Commercial Auditions

Commercial Auditions sometimes seem so incredibly random to me. I mean, I can just imagine a casting director clicking away on submissions while singing Eeny Miney Moe.

I had an audition a couple days ago for Wendy's, where I had to pretend to smell bacon. Luckily, I have a BFA in pretend so this was a pretty easy task. I left the audition thinking - weird. Commercial auditions are just so weird.

I had my callback yesterday morning. Now, like I said, I always read the sign-in list cause I'm nosy as hell and want to see if I know anyone on it. I missed Amy Paffrath by an hour, which is such a shame, because I bet she was wearing a killer outfit with some sweet boots.

At any rate, I'm sitting in the waiting room and the girl next to me has super curly hair, just like mine, except way longer and all one color. She admires my bangs. Aw thanks! We talked about them, and she asked me is she should do it. I said, well, know that they are going to tickle and annoy the heck out of you, BUT it's a change, it feels current, and we can always straighten them to get them out of our face. I like to think she seriously considered them after liking mine so much (Thanks Artease!)

It's a group scene, so five of us are selected to go to the antelobby before we go into the room. The guy next to me chats up CurlyGirl and says, you look really familiar. She replied that she was a tv whore. He asked what she had recently been on and she replied General Hospital and Greek. He said that couldn't be where he's seen her, so then he said, well, what have you done that you're most proud of, which, man, what a great question!

She said, My So Called Life.

I once watched the pilot on dvd with Marley, but couldn't place this girl.

It's our turn to pretend to smell bacon. We do. We leave.

CurlyGirl and I are walking back with The Other Guy in our audition who was complaining about having to drive back to Long Beach. Good luck with traffic, we had both said. Then I see her point to a car which goes "boop boop!" and unlocks. "Have a nice day!" she calls out merrily, and she hops into her white ferrari and drives away.

Wow, I thought, kind of excited, an actress with a ferrari!? Awesome! She's WORKING.

Yeah she is. Quite a lot. CurlyGirl is Senta Moses. Weird. She's slumming auditioning for quick service restaurant commercials! And that's why commercial auditions really are so random. You never know who you're going to pretend to smell frying cured pork flesh with.

Hell Hath No Fury

I get absolutely pissed when I am being taken advantage of. Especially when it comes to acting stuff, as my faithful readers well know.

The latest was a breakdown I had submitted myself for, for "Cosmetics Company." They were looking for models with great skin. Well! Submit away I did!

I got a note regarding a project from them this morning, which read:

Hi,

Below are all the details:

Cosmetic Company Casting Female Models of All Ages

The e.l.f. Cosmetic company is casting females to represent their line in 2010.

Compensation: $1000 plus generous make-up package. Travel paid.

Females of all ages can apply. 4 models chosen in each of the following age categories-

teens, 20's, 30's and 40 plus.

More details and application are on their
site:

http://www.eyeslipsface.com/beautyatallages.asp

- Amy

Now, I'm already annoyed because what is this on here about an "application"? Didn't I ALREADY APPLY by submitting for your project?

So you click on the above url and what happens? You get rerouted to exploremodeling.com. Now, if you've been in LA long enough, you know that exploremodeling sounds a lot like exploretalent.com, which is a scam. Further investigation and it seems that yes indeed, exploremodeling is a sister company which requires you to pay to be registered and blah blah blah.

So I am pissed. The breakdown is fake! It's spam designed to get you on another submission website which no casting directors are on! I replied to "Amy" that I believed it was such and was contacting breakdowns to alert them.

Breakdowns thanked me for letting them know and her account has been removed. I hate being preyed upon.

Hearing Voices

Sometimes my mother would watch tv and laugh. When it was off.

My mother is schizophrenic. Here's a small sample of what she goes through.

LiSa Kellerman Strikes Again

But at least she was good in the movie I was in.
Still haven't popped in my DVD just yet. I'm waiting until tomorrow night. Ooo, the anticipation. Here's what Fangoria had to say:

Also arriving on DVD this week is an indie ghost story served up on quite the traditional platter. HAUNTING OF WINCHESTER HOUSE follows a young family who move into a mansion to act as temporary caretakers. An immediate assault is launched on the trio by ghastly forces within the home. Susan (Lisa Kellerman) and Drake's (Michael Holmes) daughter Haley (credited in the film as Barry Womack, credited all over the net as Patty Roberts) is kidnapped by a mysterious wench of a ghost and held captive somewhere within the house, sending Susan and Drake into an understandable frenzy as they tear the place apart searching. But what they find isn't Haley, but an assortment of spirits, and they've got business that Susan and Drake must help finalize if they hope to ever see Haley again.

My first point of notation is Mark Atkins and his clever little script. Mark goes above and beyond with this tale, infusing a handful of plot twists that have all admittedly been used before, but seldom used together; To see them all successfully incorporated into one picture is impressive. When you think you've got the whole story figured out, count on Mark to toss another two monkey wrenches in the fold, and it's a good thing too. The attention to detail is what helps distance HAUNTING OF WINCHESTER HOUSE from every other haunted house story on the open market. Unfortunately I can't honestly praise the cast as a whole, but I can give a nod to Lisa Kellerman and Tomas Boykin for anchoring a somewhat shaky ensemble. Finally, I must say the score, composed by Chris Ridenhour makes for a nice final layer of frosting atop this cake of chills. All in all, it's a fairly tasty treat.

DVDetails
DVD extras include a brief behind the scenes featurette and two deleted scenes.

