you that I'm pretty much past the point of worrying that my Mom is going to catch me having a party."
Jeff and I were in tears laughing about this after the audition. Imagine if we book this? I can just hear the reviews:
"I loved it, but I don't understand why those two old guys wanted to hang around with those kids. That was kind of creepy. And why was that dude so worried about his Mom finding out about the party? He should just get his own place and then he wouldn't have to worry about it. I mean, the guy's like fifty already, it's about time he moved out."
At least I didn't pull the cardinal sin of trying to act much younger. "Hey, um, dawgs did you guys catch the...uh...pop culture reference...last night. How about that Snoops Dog. He's the bomb, right? Isn't he? You know, still the bomb? Don't we say that anymore?"
Jeff and I came up with a whole scenario of us bursting into the casting office with baggy cargo shorts and skateboards: "Yeah we had to skate here. Because we don't have licenses yet. You know, to drive. Because we're really young. Too young to have licenses. Pretty young."
Well, I may or may not get the part but I had a good audition and will most likely get called back for another project. At least I got a few good laughs out of it.
Sorry for the infrequent postings as of late. I had a weird week and wasn't in the posting mood. This week, however has been great so far and things are only looking up from here.
Went to a happy hour last night Lola's on Fairfax. I'm not one for the chi-chi type places, but I like that place pretty much. The food is decent and the martinis are very good (from what I hear as I pretty much drank my Sam Adams all night...Bostonian to a fault I tell ya!) and you can play pool for free. Good deal!
On Tuesday night we had a director sitting in on class to check out some actors for an upcoming horror movie he is casting. Dee (Wallace Stone, i.e. the Mom in E.T.) put me and Jeff together in a scene from X Files and it rocked. He played a creepy serial killer who had killed my sister and at one point in the scene I get to rock him with a belt across the face. Good times, good times.
Apparently we did really well as both of us, along with Mich, are getting brought into callbacks this weekend for the movie, bypassing the initial audition process all together. So we'll see where that leads us. I can't imagine anything cooler than all of us working on a film together as a bunch of 20-somethings getting butchered by a maniac.
Did a casting director workshop last night for the company that casts My Name is Earl. I would love to get on that show as I truly think it's one of the most original and best written comedies on the air. The premise of the show is that Earl (played by one of my favorites, Jason Lee) has done a lot of bad things in his life and has also noticed that a lot of bad things happen to him. After winning $200,000 on a scratch ticket and subsequently getting hit by a car, he has an epiphany...albeit coming from a quote by Carson Daly...it's all about Karma. And now he has made a list of all of his past misdeeds and is on a quest to make up for them one by one.
The premise is iron-clad and leads to great stories and situations. Think of it as Highway to Heaven for the white trash set. Not to mention the writing is as crisp as a fall New England morning. One of my favorite, and one of the funniest, lines came on last week's show as Earl's brother Randy (Ethan Suplee) is afraid of birds. Catalina (Nadine Veazquez), the brothers' companion in this quest for Karma, consoles him in her very deadpan, matter of factly way:
"It's OK, everyone is afraid of something. I'm afraid of snakes and rape."
Brilliant.
It's just a great show, really off-beat and funny and still manages to have some heart to it. It's very hard not to like Jason Lee. I'm sure there's a Sara Lee pun in there somewhere, but I'll leave it alone.
The workshop went very well and I had a solid scene. At first, I was a little concerned because the character I was playing wasn't really funny. I bring the funny and if I'm doing one of these things I like to make sure I can show that, as it's obviously my strong suit. But I was able to use some comedic timing to get a big laugh out of one of the lines, so I felt good about that. All in all a good night and I hope I made some inroads at getting on that show.
For some odd reason, I had a bunch of people ask me recently about the time I opened for Barenaked Ladies. So I decided to post the story here as a blog (it originally ran on my old website). You can also click here to hear the clip of them riffing on me "as Dido". Enjoy!
As some of you know, I had a very cool gig offered to me last minute to open for Barenaked Ladies at the Bushnell Theater in Hartford, CT this past Friday night (Edit: This show took place December 2004). I was replacing the singer Dido, who was sick and couldn't make the show.. That still cracks me up and became the running joke of the night. During BNL's set, they quipped about "Dido was a lot funnier than I remembered her being...I was expecting someone hotter, but she looked like a regular college guy."
