(no subject)
Apologies for the length of this post. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
So I've gotten my new headshots taken and have received them via eMail. Forgive the fact that I have not posted one here just yet as I have to decide which ones I keep and which ones I don't. I promise to put a few up just as soon as the elimination process is done. This may take up to 20 days so do be patient.
The results are spectacular. He gave me about 5 different "looks" and it seems to showcase my range quite nicely. Well worth the money and it should help things out a bit. An example is that agents and casting directors tend to look for headshots that "pop" and these all do. They are also in color as opposed to my older Oklahoma based theatrical headshots. Color is what is needed out here. I also will have up to 400 different pictures at my disposal. This allows for a good assortment to choose from when auditioning for a specific part. Creepy yet vulnerable might be an example. I will also be able to get business cards with them on it as well as postcards. Postcards are used whenever I mail to an agent or casting director a second or third time. Not a full sized picture and resume but just a reminder. It can also include a note such as "I'm now in Rapscallion Theater's production of Twelfth Night" and agents and C.D.'s really do attend those sorts of things. Plus I can use them as networking tools as well.
I've also found out that the episode of "Studio 60" I did background work on (back in March) aired last week. Sorry I did not alert anyone but I had no idea this was the one I was going to be in. The show has been on hiatus for so long that I sort of forgot about it. I'll try and look for a repeat if anyone is really interested in saying "There he is". I am clearly seen about 22 minutes in wandering around Matthew Perry in a black Hawaiian shirt.
I also did some more background work on an upcoming TNT show called "Saving Grace" It starts on TNT this July and was a long day of nothing to do. But, it was close by and payed really well. Plus it lead to more...
Mark L Taylor: Sort of obscure character actor I know from "Honey I Shrunk The Kids" as Matt Frewer's fishing buddy. Quiet and professional
Laura San Giacomo: Best known from "Just Shoot Me". Saw at a distance but seems really nice.
Holly Hunter: Oscar winner from "The Piano" and also in "Always" and "The Firm"
Very sweet and down to earth. Actually got to talk to her and sat with her at lunch. Really great person.
Now, while I'm not that politically outspoken I read this piece the other day and wanted to post this here for a few reasons. One, is that is something I believe in, the other is that I admire this man very much and envy the way he writes and speaks with intelligence, eloquence (without sounding elitist), humor, and grace without losing sight of what he stands for. He gets his point across without yelling or preaching.
Judge for your self
May 20 2007
Let's Watch A Girl Get Beaten To Death. This is not my blog, but I don’t have a blog, or a space, and I’d like to be heard for a bit.
Last month seventeen year old Dua Khalil was pulled into a crowd of young men, some of them (the instigators) family, who then kicked and stoned her to death. This is an example of the breath-taking oxymoron “honor killing”, in which a family member (almost always female) is murdered for some religious or ethical transgression. Dua Khalil, who was of the Yazidi faith, had been seen in the company of a Sunni Muslim, and possibly suspected of having married him or converted. That she was torturously murdered for this is not, in fact, a particularly uncommon story. But now you can watch the action up close on CNN. Because as the girl was on the ground trying to get up, her face nothing but red, the few in the group of more than twenty men who were not busy kicking her and hurling stones at her were filming the event with their camera-phones.
There were security officers standing outside the area doing nothing, but the footage of the murder was taken - by more than one phone - from the front row. Which means whoever shot it did so not to record the horror of the event, but to commemorate it. To share it. Because it was cool.
I could start a rant about the level to which we have become desensitized to violence, about the evils of the voyeuristic digital world in which everything is shown and everything is game, but honestly, it’s been said. And I certainly have no jingoistic cultural agenda. I like to think that in America this would be considered unbearably appalling, that Kitty Genovese is still remembered, that we are more evolved. But coincidentally, right before I stumbled on this vid I watched the trailer for “Captivity”.
A few of you may know that I took public exception to the billboard campaign for this film, which showed a concise narrative of the kidnapping, torture and murder of a sexy young woman. I wanted to see if the film was perhaps more substantial (especially given the fact that it was directed by “The Killing Fields” Roland Joffe) than the exploitive ad campaign had painted it. The trailer resembles nothing so much as the CNN story on Dua Khalil. Pretty much all you learn is that Elisha Cuthbert is beautiful, then kidnapped, inventively, repeatedly and horrifically tortured, and that the first thing she screams is “I’m sorry”.
