Stunts, Meetings and Sets

Last Friday was a pretty exciting and scary day for me. The afternoon was mostly interesting, since I got another case to portray at the McGill simulation center. I had a much more elaborate backstory, with boyfriends and occupations and it was slightly stressful, but so much fun also. I am really enjoying the time before we start the scenarios, when all of the fake patients hang out in a room and talk. Most of the time it is about shows or the weather or random things that are going on, not actually acting, but it truly is inspiring to be a part of this program that caters to the Montreal acting community. I didn’t know most of the people I have met, but while researching agents, a lot of them are in the rosters, others have taken classes with me. Even though most of the time we don’t talk about acting, it is still something we have in common, and when we do talk about it, it is really nice to see people who are going through the same trials and tribulations as me, or who are succeeding and showing me that if I work hard, I can make it too.

After my time as a fake patient, I took a lovely, very long walk around the entire racetrack to get to my stunt class. If someone had asked, I would have pretended it was my intention to go for a nice long walk, but in reality, I took the path of the cars, since the track only has one-way traffic. Being on foot, that was completely unnecessary, but I had the time and yay exercise, right?

As for the actual stunt class, I did horribly, but it was a lot less scary than last time. This may be because we didn’t do flips and jumps, but I felt a lot less intimidated with a few high school students and a few more newbies in the group. That being said, they pretty much all do sports, so I was kind of the least in shape person there, and my hand still wasn’t doing great, so I wasn’t doing push-ups and stuff, but I decided not to let my insecurities take over. Yes, I am not in amazing shape, I lack upper body strength, my core is laughable, but I am taking this class to learn and to improve. I am trying to work with weights and core-strengthening exercises so I can do better next week, but I am not expecting an instantaneous improvement, I am just going to keep working on it, keep going to class, so that eventually, I can play the kickass characters that I aspire to. 

We had some family from out of town, so I spent the rest of the night with them, and Saturday having a girls’ day with my mom before going to a meeting for a potential project. It was at a cafe, so I wasn’t really expecting to audition, but last time I had one of these, I had to do a self-tape afterwards, so I didn’t really know what to expect. Turns out my smile and polite composure were exactly what he was looking for in the character. The project is a very short (as in 3 minutes) murder scene for a competition called the ABCs of Death. Basically, 25 reputable directors make their 3 minute shorts, and the 26th letter is up for grabs. Luckily, I should not be manhandled too much and kind of play a receptionist type woman. Obviously, I am hoping we win, but even if we don’t, I get footage for my demo reel, new contacts in the industry and I get to act, which is great for the experience, and because I simply love acting 🙂

Sunday was a relaxing day spent at my grandmother’s from brunch to supper, but I also chose a monologue to learn and worked on my scene for Tuesday’s class.

Monday was freezing, but also so much fun. I woke up at 3 so that I could get ready and drive to Ottawa for a 7:45 call time. Unfortunately, my phone miscalculated how long it would take me to get there, so I arrived at 6:50. Luckily for me, call times had started at 5, so I got to hang out with the earlier crowd. As has become a tradition for me on extra sets, I finished my book, If I Stay, which was really good, as well as Lady Windermere’s Fan, a play by Oscar Wilde. It took me and the other ‘student’ a while to get on set, but once we did, I had a blast. It was definitely a lot colder than we were pretending it was, and I would have killed for a tea, but everyone was so nice; extras, cast members and the crew. When one of the leads saw that I was cold, he made me wear his jacket between takes. Also, my newly made friend and I got our own marks. They consisted of golf tees hammered into the ground (which means we weren’t able to pull them out, although I wanted to keep mine). It was my first time having my own mark on set, which I thought was pretty awesome, and the guy who put it there for me was also kind of cute 🙂

The ‘students’ wrapped earlier than the rest, but we might have to go back on Thursday. I don’t know if this is in addition to Monday that we were booked for, but we shall see. I drove home and watched the Emmys before going to bed.

Tuesday, I had class with Suzanna. Even though it is a lot of the same people from when I started class, I feel that the stakes are higher, the scenes are more emotional, and it is an awesome group of people. I was Erin again, this time in a breakup scene, and it took me a while to evoke the right emotions, but I think we did pretty good by the last take. I forgot my DVD there though, so I will have to wait until next week to watch it and see how it actually turned out.

Now let’s see how my September list is doing, with one week to go:

-Start Stunt Stage again CHECK 🙂

-Read 5 plays (missing one)

-Call UDA and find out if I am still a member

-Learn a monologue (found it,, just need to learn)

-Write 20 pages of my book

-Set up my website (updated the one on Casting Workbook)

-Do an Agent Sendout

-Go on an audition CHECK 🙂 

“Normality is a paved road. It’s comfortable to walk, but no flowers grow on it.”

-Vincent Van Gogh