Category Archives: Acting

SAG Awards (or Watching After Knowing The Winners)

Posted on February 3, 2016 | 2 comments

I really love the SAG Awards. All awards shows are amazing and I love watching them, but this one is so special. Part of it is that it is the only awards show that I get to vote for (at least, the only one I can vote for so far). And part of it is because these are my peers being nominated and one day I could be too. I take my voting seriously and work as hard as I can to see everything nominated (I don’t always succeed, but I make a big effort to see them all).

I usually watch the show live on TV and try to live-tweet my excitement over the winners. It’s fun to live tweet those sort of events and see what everyone else has to say about things. Even if I can’t watch with my friends, I still get to be connected with them while watching.

But when the show happened this past Saturday, I was babysitting. So I didn’t get to watch live this time. I don’t mind babysitting, but I was a bit sad that I wouldn’t get to watch the show when it happened. But I needed to babysit and I had my DVR set to record the show (plus an extra hour in case they ran late). So it wasn’t that horrible that I didn’t get to watch live.

Fortunately for me, twitter and various news sites online kept me posted on who the winners were throughout the evening. I was finally able to see who all the winners were when the kids were asleep at the babysitting job and was pretty happy with who won (a majority of the people/shows I voted for won) and I was anxious to hear all the speeches.

I got home from babysitting super late, so I didn’t get a chance to watch the awards until Sunday morning. Since I knew who all the winners were, I was able to fast forward a bit on my DVR. I watched all the introductions and speeches, but I skipped when they announced the nominees and the moment the announced the winner. But even with skipping those parts, there was so much good stuff to watch.

I loved all the speeches. Everyone seemed so grateful and gracious when they won. I knew that some of the winners were people who had almost given up on acting or had been trying to make it for years and seeing them win gave me hope that I will be there one day. And of course there were some random funny moments and I loved those as well.

Plus, I loved getting to see my friend Woody’s name in the credits at the end.

SAG Awards

All in all, it was a really great show. It did feel a bit weird not watching it live and not being interactive with people while watching. It was almost like it was my own awards show viewing and not something that everyone else watched. But even without being online and tweeting with people while it was happening, it still made me have so much pride to be a union member.

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Default ThumbnailA Night Of SAG Awards (or Watching Union Unity) Default ThumbnailBeing “Wild” (or Not Guessing A Lot Of Winners Right This Year) Default ThumbnailThe SAG Awards (or I Am An Actor) Default ThumbnailSAG Awards (or Being Inspired) Default ThumbnailBeing An Active And Interactive Viewer (or SAG Awards Live-Tweeting) Default ThumbnailEnjoying Movie Nights (or Watching My Screeners)

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Posted in Acting, Celebrations, Fun Stuff

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Getting Out Of A Funk (or A Phone Call Can Change My Mood)

Posted on January 22, 2016 | 2 comments

I’ll admit that I’ve been in a bit of a bad mood the past few days. It’s never fun being in a bad mood, but it’s been tough to escape.

First of all, I’ve been dealing with some health issues. I’ve had gallbladder issues for a while. I have a family history of gallstones and people getting their gallbladder out. I’ve had gallstones for a while and have been told that I should get my gallbladder out eventually, but I haven’t done it yet. My attacks haven’t been frequent enough to significantly bother me and I really don’t want to undergo a surgery. I used to have attacks once a month or so, but I haven’t had an attack in a while.

Then I had one. And while it was awful, I just figured that it happened and I would get another one soon. Then I got another. And another. I’ve had 3 gallbladder attacks this month. I know I should probably go to the doctor to check things out, but these attacks are not as bad as some in the past. All of them have lasted under 10 minutes (compared to hours with them in the past), so I’m hoping that maybe it was just bad luck that I got them back to back.

I’ve also had a bit of a depression regarding paying my taxes this year. 2015 was the first year that all of my income was 1099. I knew that I had to save for my taxes and I did save about 30% of what I made. I also kept track of all of my receipts and mileage and I think I did some amazing record keeping. I’m seeing a new tax preparer this year who specialized in entertainment industry taxes at the end of February and I’m hoping that I have saved enough money to pay everything I owe. Once I know that, my stress level will go down significantly. But until that appointment, it will be a bit of a dark cloud over my head.

