Category Archives: Acting

Another Screening (or Enjoying A Film Festival)

Posted on February 23, 2017 | 2 comments

I just had the film festival that I run, and the film that I did last year was part of the comedy programing. It was cool to have us in the festival and to get to share our film with more people. It wasn’t the first time we screened publicly, but it was our first film festival. And while it did feel a bit odd to have the film in a festival I run (I have nothing to do with programming so it’s fine), I was still so proud to have a film festival laurel on our movie poster.

We have been busy submitting our film to multiple festivals, but many of them won’t let us know if we got in or not for a while. But we did hear back from another festival besides the Beverly Hills Shorts Festival and we found out that we got in! We got into the Hollywood Reel Independent Film Festival and we screened there this week!

This screening was held at Regal Cinemas at LA Live, so it was going to be another screening on a big screen. And we were going to be in a block with other short films, so I was happy to see what other films were in our programming block and to support other filmmakers.

There was a pretty decent turnout for the screening. We were worried because it was on a weekday afternoon, but the theater was over half full and everyone was so excited to see the films. We were toward the end of the program, so I tried to relax and enjoy the other films that were screening.

I’m not sure if we were a block of short films or comedy short films, but it was an interesting mix of films. Some of them were a bit more out there than our film is (ours is pretty down to earth and realistic), but there were things that I really enjoyed with each of the films that were in the hour long program with us. When our film played, I couldn’t focus too much since I still don’t love to watch myself act. But I was very happy that we got a lot of laughs and some of those were in spots that we hadn’t gotten laughs in before.

Once the program was done, we headed out of the theater quickly since the next screening was going to start right after ours ended. There wasn’t a Q&A or anything, but most of the filmmakers were gathering right outside the theater. There was a step and repeat set up so of course I had to get photos with my writer/co-star and my director!

When we were taking our photos, we had some people coming up to us to tell us that they enjoyed our film. That was really nice and I wasn’t expecting it. I am really proud of our film and would be happy even if it was just for us and nobody else got to see it. But to know that other people are enjoying the film is amazing and really made my day!

I wish that I could have stayed at the festival longer and seen more films, but my schedule did not allow for that. I know there were so many short films to see and I really wanted to support my fellow filmmakers. I know it isn’t easy to get people to see short films and I wanted to see as many movies as I could. Hopefully if we get into another festival I can attend more programs and see all the films. It just wasn’t mean to be this time.

I still can’t believe that the film that we made is getting recognition. It started out as such a small project and it has continued to grow and grow. I am so proud of the work that we all did and I’m really hopeful that we can continue to get into film festivals so more people can see it. We are already discussing working on another film together because we had so much fun with “Single Parent Date Night”. But until we do, I’m just going to enjoy having a great film out there and being able to look back at the hard work that we did.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailBeverly Hills Shorts Festival (or Remembering To Breathe After Being So Stressed) Default ThumbnailA Night At A Screening (or Forgetting What Non-Screenings Are Like) Default ThumbnailExciting News (or Sometimes It Pays To Wait It Out) Default ThumbnailFilm Festival Day (or Being In Charge) Default ThumbnailEnjoying More Food and Wine Festival (or Enjoying A Hot Day At Disneyland) Default ThumbnailA Welcome Distraction At The Film Festival (or Loving Second Place)

2 Comments

Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff

Tagged , , , , ,

Game Of Thrones The Musical (or A GOT Newbie)

Posted on February 21, 2017 | 1 comment

A little bit ago, I wrote about my friend Erin and her “Once Upon A Time: The Rock Opera”. Even though I don’t watch the show the spoof is based on, I had so much fun and it was really great! It’s not easy for a spoof show to be something for fans of the show and newbies alike, but that’s exactly what Erin did with the rock opera. So when Erin told me that she was a part of a new spoof show, I said I wanted to see it even before I knew what the show it was based on was!

This time, she was a part of “Game of Thrones: The Musical”. I’ve never really seen “Game of Thrones”, but that didn’t stop me from being so excited to see the show! Erin was so generous and gave me a ticket plus an extra ticket to bring a friend. And I ended up bringing my friend Camber who is familiar with the show. I figured that she could help explain anything to me that I wasn’t able to understand.

The show is at the Macha Theatre in West Hollywood so it was pretty easy for me to get to (plus they have a parking structure right across the street). The theater had a nice bar (I can’t drink right now but Camber was able to get a great drink) and when the doors opened we were able to get some great seats in the second row where we had a perfect view of the stage.

And just like with the rock opera, this musical was designed very nicely for fans of the show and people who didn’t know the show. There were plenty of jokes that I didn’t get but everyone around me seemed to think were hysterical. But more often than not I felt like I understood everything and was able to follow the storyline of the show.