“I’m sorry.”
What is wrong with women?
I mean wrong. Physically. Spiritually. Something unnatural, something destructive, something that needs to be corrected.
How did more than half the people in the world come out incorrectly? I have spent a good part of my life trying to do that math, and I’m no closer to a viable equation. And I have yet to find a culture that doesn’t buy into it. Women’s inferiority - in fact, their malevolence -- is as ingrained in American popular culture as it is anywhere they’re sporting burkhas. I find it in movies, I hear it in the jokes of colleagues, I see it plastered on billboards, and not just the ones for horror movies. Women are weak. Women are manipulative. Women are somehow morally unfinished. (Objectification: another tangential rant avoided.) And the logical extension of this line of thinking is that women are, at the very least, expendable.
I try to think how we got here. The theory I developed in college (shared by many I’m sure) is one I have yet to beat: Womb Envy. Biology: women are generally smaller and weaker than men. But they’re also much tougher. Put simply, men are strong enough to overpower a woman and propagate. Women are tough enough to have and nurture children, with or without the aid of a man. Oh, and they’ve also got the equipment to do that, to be part of the life cycle, to create and bond in a way no man ever really will. Somewhere a long time ago a bunch of men got together and said, “If all we do is hunt and gather, let’s make hunting and gathering the awesomest achievement, and let’s make childbirth kinda weak and shameful.” It’s a rather silly simplification, but I believe on a mass, unconscious level, it’s entirely true. How else to explain the fact that cultures who would die to eradicate each other have always agreed on one issue? That every popular religion puts restrictions on women’s behavior that are practically untenable? That the act of being a free, attractive, self-assertive woman is punishable by torture and death? In the case of this upcoming torture-porn, fictional. In the case of Dua Khalil, mundanely, unthinkably real. And both available for your viewing pleasure.
It’s safe to say that I’ve snapped. That something broke, like one of those robots you can conquer with a logical conundrum. All my life I’ve looked at this faulty equation, trying to understand, and I’ve shorted out. I don’t pretend to be a great guy; I know really really well about objectification, trust me. And I’m not for a second going down the “women are saints” route - that just leads to more stone-throwing (and occasional Joan-burning). I just think there is the staggering imbalance in the world that we all just take for granted. If we were all told the sky was evil, or at best a little embarrassing, and we ought not look at it, wouldn’t that tradition eventually fall apart? (I was going to use ‘trees’ as my example, but at the rate we’re getting rid of them I’m pretty sure we really do think they’re evil. See how all rants become one?)
Now those of you who frequent this site are, in my wildly biased opinion, fairly evolved. You may hear nothing new here. You may be way ahead of me. But I can’t contain my despair, for Dua Khalil, for humanity, for the world we’re shaping. Those of you who have followed the link I set up know that it doesn’t bring you to a video of a murder. It brings you to a place of sanity, of people who have never stopped asking the question of what is wrong with this world and have set about trying to change the answer. Because it’s no longer enough to be a decent person. It’s no longer enough to shake our heads and make concerned grimaces at the news. True enlightened activism is the only thing that can save humanity from itself. I’ve always had a bent towards apocalyptic fiction, and I’m beginning to understand why. I look and I see the earth in flames. Her face was nothing but red.
All I ask is this: Do something. Try something. Speaking out, showing up, writing a letter, a check, a strongly worded e-mail. Pick a cause - there are few unworthy ones. And nudge yourself past the brink of tacit support to action. Once a month, once a year, or just once. If you can’t think of what to do, there is this handy link. Even just learning enough about a subject so you can speak against an opponent eloquently makes you an unusual personage. Start with that. Any one of you would have cried out, would have intervened, had you been in that crowd in Bashiqa. Well thanks to digital technology, you’re all in it now.
I have never had any faith in humanity. But I will give us props on this: if we can evolve, invent and theorize our way into the technologically magical, culturally diverse and artistically magnificent race we are and still get people to buy the idiotic idea that half of us are inferior, we’re pretty amazing. Let our next sleight of hand be to make that myth disappear.