And finally, I’m just stressed about work and scheduling. I’ve got a lot coming up and so many of my weekends are jam-packed already. I know that I can get through it, but I have to get through it.

But yesterday, I got some good news about the film festival I work for. I can’t share anything yet, but there may be some very exciting things with the festival coming up soon. Even though nothing is definite (and it won’t necessarily happen any time soon), knowing that it’s a possibility really improved my mood and gave me a nice positive boost in my life. I need to be reminded why I’m working my butt off so hard sometimes. It can be frustrating when all it seems I do are day jobs and I don’t do anything toward my career. And while the film festival isn’t necessarily the career path I’m on, it’s something I love and something that makes me happy. If I spend the rest of my life running the film festival and then auditioning when I can, I would be ecstatic. The festival doesn’t feel like a job to me. Hopefully, in the future the film festival will be my day job but that will take a lot of work and a lot of other factors that I don’t control. But it can be nice to dream.

I’m glad that while my week wasn’t so great, I’m ending it on a good note and am going into the weekend feeling much better about my situation than I have in a while. It’s a good reminder that when you feel like things aren’t going your way, one little thing is all it takes to change that around.

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Default ThumbnailA Phone Call Can Change My Future (or Making Plans) Default ThumbnailBusy Work (or It’s All Coming Together) Default ThumbnailExciting News (or Sometimes It Pays To Wait It Out) Default ThumbnailAnother Festival Done! (or My Weekend With The Beverly Hills Shorts Festival) Default ThumbnailAdventures In Customer Service (or Trying Not To Be The Bad Call) Default ThumbnailSeeing Signs (or How A Smurf Put Me In A Good Mood)

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Posted in Acting, Tough Stuff, Work

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Helping Out A Friend (or Getting To Act)

Posted on January 15, 2016 | 1 comment

I didn’t get to do as much acting as I would have liked in 2015. I had some really great auditions and got to take class, but there weren’t any bookings. And as much as I love the brief moments that I get to act in the audition room or in my classes, I missed working on a fun project. There’s something special about working on a project that you don’t get in auditions or in class. It’s like how being on a studio lot feels magical somehow. I don’t know how to explain it, but it just is that way for me.

I had been really excited about an audition that I got the first week of January, but right after I got the audition notice I got an email from my agents that the audition was now for a non-union project. And as a union actor I agree to not work any non-union things. I was so excited for a second and then felt really sad that the audition wasn’t something I could go to. I don’t blame my agents at all because they don’t always find out something is non-union until the audition is scheduled. I’ve even had to leave auditions in the past because they lied about the union status. But that’s just the way it is sometimes.

So I was feeling like my year wasn’t getting off to a great start for my acting career. But then a friend of mine asked me if I’d like to play a small part in a new media project that he was doing. And of course I said yes! He sent me the script right away and I got prepared to work with him.

We shot the project this past Monday (I’m so glad that it was on my day off from my day job!) and it was really fun. My part wasn’t too big so it was a pretty easy shoot for me. I got to where we were all meeting at 8am and it was my turn to film at about 8:30, so I didn’t have to wait that long (sometimes you are on set for hours before it’s time for your scene).

My scene took place in my car and my character had been pulled over by a cop. It was really funny and I had a great time performing. We did each setup maybe 2 or 3 times and there were a couple of different shots that they needed to get. But after it was all said and done, I maybe only worked for an hour. Easy peasy.

It was so wonderful to be in front of a camera again. I love getting direction from the director and knowing that my work is being captured and others will be able to see it (in auditions, the directors might get to see it but it’s not seen by that many people). I got some really great feedback from everyone working on the project and that was a nice little confidence boost for me.

This wasn’t a paying project, but that doesn’t matter to me. It was a union project (my friend made sure of that so I could be a part of it), I got to act, and eventually once it’s edited it will be out in the world for people to see. That’s all I really need (getting paid occasionally would be great too). And that hour of acting made me crave acting even more.

That’s how I know that this is the right career path for me. I love getting to audition, I love ever second I get to act, and I love anything I get to do that feels like I’m furthering my career. Nothing feels like a chore or a task. It always feels like a reward and a benefit.

