Blood-Lust
It’s been a long time since I wrote a blog entry. It’s also been a long time since I’ve had so much free time on my hands. And I’m hungry; for something to do, something to sink my teeth into.
Thread A:
When I write a blog or really when I write whatever, I like to do it without putting too much thought into it before hand. I didn’t really know this was what Thread A was going to be about until I started to write: “When I write a blog or really when I…”
Thread B:
The last full time show I worked on as an actor closed on November 19th. It’s been three months where I haven’t had a show to work on. I don’t know if I’ll ever book another full time acting job again. I keep myself as busy as I can with writing but I’ve gotten really discouraged with a serious lack of auditions.
Thread A:
The difference between a blog and anything else that I might write is that a blog is instant. I’m not going to pour over this entry for months with workshops and feedback. I’m probably not even going to care to be too specific about punctuation or grammar. I want it to make sense but I don’t want it to lose immediacy.
Thread C:
I wonder if some of the stress and the hunger that I’m going through right now has to do with being married. A week from now is my six month wedding anniversary. I have some one else I need to take care of now.
Thread B:
Sometimes I feel like 90 percent of Vancouver’s acting auditions are top secret. I see plays pop up and I bleedingly wonder how come I didn’t get a chance to audition for that show. I rarely am hurt when I lose out on a role to someone else as long as I got a chance to at least show the director what I can do. I’m always still disappointed, just not hurt.
Thread C:
At the end of writing the first Thread A, I had to get up and tuck my wife in to bed. I was writing a blog! I only write blogs when I’ve really got something on my mind that needs to shoot out of my fingers onto a page. How could someone dare distract me?! My writing needs to be immediate!
I’m married now. Part of being married is caring about someone else and their needs at an equal or higher level than you care about your own. This takes some getting used to.
Thread B:
There’s something animal within me, and I imagine a lot of actors have the same feeling. When I find out a role that I fit the stereotype of was cast without anyone thinking of me, even if the director has never met or heard of me, my temperature goes through the roof. I’m obsessed. Poison runs through my veins and it takes every thing I have not to throw myself on the floor and kick and scream. We hide this emotion as best we can but I think most actors experience it. If you didn’t experience it, you probably wouldn’t be able to be a successful actor. I feel like most emotions are universal, but in this one case, I don’t know that it would be possible to explain this to a non artist. It’s not the same thing as being past over for a job. It’s not the same as losing out to someone who was more qualified for the job, even when that’s the case. It’s about being a shark, smelling blood in the water, and seeing your victim, seconds earlier, drag himself onto the shore, out of your reach.
Thread A:
There’s no way I’m going to be able to effectively communicate all of my feelings and thoughts on these subjects. All this can be is a snippet. Maybe no one will read it anyway, it’s just a blog after all. But a blog, I guess, is first and foremost a journal: a record of experiences with commentary from the subject.
Thread B:
I love the people I work with in this community. I love the people that I regularly audition against and I love the people that get the roles that I don’t even get a chance to audition for. And yet, I’m pitted on a daily basis against these people for the very right to survive. Seriously, having not booked a gig in three months, I’m not entirely sure where my half of the rent is going to come from on the first. How can our industry foster community properly when we’re in a constant state of gladiatorial battle?
Thread C:
This is one benefit of having a wife. I might not know where my half of the rent is coming from next month, but I do know that in the last six months I’ve doubled my support network. We love each other. We’ve committed to each other. We bale each other out.
Thread B:
It’s bad enough when we have to fight our friends tooth and nail for roles, it’s worse when you don’t even get the opportunity to battle; when you watch someone on stage playing a role you were born to play (cause when you have the ego of an actor most of them are) and you think, “I could’ve done that better” and you never even got the chance to show anyone you could.
Thread D:
Sometimes I wonder if every actor watches their peers on stage and thinks the same thing, “I could’ve done that better.” Then, every so often, I’ll see someone in my age group, in a role where I know I couldn’t have done it as well as them and I’ll feel better.
Thread C:
Maybe one reason why I haven’t blogged in so long is because I’m married now. I don’t need to pour so much of my immediate reactions into a public forum because I have a wife for that. Someone who will listen to me and have my back. Someone who will hear my whines and tussle my hair, encourage me to keep going.
Thread B:
I truly hope that I’m not coming across whiney but if I am, I can only own up to the truth. When it comes to getting chances to financially support myself by doing what I love, when I don’t get a shot, I’ll whine. Anyone reading this who wants to be an actor someday, be polite, be graceful, but be ferocious. That animal-feeling of jealousy taking over your mind is an honest reaction. Sink your teeth into work. Keep creating. Keep fighting. Keep biting. If you don’t get an audition, you can’t go back in time and change that, but get the next one. Write letters. Meet people. Do the work.
Thread A:
The simultaneous danger and allure of a journal is its personal, confessional nature. It’s interesting because it’s self-serving; it is ephemeral and of the moment. Self-indulgence doesn’t have to be bad so long as you are indulging freshly; so long as the things you indulge in are relatable to others.
Thread B:
In the long run, we actors are in this together. Feeling, mostly, the same shortage of auditions, the same shortage or roles. Many of my peers would probably be furious at me to read this because I’ve had my own streaks of luck. I’ve had the blessing to work at what I love and be paid for it. Many people I know haven’t. We can’t eat our own because we are our own. How’s that for a line from a journal.
Thread C:
It’s easy to feel alone in my jealousy as an actor and, as challenging as it is for both my wife and I to aspire to a field that often feels so futile, I’m grateful that I have a partner who can understand my instinctual nausea when I hear about a show opening on Thursday that stars a twenty something male.
Thread A:
As good as a blog is to pour your heart into. It’s not as good as another human being. I hope this initiates discussion. If not between you and I, then you and another, someone sitting near, who, perhaps, you’ve auditioned against, or thought you were better for a role than. Put your arm around each other and be thankful for the jealousy that you’ve instilled in each other. As for, I’m gonna go join my wife, quit whining for a bit, and rest up for that next audition, where ever it is.
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