There were 12 original songs for the show and they were all so funny and I was laughing so hard during almost all of them. Again, the songs had some inside jokes that I missed but I never really felt like I was excluded or lost while watching. That is such a hard balance to find because they didn’t want to dumb down the show for newbies like me to understand everything.

When intermission happened, Camber was able to explain some things to me that I didn’t understand and also explained some of the jokes. I was telling her how my friend Erin was in this and my friend Ace (Erin’s husband) was in the show as well. I was showing Camber the photos from when I saw Ace in “Aladdin” at Disneyland and she thought that was pretty funny. Ace’s character in this show is nothing like Aladdin.

The second half of the show, was just as good as the first. And when it was done I was a little disappointment because I was enjoying myself so much! I never really cared to watch “Game of Thrones” before, but now I really want to! The show is based on a lot of the first season, so I’m thinking about watching the first season and then going back to see the musical again. Then I will be able to get so many more of the jokes!

After the show was done, the cast came out to take photos with everyone. Of course, Camber and I had to take advantage of that!

I got to talk to Erin and Ace after the show to tell them how much I liked it (they both knew I don’t watch the tv show and were pleased to know that I didn’t feel too lost watching it). I really wanted to talk to them more and tell them more about my favorite parts of the show, but there were so many people who wanted to talk to them and I didn’t want to take up more of their time. But hopefully I can tell them later (or they will see this post and know!).

If you are in Los Angeles or will be out here between now and March 12th, I highly recommend checking out the show! The tickets are cheaper if you buy them online (and you can use the promo code “king” for an extra discount!), plus then you don’t have to take the risk that the show will be sold out at the door! And if you aren’t in LA, you can download the soundtrack to the musical. The lyrics are so funny and I think that any fan of the show will love the songs. But I really do think everyone should go to see this show. It’s tough to find great theater that is affordable, and this is one of the better shows I’ve seen. I could see this being on a tour and being a big hit soon. So if you go now, you can say that you knew it before the world knew about it!

Thank you again Erin, Ace, and the entire cast of “Game of Thrones The Musical” for inviting me to see the show this past weekend! I had an amazing time and I really am hoping that I can come back to see the show again before you close!

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailA Bonus Musical (or Having Two Sets Of Seats For Matilda) Default ThumbnailA Weird Night In Hollywood (or Another Musical In Our Season) Default ThumbnailBig Musical Instead of Big Game (or Another Sunday Night Out) Default ThumbnailAnother Musical Season (or Enjoying A Repeat Musical) Default ThumbnailDinner And Carole King (or The Best Musical Ever!) Default ThumbnailThe End Of My Musical Season (or Finally Enjoying Phantom)

1 Comment

Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff

Tagged , , , ,

Film Festival Day (or Being In Charge)

Posted on February 15, 2017 | 1 comment

This past weekend was the Beverly Hills Shorts Festival. In the past, we’ve had the festival happen over multiple days, but this time we only had it on one day. This ended up being a good thing for me because this year’s festival was quite the stressful thing. I love working this festival and at least the love and happiness I have overrides the stress I get. But that doesn’t mean that the stress doesn’t affect me sometimes.

As I mentioned before, we had a last minute venue change with the festival. It was an unfortunate situation where our previous contact was no longer with the venue, but they never told us that in their email correspondence. So even though we had emails from them saying that we were all confirmed for the date, there was no record of us since they didn’t work for the venue and had no authority to book events. I’m glad that the venue felt bad for what happened to us and was able to put us in a new venue, but it was still stressful knowing that it was a venue that I hadn’t held a festival in before and wasn’t sure how it would all work.

I had gone to the new venue to see the setup and try to plan out how I wanted things to happen, but still the day of I was stressed more than I would have liked. I wanted to be able to relax and enjoy the festival, but I knew that until I knew that everyone had a good time that I would be worried about things. But the staff at the new venue was amazing and really did everything they could to make sure that the festival ran as smoothly as possible. Things weren’t perfect, but without the awesome staff and management I knew the festival wouldn’t have happened at all. I’ve thanked them so many times already, but I can’t thank them enough. I wasn’t the easiest person to deal with when I’m that stressed out and there were lots of little things that I wanted to make sure were right. But they understood my need to try to make things perfect and really worked with me.

It’s still weird to me to be in charge of everything. When I started with the festival, I was a volunteer. I worked my way up the ranks over the years (I’ve been with the festival for 9 of the 10 years it’s happened) but I still feel like I’m at the bottom of the totem pole. I need to build confidence with being in charge, but for now I have to fake it until I make it.

Since we had a reduced timeframe for the festival (which was because the other venue was supposedly only available for that limited time), we only had 2 screening programs: comedy and drama. And this year, one of my films was submitted and accepted into the festival! I know it sounds like I had something to do with it, but I do not program the films and the programmers don’t all know who I am. So it was exciting to have “Single Parent Date Night” make its festival debut at the Beverly Hills Shorts Festival!