The sky isn’t evil. Try looking up
- Joss Whedon
Here is the link to the site this is on. As well as another link I encourage you to watch if you liked the above.
http://whedonesque.com/comments/13271
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYaczoJMRhs
Well, I've rambled on long enough. But before I sign off and go to the New Beverly Cinema to watch a double feature of "Raiders of the Lost Ark" and "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade" I'll leave you with...
Question Of The Day #265: How would you describe your parents marriage while you were growing up?
Take care all and T.T.F.N.
So I've gotten my new headshots taken and have received them via eMail. Forgive the fact that I have not posted one here just yet as I have to decide which ones I keep and which ones I don't. I promise to put a few up just as soon as the elimination process is done. This may take up to 20 days so do be patient.
The results are spectacular. He gave me about 5 different "looks" and it seems to showcase my range quite nicely. Well worth the money and it should help things out a bit. An example is that agents and casting directors tend to look for headshots that "pop" and these all do. They are also in color as opposed to my older Oklahoma based theatrical headshots. Color is what is needed out here. I also will have up to 400 different pictures at my disposal. This allows for a good assortment to choose from when auditioning for a specific part. Creepy yet vulnerable might be an example. I will also be able to get business cards with them on it as well as postcards. Postcards are used whenever I mail to an agent or casting director a second or third time. Not a full sized picture and resume but just a reminder. It can also include a note such as "I'm now in Rapscallion Theater's production of Twelfth Night" and agents and C.D.'s really do attend those sorts of things. Plus I can use them as networking tools as well.
I've also found out that the episode of "Studio 60" I did background work on (back in March) aired last week. Sorry I did not alert anyone but I had no idea this was the one I was going to be in. The show has been on hiatus for so long that I sort of forgot about it. I'll try and look for a repeat if anyone is really interested in saying "There he is". I am clearly seen about 22 minutes in wandering around Matthew Perry in a black Hawaiian shirt.
I also did some more background work on an upcoming TNT show called "Saving Grace" It starts on TNT this July and was a long day of nothing to do. But, it was close by and payed really well. Plus it lead to more...
Mark L Taylor: Sort of obscure character actor I know from "Honey I Shrunk The Kids" as Matt Frewer's fishing buddy. Quiet and professional
Laura San Giacomo: Best known from "Just Shoot Me". Saw at a distance but seems really nice.
Holly Hunter: Oscar winner from "The Piano" and also in "Always" and "The Firm"
Very sweet and down to earth. Actually got to talk to her and sat with her at lunch. Really great person.
Now, while I'm not that politically outspoken I read this piece the other day and wanted to post this here for a few reasons. One, is that is something I believe in, the other is that I admire this man very much and envy the way he writes and speaks with intelligence, eloquence (without sounding elitist), humor, and grace without losing sight of what he stands for. He gets his point across without yelling or preaching.
Judge for your self
May 20 2007
Let's Watch A Girl Get Beaten To Death. This is not my blog, but I don’t have a blog, or a space, and I’d like to be heard for a bit.
Last month seventeen year old Dua Khalil was pulled into a crowd of young men, some of them (the instigators) family, who then kicked and stoned her to death. This is an example of the breath-taking oxymoron “honor killing”, in which a family member (almost always female) is murdered for some religious or ethical transgression. Dua Khalil, who was of the Yazidi faith, had been seen in the company of a Sunni Muslim, and possibly suspected of having married him or converted. That she was torturously murdered for this is not, in fact, a particularly uncommon story. But now you can watch the action up close on CNN. Because as the girl was on the ground trying to get up, her face nothing but red, the few in the group of more than twenty men who were not busy kicking her and hurling stones at her were filming the event with their camera-phones.
There were security officers standing outside the area doing nothing, but the footage of the murder was taken - by more than one phone - from the front row. Which means whoever shot it did so not to record the horror of the event, but to commemorate it. To share it. Because it was cool.
I could start a rant about the level to which we have become desensitized to violence, about the evils of the voyeuristic digital world in which everything is shown and everything is game, but honestly, it’s been said. And I certainly have no jingoistic cultural agenda. I like to think that in America this would be considered unbearably appalling, that Kitty Genovese is still remembered, that we are more evolved. But coincidentally, right before I stumbled on this vid I watched the trailer for “Captivity”.
