So todays mission was my first ever film casting. Short film, awful script (as I laughed about over coffee beforehand!) and far too much gratuitous nudity and violence for my liking. But as they say, it's all experience! The casting was held in the downstairs room of a pub in central London. The team of writer/producer/director/casting director were all nice, although slightly creepy. There's something that doesn't sit right with me about grown up men writing Zombie films where the main female characters are either naked or lesbian. Thankfully, the part I was reading for was the lesbian one, not the naked one. But still. The script was full of guts and gore as you would expect. Don't get me wrong, being in a really bad horror film is on my list of ambitions (which will no doubt be published one day when nothing else happens to me!), but something tells me that this one won't be the one to take that slot. Me and that character were not a good fit. But it was a good casting session. There were people reading for the other parts there too, all of whom had experience in film work (but you have to start somewhere right?!) and seemed far more comfortable in the situation than I was. They were all nice enough though. One of the guys was even nice enough to walk in completely the wrong direction to the wrong tube station with me on the way back (although I think that might have had something to do with the fact that I was wearing quite a short skirt and heels!).
We had been told by the director that they had auditioned 30-odd people over the past two days out of over 300 applicants. That made me feel slightly at ease from the start. There was obviously something about my castingcallpro profile that made me stand out from the other 270-ish people. Possibly something to do with the fact that my headshot actually makes me look quite good! That's the world of the sleazy casting director for you...although obviously I'd rather think it's the pure talent and persona that oozes out of my CV...the CV which is currently pretty dire as I have nothing on it except my college performances. But again, everyone has to start somewhere!
Having read through the script together a number of times (it's a very short film!) they recorded our reading and took photos of us. Surprisingly, this didn't throw me as I thought it would. I am sort of glad that we didn't have to action the dialogue fully as I'm pretty sure had I tried to kiss the other girl that was there she would have punched me. So now, I can add 'film casting' to my ever growing book of experiences.
I was reading an article this evening in an old issue of 'Drama Student' magazine about Jeremy Irvine, who has just been cast as the lead in Spielbergs new adaptation of 'War Horse'. It was written a while ago (before his uber success) and was about how he'd decided to go it alone following one year at Drama School. It was quite inspiring, to think that a year ago he was in the same position as me and now he's on his way to the top! Obviously everyones path is different, but why not expect great things! I have a new point on my action plan for next week.
My general plan is to make sure that every day I do something that is a 'career thing', no matter how small and trivial it may be. It's kind of a plan to stop myself sitting back and waiting. At the moment there's quite a bit to do. I'm sure at some point I'll run out of ideas, which will be the point I start learning crazy Shakespeare monologues or mentally hard songs. Both of which are also useful things to do! However the more pressing issues are things like choosing which agents to write to (which is Mondays job) and organising an audition folder (Fridays job) or getting photos and website sorted and recording some stuff for a showreel...by the end of July I plan to be the most organised actress in London. That has to count for something!
The gruelling process of sifting through the casting calls and applying to things happens every day too. Yes, I am one of the sad people who logs on 3 times a day to check if there is anything new and to get in there first. But if it gets me a job, then how is it bad?
So all of this, added to my need to earn money, means that my addiction to trashy US TV may have to be overcome. Either that or I could give up sleep...
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