The only downside to having the film in the festival was the way that the venue was set up, our lobby/reception area had about 8 TVs which all were playing what was playing in the screening room. So when our film started, I was surrounded by me. Not the best thing for someone who doesn’t love to watch themselves on the screen, but it was pretty funny to not be able to escape from it.

This wasn’t the most successful year, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t a great festival. Everyone who was there seemed to have a great time and many filmmakers came up to me after the screenings to say how much fun they had. I’m glad that everyone had a good time since that’s all I really wanted to get out of the festival.

I know that we are going to take a bit of a break before the next festival. My co-director and I really want to bring it back to the glory days it had in the beginning. We want to be back in a great venue and have the filmmakers be excited to be screening there. We know we have a great event, we just have to make sure that others know it as well.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailExciting News (or Sometimes It Pays To Wait It Out) Default ThumbnailA Concert, Film Premiere, And A Fire Pit (or The Best Saturday Evening Ever!) Default ThumbnailAnother Screening (or Enjoying A Film Festival) Default ThumbnailAnother Festival Done! (or My Weekend With The Beverly Hills Shorts Festival) Default ThumbnailA Welcome Distraction At The Film Festival (or Loving Second Place) Default ThumbnailWomen In Film (or Brunch and Ghostbusters)

1 Comment

Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff, Tough Stuff

Tagged , , , , ,

Brunch Time (or Keeping Up With Our Group)

Posted on February 7, 2017 | Comments Off on Brunch Time (or Keeping Up With Our Group)

It’s now the 3rd year that my WIF mentoring group has been meeting and I’m so glad that we have been able to continue meeting as a group. Even though the past 2 years have been without our mentors, I still think our group is just as effective as ever. We have bonded so well as a group and the encouragement we get from each other is so important.

We had our first meeting of 2017 this past Sunday (we’ve discovered that brunch meetings seem to work best for us all) and it was nice getting to see almost the entire group together! We did miss 2 people due to scheduling issues, but it’s pretty tough to get everyone to be able to agree on a date with all the crazy schedules we all have. So we try to pick the time that works for most of us and that’s what we go with.

We had a nice brunch at Rush St (where my birthday party was 2 years ago) and even though it was Super Bowl Sunday, we were there early enough that the restaurant was still pretty empty and it was quiet. We all got there within a few minutes of each other and quickly ordered our food so we could get down to the business part of the meeting.

Every time I’m at Rush St for brunch, I have to get something that includes their tater tots. They are so amazing and even though this was a splurge meal for me, it was totally worth it (it was also my main meal for the day).

Once we got our food ordered, we had our traditional meeting with going around the group sharing what we have been up to for the past 2 months and asking for advice with things that we need help with. Everyone wanted me to go first so I updated everyone on my liver situation, the short film, and the Beverly Hills Shorts Festival (which is coming up this Sunday if you want tickets!).

I realized that I didn’t have too much to update everyone on beyond those things since lately my life hasn’t been too focused on my acting career. I didn’t realize how much I had been slacking on things until talking to the group so it was a big wake up call for me to get my butt in gear and start doing more. I know that I am putting things off because of the surgery in 2 months, but there is a lot I can do before surgery and I want to get things in place to be ready for me when I’m fully recovered (which will hopefully take about a month).

When everyone else was sharing, as always I was so inspired by each of them. While we all are at different stages of our careers, I know that we can all learn from each other and that the experience we each have is valuable. I love getting to hear what everyone else has been doing and the progress they’ve been able to make in the last 2 months. Some of the projects that we talk about are things that people have been working on since our very first meeting. It shows how important sticking with it and not giving up really is to having a successful career. As much as we all want to be overnight success stories, so many of those are really 10 years in the making.

Because of all of our busy schedules, we had to keep this brunch pretty quick so we could all get to our various meetings, events, and jobs. It is awards season right now and there are so many things happening around LA. Plus, with the Super Bowl happening that day, the restaurant was starting to fill up and the sound was being turned on the tv so it was getting loud. So we all wrapped up our meeting and headed out to continue our day.