Hopefully this project will be the start of an amazing year for my acting career. I haven’t had my first audition of the year yet, but the regular start of pilot season is coming up quickly and hopefully I’ll have at least one pilot audition. And of course now that tv is back there are all those co-star and guest star parts I could potentially audition for. While there aren’t as many opportunities for someone of my type as there might be for a super skinny hot blonde girl, I know those opportunities are out there and it’s my job to be prepared for when they come my way.

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Default ThumbnailMaking My Acting Bold (or Feeling Great From An Audition) Default ThumbnailFiguring Out The Next Step (or I Need To Keep Acting) Default ThumbnailBeing Proactive (or Bringing Acting To Me) Default ThumbnailDoubling Up On Friend Time (or It Feels Like We Just Saw Each Other) Default ThumbnailWorking On A New Plan (or Self-Producing) Default ThumbnailAnother Day Another Audition (or This Is The Life I Love)

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A Night Out With Some Awesome Women (or Being Ok Being Awkward)

Posted on January 13, 2016 | Comments Off on A Night Out With Some Awesome Women (or Being Ok Being Awkward)

The other night, a friend of mine invited me to join her at a meeting of women writers. I asked her if it was ok for me to go even though I wasn’t a writer, and she said that the group was ok with it. This group had met before, but not all members had met before so it wouldn’t be like I walked into an established meeting.

My friend and I were the first ones at the bar we were meeting everyone at (after getting a perfect almost free parking space right in front!) and soon after we arrived more people showed up. We got a table for the group and started ordering food and drinks.

In the beginning, I was just listening to what everyone else was saying. They were updating each other on their lives and jobs and I didn’t want to interrupt. It was really cool to hear what all these awesome writers have been doing and not just listening to what other actors are doing (those conversations can be very repetitive and weird for me at times).

But soon after that, more women showed up for the group and our table got pretty full. There were maybe 8 or 9 of us and the bar was a bit loud. I really wanted to hear what everyone was saying and participate in the conversation, but it just got very difficult to hear. I listened to what the people immediately next to me were saying, but I was still not really a part of the group.

My friend (who was sitting next to me) noticed that I was being really quiet and not adding to the conversation and she interpreted it as me being bored. I explained that it wasn’t that I was bored but it was awkward in the group because I really didn’t know everyone and it was tough to be a part of the conversation. I wanted to be a part of things, but I had to be ok with the circumstances and be ok with being an outsider for the night.

It wasn’t the group’s fault at all. The table we had was pretty big, there were a decent number of people, and it was pretty loud. Even our waitress had trouble hearing us from time to time. So it wasn’t the best place to be when I tried to get to know a bunch of new people.

My friend and I left a bit on the earlier side because we had another place we wanted to stop by before it got too late, so we started to say our goodbyes to everyone. And I talked to everyone more while saying goodbye than I had all night. I was talking to people individually while we were standing next to each other. So the noise and number of people didn’t affect the conversation. And everyone in the group was so awesome and I wished that it had been easier to be a part of the group the entire evening. But it just wasn’t meant to be that night.

I’m sure that I will get to see everyone again in the future. Hopefully I’ll be invited to another group meeting and maybe it will be somewhere that is a bit quieter so I can feel like I’m part of everything. But even though I pretty much sat quietly in my chair during the meeting, it felt awesome getting out and getting to meet new people. I’ve been in my own bubble with my set group of friends for a while and I know I need to expand my friend circles. Meeting people who are awesome is always a good thing in my mind. And I learned from those brief conversations that everyone in that group was pretty awesome.

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Default ThumbnailWomen In Film (or Brunch and Ghostbusters) Default ThumbnailMentoring Circle (or Women Who Support Each Other) Default ThumbnailEnd Of The Mentoring Circle (or One Final Lunch) Default ThumbnailMs In The Biz Picnic (or Spending My Day Off With Some Awesome Women) Default ThumbnailFOX Girls’ Night Out (or Getting To Meet Women I Admire) Default ThumbnailA Belated Mother’s Day Post (or The Awesome Women In My Family)

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My 2016 Goals (or I’ve Got Some Big Ideas This Year)

Posted on January 1, 2016 | 2 comments

Happy New Year! I hope that you all got to spend New Years Eve last night with people you love and had a great time (and hopefully not feeling it too much today)! As I’ve done the past few years, I’m sharing what my goals are for this year and what I hope to accomplish.