That's Not My Name!

My dad was a nerd living vicariously through his Cal Berkeley hippy peers in the late 70s. He was too studious to smoke much pot, and probably thought scoring drugs meant evaluating their performances in clinical tests.
And when my mom was pregnant with me, a girl (!), my dad was super excited to start thinking up names. No Jennifer, or Jessica, or Amanda for his baby girl, oh no! He wanted a name that stood out! That required people to know Greek!
So he named me after the constellation Lyra. But see, this was before spellcheck. And my father, who had his masters in Physics! had no doubt that he knew how to spell.

And so on my birth certificate, there's my name. Misspelled.

But that's okay, Lira is also money! The only problem, though, is that sometimes when people see my name, their brain switches the a and r so that the word is familiar to them. I get "Liar." a lot. in fact, the first time I saw this movie poster, I thought it had my name on it twice.

At any rate, people misspelling or mispronouncing my name is not uncommon.

But I was on my way to making my name more popular! People compliment my name all the time, how unusual it is, how pretty it sounds aloud. And I love seeing my name in print, because growing up, at DisneyLand or Great America, or any other tourist place in the world, my siblings could get keychains and mugs that proclaimed them theirs, but I never could. And so seeing my name during the credits of projects I've done is so hugely awesome and rewarding.

And so when I booked the lead role in Haunting of Winchester House, I was excited, because my name would be all over it! I received my copy of the dvd yesterday, and I was giddy as I turned it over to see the bottom credits. And there! There was my name in print:

STARRING: LISA KELLERMAN

sigh.
That's not my name.

The Student

I really, really like this picture because it reminds me of my friend Tanya. And I miss her. But yeah, Me, Tanya and JenIsIris and Glow all need to karaoke more. Especially Tanya. That girl, who's like, 4'11 on a good day, has the most amazing voice! Angela does too. That's it, more karaoke on Tuesdays!

The Sophisticate

Don't you love driving in expensive luxury cars? I know I do.

I also love receiving diamonds.

Don't I look totally respectable? I love this photo! I can't believe I look so fancy. That's a necklace my sister gave me, which, if you rub your teeth against the pearls, are grainy and therefore real! And if you rub your teeth against the dress, it's real too! Great bridesmaid dress choice, Sarah! I wore it again!

Are Actor Drops Worth It?

Oh you know the story: you're a struggling actress and someone tells you to mail your headshot or postcards to casting directors you've never met - perhaps they'll call you in!

So of course I tried it as well. In fact, there are even headshot drop services, where they'll bundle up your headshots and drop them for you! Save thousands of dollars in postage!

And after two months of that, I still got nothing.

So in got me to think, What would I Do If I Were a Casting Director? Well, I'd throw them away. Because most likely they're from actors who don't have the credits and talent I need. And I've got relationships with the best agencies anyway. I don't even have to open these!

I heard an argument from another actress that she does this and she HAS gotten auditions from them. But you're sending them to casting directors you've booked with, right? I had asked her.

So hey, I asked a Casting Associate who has works on True Blood and In Treatment if Actor Drops were a big ole waste of resources and money.

And here's what he said: Most of the time those don't get looked at. Miracles happen occasionally when we're really bored or desperate. Drop-offs should be your last strategy after class, workshops, plays, personal friends, agent, manager, etc. I'm not saying don't do them. Just do them last.

So there you go. You can be optimistic. Go Forth, my friends. Especially if you have a bunch of old headshots you got in bulk and don't use anymore.

Trustworthy Young Woman Next Door

Hey Guys, let me tell you a little something about car insurance, cause I've been in the business a long time.

Note my folded arms. This means I know what I'm talking about.




Today I pick up a proof book, meaning all my thumbnails from my headshot shoot in 2x3 glory, all together in a booklet so that my agent can take a look at all 598 photos to pick out his favorites. I'll let you know which ones he picks.


Oooh! And the trailer for Haunting of Winchester House came out. Blink and you'll miss me, but hey, still fun!

Characters!

So commercial headshots used to be the actor smiling. Back in the day of only having 72 exposures to make sure you "got" the headshot, actors were pretty limited. Nowadays, thanks to digital, we can delete the blinky shots or the ones where we're in the middle of talking, and we still have HUNDREDS to choose from.
And Agents especially love this, because insrtead of just haivng one smling, "commercial," shot, now they can ask for Characters! So hey, in homage to Laura Wise, I'm gonna show you a different character each day.


Here, Glow and I were going for "Natural, granola." See how the zipup says "Loves natura hikes!"? No? Well, it does. And I like how I look my age here. "Want to go to Disneyland, 8 and 10 year old kids?" Cause Disney LOVES doing commercials where the moms are in their late 20s and their kids are half their age.
At any rate, I was walking around the mall the other day, THANKING GOD that I don't have to deal with the junior's department if I don't want to. Now I can wear all that older lady crap. Being hot and trendy and stylish is just too much work, you know? Throwing on a zip up and looking mom-ish doesn't seem so bad.
So here I am, looking mom-ish. Like, oh! There's mom playing Wii-sport! Oh, there's mom pouring orange juice! Oh, there's mom mopping the floor!
Although, if you took a look at our floor in our apartment, you would be very grossed out. Antne complained the other day that he walked into the kitchen bare-foot and stepped on several things. Well, I had replied, that was your first mistake. Always wear shoes in our kitchen. Actually, don't go in our kitchen. Ever.