Our next meeting will be in April and it should be before my surgery. I joked that I wanted to hold the next meeting from my hospital room, but I’m glad that we don’t have to do that in case I’m in too much pain. But I think most of the people from the group are going to be visiting me when I am in the hospital. Plus, since so many of them live in my neighborhood, they have offered to help me out if I need it after surgery. I will have my parents here for about a week and a half, but it’s good to know that I have some amazing friends that can be there for me if I need it.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailFinally Having Our Brunch (or Almost All The Mentees Together Again) Default ThumbnailAnother Delayed Brunch (or I Wish I Had More Accomplishments) Default ThumbnailFinally Seeing My Mentoring Group Again (or Our First Brunch Of 2020) Default ThumbnailLast Mentoring Group Brunch For The Year (or Switching Things Up For Next Year) Default ThumbnailAnother Brunch Check In (or Wishing I Had Done More) Default ThumbnailBrunch Celebration (or Everyone Has Awesome News)

Comments Off on Brunch Time (or Keeping Up With Our Group)

Posted in Acting, Food, Fun Stuff

Tagged , , ,

SAG Awards (or Being Inspired)

Posted on February 2, 2017 | Comments Off on SAG Awards (or Being Inspired)

After my podcast hangout, I had to rush back to my house. That night was the SAG Awards and I decided to host a viewing party at my house! I had invited a ton of people to come over and at one point there were 12 people who said they were going to come by. I’m glad that people started to cancel because there was no way that my house could have that many people! In the end, there were 3 of us watching.

All of us got to vote on the SAG Awards, so it was fun to see if who we voted for won. There were a bunch of surprises and we were all pretty chatty while watching. Sometimes, we were commenting so much that we ended up rewinding my DVR so we could catch what we missed. But we were all in a pretty good mood and being chatty was the mood for the night.

Of all the award winner speeches, I think the two that hit me the most were the ones for “Stranger Things” and “Hidden Figures”. I loved that show and that movie and was so happy to see them win. But I didn’t expect the speeches that we got.

If you haven’t seen or read it, the “Stranger Things” speech was a truly inspiring moment in a time where politics are making a lot of people stressed or upset. Here’s just a part of it:

“I would just like to say, in light of all that’s going on in the world today, it’s difficult to celebrate the already celebrated Stranger Things, but this award from you who take your craft seriously and earnestly believe, like me, that great acting can change the world is a call to arms from our fellow craftsmen and women to go deeper. And through our art to battle against fear, self-centeredness and exclusivity of our predominately narcissistic culture and through our craft to cultivate a more empathetic and understanding society by revealing intimate truths that serve as a forceful reminder to folks that when they feel broken and afraid and tired they are not alone. We are united in that we are all human beings and we are all together on this horrible, painful, joyous, exciting and mysterious ride that is being alive.

Now, as we act in the continuing narrative of ‘Stranger Things,’ we 1983 midwesterners will repel bullies. We will shelter freaks and outcasts, those who have no home. We will get past the lies. We will hunt monsters and when we are at a loss amidst the hypocrisy and the casual violence of certain individuals and institutions, we will, as per Chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the weak and the disenfranchised and the marginalized. And we will do it all with soul, with heart, and with joy. We thank you for this responsibility. Thank you.” 

This was exactly what so many people needed to hear right now. So many things in politics have been upsetting, but there are people willing to fight for what they believe in. It’s nice not to feel alone and that there is a community that shares my viewpoints.

When “Hidden Figures” won, I didn’t consider it an upset (it’s the movie I voted for), but I think the cast was so shocked that they won. With the controversy of #OscarsSoWhite last year, I think the fear would be that show and films with diverse casts wouldn’t be recognized this year. But I’m glad that it wasn’t the case.

I love the genuine emotion that was in the speech for “Hidden Figures”. The speech was about recognizing those who were not recognized for their accomplishments at the time and the power of coming together. Again, that is exactly the message we need right now. There is so much trying to get us to be against each other and we can’t have that. As a country, we need to come together and work on making sure everyone is living their American dream.

The SAG Awards was much more political than it has been in the past, but I think that was appropriate given the circumstances now. I know some people think that celebrities don’t have a right to share political views (I don’t know why since our current president is known for being a reality TV performer), but I think hearing other people being so passionate in what they believe in is so inspiring. It has encouraged me to speak out more to make sure that my voice is heard and that I’m not a silent bystander.

Besides being so inspired by the speeches, I was inspired to see people who I’ve gotten to work with on tv. I’m working hard on my acting career and I know that eventually I will be at a level of success similar to my friends. But for now, I just have to be so excited when I see them on tv or their names in the credits.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailAwards Season (or I Have No Idea How I Can Watch All The Movies) Default ThumbnailEnjoying Movie Nights (or Watching My Screeners) Default ThumbnailA Night Of SAG Awards (or Watching Union Unity) Default ThumbnailBeing An Active And Interactive Viewer (or SAG Awards Live-Tweeting) Default ThumbnailSAG Awards (or Watching After Knowing The Winners) Default ThumbnailThe SAG Awards (or I Am An Actor)

Comments Off on SAG Awards (or Being Inspired)

Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff

Tagged , , , ,

Podcast Hangout (or A Quick Coffee Meeting)

Posted on January 31, 2017 | 2 comments

I’ve been busy working with Inside Acting Podcast for a while now. We’ve got a lot of really great things coming up, including my planning for our 300th episode this year! It’s going to be tough to top our 200th episode celebration, but I’m trying to do it and there are some really big ideas that we are debating about doing right now.