First is my big workout goal. I want to do 180 workouts in 2016. It’s only 5 more workouts this year than I did last year, but I wanted to make the goal not too much of a stretch. I’d love to pass this goal and do closer to 190, but I also know that life can get in the way and I don’t want to stress out about reaching my goal like I did in 2015. I think it’s very doable and I’ll be tracking my workouts using the same app I did last year (it made this very easy for me). So hopefully in a year I’ll be telling you all how I got this done!

My next goal is to have a new PR for my 5K. This one is going to be difficult for me because I’m still dealing with calf pain, but I think that maybe I can do it. Right now, I have 2 5Ks that I’m planning on doing (the same ones as last year) but I might add another one in there. So there aren’t a ton of opportunities to get a PR, but I will have a ton of time on the treadmill at Orangetheory to work on my speed training. I still have an ultimate PR goal for my 5K (15 minute miles) so I can feel comfortable doing a Disney race, but I know that this goal is very possibly a few years away.

Next on the list is a money goal. Or more like money goals (but I’m combining it into one goal). I want to get my debt down farther, budget better, and even maybe start having more savings than just what I’m saving for my taxes (as a 1099 employee, I will probably owe a lot in taxes). This is not an easy goal. Money is tight and while I wouldn’t say that I have a spending problem, it’s hard to not spend like some of my friends do at times. And those friends sometimes make 4 or 5 times what I make. I’ve been using You Need A Budget for a budgeting app and I think I’ve gotten budgeting close to what I want it to be. However, YNAB just launched a new version and it’s a subscription payment model. I can still use the old version and not have to spend money on the app, but I’m also looking into new apps to use because I don’t want to spend $50/year on a budgeting app when that money could go to something better. I do have an amount in mind as far as reducing my debt goes, but that’s something that I’m going to keep to myself for now.

Next is a fun one. I want to travel more and find more ways to spend time with my friends. While I’m ok with saying no to going to parties and things, I like going on adventures and fun outings. So I want to work on figuring out adventures to go on with my friends so that we can have more fun. And for traveling, I’ve got one trip planned for February with my mom and I’m hoping to do a trip with my sister-in-law in March or April. So that’s a step in the right direction.

I’d also like to do another acting class this year. I think it will probably be the next level at UCB, but I’m open to acting classes that fit into my schedule and my budget. While it’s important for me to keep working on my acting skills, I want to be in another class for other reasons. It’s great meeting new actors, it makes me happy because I get an opportunity to act, and I feel like I’m making progress in my career even if I’m not auditioning. So I feel like this is important for me to do and I feel pretty confident that I’ll be able to get this done.

And finally, I want to be either in recovery from my eating disorder or on my way to recovery. I’m starting to look at my eating disorder as something to research and educate myself on instead of an emotional thing. I’ve been doing reading, listening to podcasts, and using apps for my eating disorder over the past week and I’ve already felt a difference. It’s still a battle that I lose sometimes, but I’m feeling much better about how I’m approaching things this time. And hopefully in a year I will be posting that I’m either in recovery or I’m getting very close to recovery. That would be such a wonderful thing I could accomplish in this year and if it happens I know that it will change my life.

So that’s it for my goals for this year! I think that I’ve got some good plans in mind. And while they won’t be easy to get done, they are not completely out of my reach. I’d love to hear some of the goals that you have for the coming year and hopefully we can keep each other on track!

Happy 2016!

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Default ThumbnailRecapping My 2016 (or Almost Doing All That I Wanted To) Default ThumbnailMy 2017 Goals (or I Know This Year Will Be Amazing!) Default ThumbnailWhat I Plan To Do This Year (or 2015 Goals) Default Thumbnail2014 Goals (or Hoping To Get More Goals Done This Year) Default ThumbnailReflecting Back On 2014 (or How I Did With My Goals) Default ThumbnailAn Almost End Of The Year Review (or Looking Back At My Goals)

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

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Was I Bold? (or Recapping How I Did With My Word Of The Year)

Posted on December 30, 2015 | 2 comments

For this year, I decided to do a word for the year for the first time. I was inspired by my fellow bloggers and decided to go for it. The word that I had decided on was “bold” and I really felt like it was the perfect word for me to use for 2015. Now that the year is about done, I’m looking back at my year and trying to think if I was bold.

