My brother sent me one as an early Christmas present. He read what I said here about my apartment building not having a central heating unit, and decided I could use something like that. I brought it home from the post office yesterday. A certain generous, highly intelligent, and attractive writer had given me her old futon the day before. I put away the leaky air mattress and the frame I saved from the trash heap, and set up my new bed.
I may be barely making my rent with my meager hours in my multiple day jobs, but that does mean I have a great deal of time on my hands. I'm pretty insistent on getting eight hours of sleep every night. I'm not behind. I thought I'd just get that again when I went to bed a little before midnight.
I woke up again well after 11am. That was a good night's sleep.
I rolled around and stretched, feeling like a happy, warm cat. Then I reached for my phone. I'd just been redesigning my sister's website and had found out very late last night that through a miscommunication, we'd cut off her new email. I wanted to see how urgent it was. I'd told her to call if it was, but with that comforter, I thought there was probably a good chance she'd called and I had slept right through it.
No missed calls. I flipped open my email. Tons of new messages. Naturally. Three got my attention right away, they were all from Actor's Access, my main platform for getting auditions. I submit a headshot and resume, and if the casting director likes me, they send me a message via something called "Cmail." The three messages' subject lines each read as follows:
3:03am- Cmail Notification
6:03am- Cmail Reminder
9:03am- Cmail- Final Reminder
I still can't believe how often showbiz expects you to check and respond to all messages. I followed the link from Email to Cmail and found an audition invitation. SAG short film agreement pending. They want me to read for the lead. Wow, fantastic. The catch? This lead character is a high school senior.
I vividly remember watching Back to the Future for the first time, and assuming the Michael J. Fox was playing the dad. When I realized he was supposed to be a high school kid, I was stunned, and almost offended. He looked thirty.
When I was sixteen, some friends of friends once mistook me for "somebody's dad or something." Now, I'm twenty-four. Dark hair and sensitive pale skin have given me a semi-permanent five-o-clock shadow. Leaving even my collar shirt button open often prompts other guys to joke pretend I'm challenging them to a chest hair competition. They usually lose. When I told the calculus student I tutor (an actual high school senior) today that these people want me to read for the part of a seventeen year old, she nearly fell on the floor laughing.
So, potentially, I might be following in some very famous footsteps. They just happen to be footsteps I once treated with disbelief and mild derision. Well, if they think I can act like a convincing high school senior next week, I'll be a high school senior again for them. Either way, I'll just have fun with this reading.
That's next week. Before that, tomorrow, I've got a callback with the Independent Actors Theater. After lunch with an old college friend, before a holiday party at Edge Studio, a birthday party for another college friend, and maybe a cast party for a hilarious stage adaptation of Tommy Wisseau's The Room. Life's still pretty good out here.
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