But while I’m working a lot with the podcast with getting guests, scheduling things, and helping to manage everything; I haven’t gotten to do a lot of events with our listeners. We had our vocal class and headshot sessions last year, but this year we are hoping to have more gatherings so that we don’t always feel like we are putting out the podcast into a void.

Our community manager and I have been working really hard at ideas for events and we have some things that should be able to happen. But because we don’t want to keep putting things off while we schedule fun stuff, we scheduled a casual coffee hangout this past Sunday. We found a coffee shop that is pretty centrally located (since we know everyone is coming from all over LA) and put it out to the listeners that we were organizing a meetup.

We didn’t know how many people would be showing up since we didn’t do any RSVP system. But we hoped it would have a good turnout and figured that if it was a low turnout that at least we would get to know a couple of our listeners a lot better.

When I showed up, a few listeners got there before me which was great since they were able to get a table for the group. And pretty quickly after I got there we had more and more members arriving. And before I knew it, we had more people than our big table could fill and we started to take over the coffee shop with all of us hanging out and meeting each other!

There were so many amazing conversations happening there! A lot of us are members of the podcast (if you aren’t and want to become one, you can sign up for it!), and we are in week 5 of “The Artist’s Way”. Even though we are pretty active in the membership discussing our thoughts about what we are doing and if we are having any victories or setbacks, it’s really nice to discuss it in person. And I think a few people who weren’t doing “The Artist’s Way” with us will be starting it now so we will have more people to discuss this with soon!

We also were talking about some of the events that we are hoping to be doing for the membership and listeners soon. We want to do another headshot day, there are a few classes we are bringing in for everyone, and we have a few fitness classes that will be happening. It’s fun getting everyone else excited about the events because it makes us more excited too!

And some people wanted to know about some of the upcoming guests that we have planned. I wish I could tell people about guests we are working on, but because it takes a long time sometimes to get everything set up and scheduled (there are some guests I’ve been working on for over a year), we don’t usually share too much. But I did mention a few people that we are hoping to get on the show soon and that again gets everyone super excited about what is happening!

I wanted to stay at the hangout as long as possible so I could see as many people as I could, but I was having friends over that evening and needed to get home to clean and get things ready. But I was able to be there for about an hour and a half so I think that wasn’t too short. But it was tough to leave when there were so many people there that I wanted to talk to and so many conversations that I wanted to keep being a part of. Hopefully we can pick up the conversations at the next hangout that we schedule and that this in person momentum keeps going!

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailAnother IAP Hangout (or The Entire Team In One Place) Default ThumbnailA Podcast Hangout (or Observing A Vocal Class) Default ThumbnailPodcast Picnic (or A Perfect Sunday Afternoon) Default ThumbnailBar Food Hangout (or A Quick Friend Catch Up) Default ThumbnailAnother Day On The Lot (or Going Solo For The Podcast) Default ThumbnailCelebrating 200 Episodes Of The Podcast (or Come and Celebrate With Me!)

2 Comments

Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff

Tagged , , ,

Enjoying Movie Nights (or Watching My Screeners)

Posted on January 19, 2017 | Comments Off on Enjoying Movie Nights (or Watching My Screeners)

It’s almost time for the SAG Awards which means I’m getting ready to vote on who I think should win in the various categories. It’s still so much fun that I get to vote on the awards and it fees so special to me. I know that all union members get to do this, but it’s still relatively new to me and feels like a novelty. And I do take it seriously and want to make sure I vote for who I feel deserves to win and not just who is my favorite. I know that no everyone does that, but I look at it as if I might be nominated one day. I might not be a name actor by that point, but I would want as much consideration as an a-list actor might get. So I take each nomination just as seriously as the others.

Usually, I’ve been able to see more of the films before the nominations come out. I get to go to screenings through SAG-AFTRA and the film society as well as thought Women In Film and usually toward the end of the year those end up being the films that are the ones that get nominated. But this year, for some reason I really didn’t get to make it to many of the screenings of the films that were nominated. In fact, I didn’t get to see anything other than shows that were on Netflix this time. It’s just the way that the screening season went. A lot of screenings were times that I couldn’t go, and during the holidays a lot of screenings were the blockbusters and not necessarily the films that get award nominations.

So when we started to get our screeners, I was excited because I knew I needed to watch a bunch of movies. But somehow time was going by and I wasn’t watching the screeners I had. And over the weekend, I realized that I needed to start catching up in order to have time to watch everything before I had to vote. So I have been trying to watch one movie a day if possible to make it through my movies. I haven’t been able to do that every day, but I’ve been able to do it for many of them and I’m finally about halfway through watching all of them.