I worked hard to remind myself to be bold when I could. I used the word as the background of my computer and used a similar graphic without the word as the background on my phone and iPad. So I was constantly reminded of it. There are still times that I feel like I can’t or won’t be bold, but I think I made a good effort at it.

Bold

The place where I think I was the boldest in 2015 was my acting career. I took new risks in my auditions and wasn’t afraid to make a wrong choice. I know that making an incorrect choice is really better than no choice at all. I decided that I was going to make each character strong in my mind and go with it full force. I know that not all my choices were right (and I didn’t book much this year), but I know that casting directors will remember me for being prepared and taking a risk. So many auditions of mine are in offices that I’ve been in before, so I know that they like me as an actor. It just might have been in the past that the part wasn’t right for me.

Not only was I being bolder in my auditions which allowed me to leave the audition room feeling better, I was bold in my actions outside of performing in the acting world. I never would have thought of running as a SAG-AFTRA delegate in the past, but this year when I was asked to do so I said yes before I could talk myself out of it.

Running as a delegate wasn’t always easy (some of the hate messages I got still are stuck in my head), but I’m so glad that I did it. I met some amazing people and I really had the best time at the National Convention. I’m actually sad that the National Convention isn’t every year. I don’t know if I’ll run for local or national board in the next elections (I’ve got plenty of time to think about that), but there’s no question that I’ll be running as a delegate again. The education that I got about the union during the convention was invaluable and I know that it will make me a better union member for it.

I was also bold in working on overcoming my eating disorder this year. I got a new therapist and I’m now trying medication to help me win this battle. I’m still in the depths of my battle and it feels at times that I will never get over my eating disorder, but I’m done being a victim of it. I’m working hard at it and hopefully sometime soon my hard work will pay off.

Finally, I think I was bold in my social life. Not in the sense that I was bold as a person at events but in the sense that I stopped being scared of saying no to an event and staying home. While I’d love to go out every time that someone has a fun event, sometimes I need to be at home for the evening. I might be tired or not feeling well or I might just not feel up for it and don’t want to force myself to go. But I don’t care anymore about missing things. Sometimes I wish that I could go, but I’m not feeling like I’m missing out on things as much as I did in the past. So saying no is a bold choice.

I’m still finalizing what my word for 2016 will be and I’ll be sharing that next week. But I’m really happy how I embraced bold as my word for 2015 and the results that I got from it!

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Default ThumbnailMy 2017 Word (or I Am A Warrior) Default ThumbnailBe Bold (or My Word For 2015) Default ThumbnailRethinking Being A Warrior (or Refocusing On My Word For The Year) Default ThumbnailMaking My Acting Bold (or Feeling Great From An Audition) Default ThumbnailRecapping My 2016 (or Almost Doing All That I Wanted To) Default ThumbnailMy Word Of 2016 (or I’m Going To Be Strong)

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Graduation Show (or Completing Improv 101)

Posted on December 16, 2015 | 1 comment

This past Sunday was the graduation show for my improv class. The way that UCB runs their classes is that the class has 8 classes that are 3 hours each (typically 1 class a week unless it’s the intensive class which means 4 times a week for 2 weeks) and at the end you have a graduation show.

I had been a bit nervous about the graduation show because it felt like we hadn’t been told too much about how it would work. But I’m used to short-form improv where it is game based and not scene based. So the nerves were unnecessary because we pretty much did the same thing that we had been doing in the past few classes.

Our class was split into 2 groups (there were 12 of us doing the graduation show) and each group thought of a team name. My group was going second so we sat in the audience for the first half and got to watch our classmates perform. The audience was made up of us from the other group and friends and family that we invited to the show (I didn’t have any friends or family in the audience, but I only told people about it a few days in advance). Before I knew it, it was our turn to go backstage and get ready.

When my group started, we got a suggestion of one word to start things off. Then one person said a personal monologue and we created 3 scenes from that monologue. After the 3 scenes were done, another monologue was done followed by 3 scenes. In total, my group had 3 monologues and 8 or 9 scenes. And I initiated a few, joined in on a few, and did walk ons in a few. We had about 25 minutes on stage, and it rushed by so fast. And since the lights on the stage were so bright, I never felt like I was performing for an audience. I felt like we were performing to our classmates the way we did in the classroom.

Overall, I feel pretty good about how I did and how the entire class did as a whole. And I think that we were all pretty excited about completing the graduation show.