First off, I'm a huge Barenaked Ladies fan and when the gig was offered (by Rob Steen of North Shore Comedy), there was no money but they said they would limo me from Boston to Hartford and offered a hotel. It was a benefit show for Care For the Children (sort of a Toys for Tots thing, which I try to perform at some TfT benefit every Christmas) put on by 96.5 in Hartford (sister station to 98.7 in L.A.) No problem, I'm there. Then the booker calls me back and says, "oh they are offering a couple of hundred bucks now because they are so thankful you bailed them out on such short notice". So I ended up getting paid and drove myself down there instead of having them send the limo.
The show could not have been more fun and the guys in the band could not have been more gracious or nicer.
I was a little concerned about how the show would go. First off, it was a music crowd and that can always be a little strange adjusting to a standup comic. Second, they were expecting Dido. Combine their expectation of Dido, me performing instead and the fact that I'm a comic and not a singer and well, it could have been a long 30 minutes. As I started my set, the crowd was still filing into the theater so I thought that could be a little rough...it was fine..they were getting into it, good laughs. But I knew I had them when I did a joke about having no chest hair (sad but true) and some girls in the crowd screamed out "SHOW US!"...so I did. I took off my shirt and the place went nuts. Clapping and laughing. I said, "you ain't gonna get that kind of action from Dido!" And that got another round of applause. I finished my set and it was a great time. The radio station people were thrilled and so thankful and want to have me back for other events.
But that's not even the best part...
I go back downstairs to the dressing rooms and the guys from BNL are hanging out. They asked me how it went and chatted...we took pictures together. And then Ed, the lead singer/guitarist, turns to me and says, "hey, do you want to come out during the encore and sing 'Do They Know It's Christmas' with us?"
Ummm, yeah. I believe I do.
So I did! I watched the show from the first row in the crowd and during the encore went backstage and went out with the station DJs when they hit the chorus (the band Guster was also on the show and out on the stage) I got to go out and sing along with one of my favorite bands in front of close to 5000 people!
This past Saturday I played in a 60 person Texas Hold Em Tournament up in the Valencia area. It was a lot of fun and a touch intimidating as I had never played in a tourney that big before.
The people running the tournament asked if I could bring my poker table as they had about 80 people at the last one. Luckily my roommate Tim wanted to play and has an SUV, so we loaded it up and brought it along. That will be the last time I do that as A) there was no incentive for me to do so as I still had to pay for the hall fee (I thought I might get waived since I helped out by lugging the table) and B) I spent the whole night worrying that someone was going to spill stuff on my table. I was so happy when tables combined and they broke down my table. I'm kinda anal that way.
I started off slow and took down a couple of big pots early. But from then on it was a slow, bleeding-to-death existance as the blinds kept draining me and I had nothing to show for it. I was down to 1000 in chips (you start with 2000) and I made a big move late in the game with Ace-Jack off suit and tripled up. The blinds were doubling every 15 minutes and there were a lot of, shall we say, "partiers" at our table so they took a long time to make their play. With about 2000 in chips and the blinds at 500-1000 I made an all in move with Ace-10 suited and got called twice. One guy (who I swear was Martin Landau...check to Bela Legosi!) had Ace-2 suited but the second caller had pocket Kings. I was feeling OK as the flops had Aces in them more times than not in that game, but it was not to be. I was All In and All Out. The payouts started at 15th place and I came in 19th.
Ah well...better luck next time. Damn you Martin Landau!!!
2006 is underway as vacations are ending and people are trickling back to their jobs and schools. I'm getting the vibe that '06 is going to be a huge year for a lot of people, and I have to believe I'm one of them. Why not? What did you expect me to say?
Here are some of the things I want to accomplish in the coming year:
** I want to complete the first issue of 60 Minute Broadway and find a publishing home for the book. It's a great read and Jeff's artwork is top notch. It will be published this year and I think that will lead to it finally getting picked up as a film (it began as a screenplay). As a side note, I think the perfect person to play Ace in the film would be Nathan Fillion.
** I want to make enough money in SAG to earn health insurance.
** I will get my webcomic Terriyaki Milkshake (or whatever name I settle on) up and running. At least weekly.
** I want to get either a supporting role in a major film or a series regular gig on a quality show. I'll take one or the other, but I really want both!
** I want to do a lot more standup than I did in 2005.
** I will be happy, healthy and enjoy the journey. That last part can be the toughest for me.