It’s been a fun routine at night (or sometimes before I start work in the morning) to pick out a movie that I want to watch. It’s a luxury to be able to watch these movies at my house where I can be comfortable on the couch (and pause the movies if I need to get something to drink or run to the bathroom). And when my hips have been hurting, it’s nice that I can stretch out on the couch or floor and get my body to feel ok. That’s not something that I can do in a theater, even though I do have to stretch out in my seat when I’m out at a movie or a show. Each time I watch a screener, I feel so lucky that I get to have this privilege and hope that I never get so jaded that I start to expect this treatment.

Most of the movies I’ve watched have been very good. I’m actually sad that some of my favorites are only available on the screener website because I know I’ll lose access to watching it soon. And there are some other films that I’ve struggled to get through and haven’t understood why my friends have thought it was the greatest movie ever or that it was better than all the rest. But whether or not I like the movie, I totally agree that the performances in the films have all been the best of the best and all the actors have been very worthy of their nominations.

There totally are some front-runners in my mind for who I want to vote for already. I won’t vote until I finish watching the movies because that’s only fair. I don’t feel like there is a lot of campaigning by actors and producers to get their films or performers to win. I do get flyers and things in the mail (and I guess you could say getting a DVD screener versus having to watch it on a website is a way to campaign), so I don’t feel pressured to vote any certain way like some other awards shows might have. I get to be an actor watching actors and deciding who is inspiring me the most with their performance.

I’ve got less than 2 more weeks to work on this and I think I’ll be fine getting through all the movies. I do need to set aside time to work on it (which seems like a funny concept to me), but as long as I make it a priority in my off time, I will watch everything before needing to vote. And right after voting, I’ll get to see how the rest of my union actors feel about the performances when the winners are announced. I can’t wait to see what happens!

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailThe SAG Awards (or I Am An Actor) Default ThumbnailAwards Season (or I Have No Idea How I Can Watch All The Movies) Default ThumbnailSo Many Virtual Movie Nights (or Thank Goodness For Technology) Default ThumbnailA Night Of SAG Awards (or Watching Union Unity) Default ThumbnailWatching Some Inspiration (or A Weekend Of Screenings) Default ThumbnailSAG Awards (or Watching After Knowing The Winners)

Comments Off on Enjoying Movie Nights (or Watching My Screeners)

Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff

Tagged , , , , , ,

The Artist’s Way (or Working On My Creativity)

Posted on January 11, 2017 | 1 comment

Even though I didn’t set a specific acting related goal for this year, that doesn’t mean that I’m not working on it for the year. It’s tough for me to plan acting related things for this year since there is a lot of uncertainty with how long I’ll need to recover from liver surgery (so I don’t want to plan for any classes until that’s done) and a lot of the things I want to accomplish in acting aren’t up to me (I can’t control when I book a job or not). So finding a good way to work on my acting and creativity is a bit challenging with those restrictions in mind.

So when in the member’s only forum for the podcast I work for someone suggested working through “The Artist’s Way” together as a group, I knew this would be the perfect way to work on acting for the beginning of this year.

“The Artist’s Way” is a 12 week guided program to help artists regain their creativity and to remove roadblocks that may be in the way. This book is something that so many people have done and it’s always highly recommended. I’ve actually tried to complete the 12 weeks a few times in the past, but I’ve never been able to get through the entire thing. This is a common issue with people trying to complete the 12 weeks, so they usually suggest having a way to stay accountable. And one of the suggested ways is to work through the weeks with a group.

The group through the podcast is currently online only, but it’s doing great for keeping me accountable and making sure I do the work. There isn’t a ton of work that you have to do to complete the 12 weeks, but there is stuff to do every day and that commitment isn’t always easy to do. But knowing that people are doing this with me and we are all counting on each other is helping me not want to slack on doing the work. I also think that since I’ve been working on building habits for the past year or so, I’m better now at following through with things than I was in the past. So now seemed like the perfect time to do this.

One of the main parts of the program is doing the morning pages. Morning pages are 3 pages of writing every single morning when you wake up. They are just basically a brain dump of anything that you want to write so they don’t have to make sense. You can write in full sentences or partial sentences, grammar and spelling doesn’t matter, and my penmanship isn’t important. It’s not always easy to remember first thing in the morning to write my 3 pages, but I’ve set a reminder alarm to do it so that is helping. There are a few mornings that I’ve forgotten for maybe 10-15 minutes, but I usually remember before I’m really starting my day.

I struggled with the morning pages before, but this time they have been really great for me. I’ve been using them to vent in the mornings. I’m so grateful that I’m safe and I have a new car, but the situation still makes me mad a bit. Getting those feelings out first thing in the morning helps me to not have to carry them with me all day. I can write in them things that are scaring me or things that I’m concerned about for that day. By putting those feelings out in writing, I don’t feel the need to keep them with me as much as I would before. The feeling I get is similar to what I feel like when I post on here, but I don’t have to worry about making sense or saying things that I might regret later.