UCB 101

The only thing that I was a bit sad about was that we didn’t really seem to bond as a group until the last week or so. There was the awkwardness at the beginning and then just feeling the personalities of the group out. And we really felt like a team at our last class and then again in the show. I’m not sure if making the class longer than 8 weeks would have helped, but it was a bit sad to say goodbye to everyone when I felt like I was just getting to know them.

UCB Graduation

We don’t find out if we failed the first level of improv until we register for the next class (if we failed, they will let us know that there was a problem). I’m still thinking that I’d like to go on to the next level and possibly do all 4 levels eventually. I’ve got a year to sign up for level 201 before I have to repeat 101 and I have a feeling that I’ll be signing up sooner than next fall. I just need to get the money together for it (I might have extra money left over after I pay my 2015 taxes) and figure out a time that works with my schedule.

I’m so glad that I finally jumped in and took another improv class. While I still miss Kip all the time and wished I had heard his laugh in the audience (he had the best and most distinctive laugh), I think he would have been happy that I moved on and continued my education. I don’t know if I want to join a troupe after I complete all the levels (if I do that), but I’m taking things one step at a time and just focusing on taking level 201 now.

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Last Official Mentee Meeting (or Planning For 2016)

Posted on December 9, 2015 | 1 comment

This past week was the final mentee only meeting for my Women In Film mentoring group. We’ve been meeting for about a year now, and we only have one meeting left with our mentors.

It’s been a pretty awesome year with my mentoring group. I’ve become friends with all the women in my mentoring circle. I’ve hung out socially with them outside of our meetings and we’ve discussed working on a project together in the future (the benefit of having women in all parts of the industry in the mentoring group). And I’m sad that our year is coming to an end.

Our last mentoring group was pretty small. Due to holiday conflicts, only 3 of us were there (out of 8), but we still had a nice time. It was more of a social hangout than an official meeting, but that was fine with us all. We chatted about things we have been doing in the past few months and what we are working on in the start of the new year. We also did a gift exchange (I got some greeting cards with amazing artwork on the front done by one of my fellow mentee’s husband).

With the end of the official mentoring circle time here, we also discussed what we wanted to do going forward. In my past mentoring group, it seemed like the end of our official time was a natural end to our group. We had never met outside of the meetings with our mentors, and while I do keep in touch with some of them over Facebook we’ve never gotten together after the end of our group.

But with my current group, we’ve gotten to know each other so well and have really bonded as a group. So we started talking about keeping our current schedule of meeting every other month as just a group of mentees. It’s going to continue to be an accountability group as well as a sounding board for questions or issues we might be dealing with in our professional or personal lives.

We’ve already started to plan how to continue our meetings into the new year. I think that we will be meeting again in February and I have to say that I’m so happy that it seems like the rest of my group is also looking forward to continuing with our meetings. I’d be pretty upset if we stopped meeting. Our meetings have become evenings that I look forward to. It’s an evening with my friends and an evening that always leaves me feeling inspired. I still feel like I’m the most beginner of our group, but if anyone else feels that way about me they don’t show it. They treat me with so much respect and have really helped to push me further in my career.

I’m so lucky that Women in Film partnered me up with the mentoring group that I have. I know how tough it can be to create a bond within the group when all the women are extremely busy and have crazy and complicated schedules. But we all tried to make our meetings a priority and it really worked. I have the opportunity to join a new mentoring group in the spring or fall next year, and I’m not sure if I will do that. I would love to have another great group, but I’m also scared that the new group wouldn’t be able to live up to this group and I wouldn’t be able to be as involved as I would want to be. I’ve got time before mentoring circle applications come around again, so I don’t have to rush to a decision yet.

But for now, I’m so grateful for what I’ve gotten out of the past year and I can’t wait to see what the next year with my mentoring group will bring to me.

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Making Strides In Class (or Relaxing And Having Fun)

Posted on November 20, 2015 | 2 comments

My improv class this week went really well. In fact, I think this might have been the best class I’ve had so far. I’m still on the fence about moving on to the next level of improv, but like I said before I’m focusing on how much I can get out of the class I’m in.

I had a few moments in class where I either didn’t hear things correctly or said something off that threw the scene or game that we were doing, but none of those moments were big screw-ups like I’ve had before. It’s not that I wasn’t listening before, but my focus in the past was to unlearn “bad” habits from my other improv training. And when I’ve been doing that it’s hard to focus on the game at hand. So I stopped trying to ignore and unlearn what I’ve learned in the past and I used it in class.

And that actually paid off! I’m not sure why I was so scared of doing that before. I know that I didn’t want to feel like a show-off or do something so weird that the teacher wondered why I did it. But that fear had really set me back and I think prevented me from performing to the best of my ability in the previous weeks. This past week, I had some really great scenes and I felt like I got more positive notes from the teacher than critiques.

I do feel a bit like a show-off at times or that I’m commanding the scene and I’m really working on that. I’m trying not to overshadow my fellow actors if it feels like the scene is going that way. It can be tough because sometimes I can feel that the other person might be struggling and I just want to help them. But helping them can also prevent them from having their fair time. And when only a few people out of the group get to do something special (we used a few personal monologues this past week to help inspire scenes), I’m not always trying to take a turn.

It’s a fine balance I’m trying to find between performing to the best of my abilities and hogging a scene. I know I’m not the best person in class, but I also know that I’m a bit of an aggressive performer. I’ve had to learn in the past to be fearless and to just go with it. But sometimes that can seem like I’m trying to show-off or steal the spotlight from someone else.

I think it was easier for me in the past because with the first improv troupe I performed with, we all kind of came into the class at the same level. We had dabbed in improv, but none of us have really taken a class. In my class now, there are some people who have never taken a class before and there are people who have done years of improv training (I’m kind of in the middle). It also might have been easier in the past because I was either working with a group doing short form improv (which are the quick fun game) or working alone doing an improv interview when I was in Kip’s class.

Now, we are doing longer scenes and there isn’t a gimmick to the game. It’s just trying to be as truthful to the scene as possible. I think that this is better for my acting career than learning the games that I’ve done before, but it’s not easy. It’s hard to stay based in reality when you have no idea what is coming up next (or if you get a super weird suggestion). But I’m really enjoying the challenge and I think having fun in the class is the most important thing.

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Halfway Through Class (or Not Thinking About The Next Step)

Posted on November 13, 2015 | Comments Off on Halfway Through Class (or Not Thinking About The Next Step)

I’m halfway through my UCB class. In about 4 weeks I’ll be doing my 101 graduation show. That show still terrifies me a bit because I feel like we (or at least I) won’t be ready in time, but I’m trying to put that fear in the back of my head and focus on what we are doing now in class.

Each week in class, we do focus on a particular aspect of improv. This past week was all about characters. While I’ve done character work before, I really enjoyed this class because new ideas on character types were mentioned that I’ve never used before. I’m surprised that I never thought of some of these types (like being high class vs. low class) never came up in my past studies. But I’m glad I know them now for the future.

I did have a bit of difficulty in class with some of the character work. There was one mimic game that we played and I went first. I was a bit unclear on the instructions (if I was supposed to mimic an accent or just the general attitude of the other person) so I had to start over several times. I also hate having to do accents because they are extremely tough for me to do. I’m partially tone deaf (it’s why I’m not a music person) so accents sound funny to me. I can hear someone and thing that I’m mimicking it perfectly but in reality I’m not doing any accent.

After starting over several times, I decided to just focus on the attitude of the other person and made it through the game. But that set back really was tough on me. I don’t think I’m the best actor or best improviser out there, but since I was so confused I wish that I had more instructions or that I asked more questions so I knew what was expected. All the other students seemed to mimic the attitude and not the accent so I guess I made the right choice.

This week I also went to another improv show. This one was a show that was performed by teachers from UCB (my teacher wasn’t in it). It was a really great show and even though I’ve fulfilled my 2 show viewing requirement I’m thinking of going to that show again next week (it’s a rotating cast).

Some of my fellow students are already starting to think about taking improv 201 as soon as we are done. I’m still torn on if I’m going to continue or not. I’d like to complete all 4 levels just to say that I’ve done it. The cost is a bit of a set back. I think I have a year from the time I graduate improv 101 to decide if I’m going to take 201, so I’m going to allow myself some time to think about it all. I like not having to commit to the next level right away and I want to make sure that I’m making the best choice financially as well as for my acting career.

For now, I’m just going to focus on enjoying the last few weeks of my class, having a great graduation show, and doing the most growth I can in the class.

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