There are also weekly questions that I answer each week of the book and they do allow me to reflect quite a bit on what I’ve done so far, what I am planning on doing, and what I should be doing. I’ve been learning a lot about myself in the 2 weeks I’ve been doing this and I’ve never had that experience before in my previous attempts. Maybe I’m in a better mindset to work on this in my life. Maybe my work on my eating disorder recovery is allowing me to work on other aspects of my life in ways I haven’t been able to do before. No matter what the reason is, I’m just happy that I haven’t felt like giving up on this process yet.

Since it feels so different compared to all the other times I tried to do the 12 weeks, I have high hopes that I will be able to get through all the weeks this time. Even if I don’t get anything out of doing this other than saying that I’ve completed it, that will be a victory. I don’t want to bail on things in my life, and being able to complete this will help to prove to myself that if I stick with something that I can make it through.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailWorking On Money (or A Prosperous Heart Update) Default ThumbnailAnother Monthly Challenge Down (or The Prosperous Heart) Default ThumbnailMy First 2017 Monthly Challenge (or Working On My Tumors) Default ThumbnailAnother Happiest Place On Earth (or Working On Episode 300) Default ThumbnailWorking On A New Plan (or Self-Producing) Default ThumbnailProductive One Way And Slacking In Another (or Working On Finding Time)

1 Comment

Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff

Tagged , , , ,

Recapping My 2016 (or Almost Doing All That I Wanted To)

Posted on December 30, 2016 | Comments Off on Recapping My 2016 (or Almost Doing All That I Wanted To)

I can’t believe that it’s the end of the year! It’s so true that the year flies by and that it seems like it wasn’t that long ago that I was writing what my goals were going to be for 2016. My year didn’t totally go the way I expected (both in good and bad ways), but I’m happy to say that I almost got all the goals I set for the year accomplished.

My first goal for 2016 was to do 180 workouts at Orangetheory. Sadly, this one wasn’t a goal that I accomplished. I will have one more workout for the year tomorrow, and that will bring my total for the year to 177 workouts. I know that 177 workouts for the year is still impressive and better than I did last year, but I really wanted to reach my goal. I had some setbacks that I wasn’t expecting, so that contributed to missing some of the workouts that I thoughts I’d be able to do. It’s not the end of the world that I didn’t hit this goal, and I’m trying to remember that the quality of the workouts that I did this year were so much better than last year.

I was lifting heavier weights than I ever have before. My form on the bodyweight exercises is significantly better. And most importantly I started to run this year! I never thought that was going to happen for me this year and I’m so happy that my coaches pushed me to do it. I still have so much progress to do on my running, but the amount of progress that I’ve had this year already has been incredible!

And that leads me to my next goal I had for 2016 which was to have a PR on my 5K. And because of my running, my most recent 5K was an amazing PR for me! Even with all the running training I had been doing, I had no clue that I could do that fast of a race! I accomplished so many goals I had for my 5K timing with that one race and now I have to figure out what new goals I have for 2017 for my races. My next race should be before my liver surgery and the second one will be after. And I have no clue how the surgery will affect my training so I need to be cautious with the goals I set.

The next goal I set for 2016 was regarding money. I wanted to budget better, reduce my debt, and possibly start saving money. While things haven’t been as great as they could have been with money, I think I’ve been doing a lot better than I have before. My budgeting is going better and part of that budgeting is budgeting money each month to go into saving money for big things like when I have to do car repairs or my new computer. I’ve also brought my debt down this year. And even though it isn’t as low as I hoped it would be, getting it down is tough so any reduction is an accomplishment.

I also set a goal to travel more and go on more adventures with my friends. I really didn’t do a ton of traveling this year, but the trips I did take were really fun. I didn’t get to do the trip with my sister-in-law like we had planned, but we are working on a trip idea for 2017 so at least trip planning happened this year. But I totally did do more adventures this year with my friends. I’ve been going to shows quite a bit and those still make me so happy. I got to go back to Magic Castle and had so much fun with my friends being silly there. And of course I had a ton of outings to Disneyland and Universal Studios.

The one goal that I didn’t really even get close to doing is being in another acting class this year. I debated doing the next level of improv at UCB, but I decided against it for a couple of reasons. I looked into a few other acting classes and I’ve found a couple that do interest me, but there was an issue with scheduling. And with knowing that I have surgery coming up in the spring, I’m very hesitant to try to get a class planned for the new year. I know I need to get back into a class, and I’m a bit upset with myself that I didn’t do any action with this during 2016. But I’m ok with not doing it because I didn’t want to waste money on a class I didn’t really care to do.

And my final goal for 2016 was to be in recovery or on my way into recovery from my eating disorder. I’m not in recovery at all, but I’m working toward it and the steps I’ve made this year have been significant. I think I’ve made more progress this year than I have in the past few years combined. I’m working on recovery every day which is something that I haven’t done before. I’ve had fewer binge episodes a week than before and the binges I have had were not as severe as they were in the past. I still have a lot of work to do, but it’s getting there.

Considering all the craziness of my life this past year, I’m pretty happy with how my goals went for the year. I know that things could have been better, but they also could have been so much worse. And I know that 2017 is just going to be even better!

My goals post for 2017 will be next week (along with the post with my word for 2017). I hope you all have an amazing New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day! Please be responsible and call for a cab/Uber/Lyft if you are out drinking so you get home safely. And here’s to all of us having an incredible start to 2017!

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailMy 2017 Goals (or I Know This Year Will Be Amazing!) Default ThumbnailReflecting Back On 2017 (Kind Of Reaching My Goals) Default ThumbnailMy 2017 Word (or I Am A Warrior) Default ThumbnailMy 2016 Goals (or I’ve Got Some Big Ideas This Year) Default ThumbnailWas I Bold? (or Recapping How I Did With My Word Of The Year) Default ThumbnailMy Word Of 2016 (or I’m Going To Be Strong)

Comments Off on Recapping My 2016 (or Almost Doing All That I Wanted To)

Posted in Acting, Fitness, Fun Stuff, Health, Saving, Tough Stuff

Tagged , , , , , ,

A Casual Brunch (or More Hangout And Less Catchup)

Posted on December 20, 2016 | Comments Off on A Casual Brunch (or More Hangout And Less Catchup)

Even thought I haven’t been too active with Women In Film lately, I’m still a member and still so happy that I joined with I did. They recently were taking applications for new mentoring circles and I thought about signing up to see if I could get in. But I did have some negative experiences with my 2 previous groups so I decided to take a break from it for 2017.

I might rejoin a mentoring circle the next time they do applications, but it really felt right to step back from it this year. I have a lot of other things that will be taking my focus (that are not acting related) so I don’t want to join a mentoring circle and not be able to dedicate myself to it completely. That’s the issue we had with my first group. Out of the 10 women who started in it, only 2 or 3 of us would attend the meetings. I don’t want to be a flake when someone else more deserving could take that spot.

But with my last mentoring group, the negative things had nothing to do with my fellow mentees. So it makes me so happy whenever we can get together. We were supposed to have our brunch in November, but the month was just too busy for us all and we decided to push things back a month. And this past weekend was our brunch where we were supposed to have 5 of us there, but even though only 3 of us could make it there it was still awesome!

We met at Rush St. (I think that will be our official brunch place) and since there was only 3 of us the catchup time was pretty short. I had run into one of my fellow mentees at Target recently so she was pretty up to date on the tumor situation. But I filled them in on the rest of the updates which is pretty much down to now we wait to see if the tumors shrink. I also updated them on how the premiere of my short film went and how there are a few other projects I’m looking at working on.

The other two women both had fun updates. One of them is currently writing a Hallmark movie and the other has been shooting a bunch of short films. And one of the mentees who wasn’t able to make it had emailed her update to us and she’s been doing so much as well. It’s always so inspiring to hear all the incredible things that everyone else is doing and they are so supportive no matter how much I have to share or if I got no acting related things done since I had seen them last.

Since there was only 3 of us there and we all had pretty short updates, we got to spend the rest of our brunch just having fun. Since we’ve been a group for so long now, many of us have become really good friends and that’s just so much fun. We were talking about the holidays and upcoming trips that they would be going on. We also joked about how the timing of when my liver surgery will likely be will mean that one of our meetings would be at the same time. So we were saying we should totally have a mentoring circle meeting from my hospital room! If I have to be in the hospital for a few days, I know I’ll need some entertainment and having our meeting then would be pretty awesome!

I do wish that more people could attend our brunch, but with us all having crazy schedules plus with the holidays happening we knew that it was going to be a tough month to figure out when everyone could make it. Our next brunch will be in February and I’m hoping that we can get everyone together for brunch to be a great way to kick of the mentoring circle meetings for 2017!

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailEnd Of The Mentoring Circle (or One Final Lunch) Default ThumbnailMeeting My Mentoring Circle (or Being In The Minority) Default ThumbnailLast Official Mentee Meeting (or Planning For 2016) Default ThumbnailNetworking Brunch (or Having Lots To Share) Default ThumbnailA Friend Party (or A Casual Hangout And Catchup) Default ThumbnailAnother Brunch Check In (or Wishing I Had Done More)

Comments Off on A Casual Brunch (or More Hangout And Less Catchup)

Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff

Tagged , , , ,