A few of you may know that I took public exception to the billboard campaign for this film, which showed a concise narrative of the kidnapping, torture and murder of a sexy young woman. I wanted to see if the film was perhaps more substantial (especially given the fact that it was directed by “The Killing Fields” Roland Joffe) than the exploitive ad campaign had painted it. The trailer resembles nothing so much as the CNN story on Dua Khalil. Pretty much all you learn is that Elisha Cuthbert is beautiful, then kidnapped, inventively, repeatedly and horrifically tortured, and that the first thing she screams is “I’m sorry”.
“I’m sorry.”
What is wrong with women?
I mean wrong. Physically. Spiritually. Something unnatural, something destructive, something that needs to be corrected.
How did more than half the people in the world come out incorrectly? I have spent a good part of my life trying to do that math, and I’m no closer to a viable equation. And I have yet to find a culture that doesn’t buy into it. Women’s inferiority - in fact, their malevolence -- is as ingrained in American popular culture as it is anywhere they’re sporting burkhas. I find it in movies, I hear it in the jokes of colleagues, I see it plastered on billboards, and not just the ones for horror movies. Women are weak. Women are manipulative. Women are somehow morally unfinished. (Objectification: another tangential rant avoided.) And the logical extension of this line of thinking is that women are, at the very least, expendable.
I try to think how we got here. The theory I developed in college (shared by many I’m sure) is one I have yet to beat: Womb Envy. Biology: women are generally smaller and weaker than men. But they’re also much tougher. Put simply, men are strong enough to overpower a woman and propagate. Women are tough enough to have and nurture children, with or without the aid of a man. Oh, and they’ve also got the equipment to do that, to be part of the life cycle, to create and bond in a way no man ever really will. Somewhere a long time ago a bunch of men got together and said, “If all we do is hunt and gather, let’s make hunting and gathering the awesomest achievement, and let’s make childbirth kinda weak and shameful.” It’s a rather silly simplification, but I believe on a mass, unconscious level, it’s entirely true. How else to explain the fact that cultures who would die to eradicate each other have always agreed on one issue? That every popular religion puts restrictions on women’s behavior that are practically untenable? That the act of being a free, attractive, self-assertive woman is punishable by torture and death? In the case of this upcoming torture-porn, fictional. In the case of Dua Khalil, mundanely, unthinkably real. And both available for your viewing pleasure.
It’s safe to say that I’ve snapped. That something broke, like one of those robots you can conquer with a logical conundrum. All my life I’ve looked at this faulty equation, trying to understand, and I’ve shorted out. I don’t pretend to be a great guy; I know really really well about objectification, trust me. And I’m not for a second going down the “women are saints” route - that just leads to more stone-throwing (and occasional Joan-burning). I just think there is the staggering imbalance in the world that we all just take for granted. If we were all told the sky was evil, or at best a little embarrassing, and we ought not look at it, wouldn’t that tradition eventually fall apart? (I was going to use ‘trees’ as my example, but at the rate we’re getting rid of them I’m pretty sure we really do think they’re evil. See how all rants become one?)
Now those of you who frequent this site are, in my wildly biased opinion, fairly evolved. You may hear nothing new here. You may be way ahead of me. But I can’t contain my despair, for Dua Khalil, for humanity, for the world we’re shaping. Those of you who have followed the link I set up know that it doesn’t bring you to a video of a murder. It brings you to a place of sanity, of people who have never stopped asking the question of what is wrong with this world and have set about trying to change the answer. Because it’s no longer enough to be a decent person. It’s no longer enough to shake our heads and make concerned grimaces at the news. True enlightened activism is the only thing that can save humanity from itself. I’ve always had a bent towards apocalyptic fiction, and I’m beginning to understand why. I look and I see the earth in flames. Her face was nothing but red.
All I ask is this: Do something. Try something. Speaking out, showing up, writing a letter, a check, a strongly worded e-mail. Pick a cause - there are few unworthy ones. And nudge yourself past the brink of tacit support to action. Once a month, once a year, or just once. If you can’t think of what to do, there is this handy link. Even just learning enough about a subject so you can speak against an opponent eloquently makes you an unusual personage. Start with that. Any one of you would have cried out, would have intervened, had you been in that crowd in Bashiqa. Well thanks to digital technology, you’re all in it now.
I have never had any faith in humanity. But I will give us props on this: if we can evolve, invent and theorize our way into the technologically magical, culturally diverse and artistically magnificent race we are and still get people to buy the idiotic idea that half of us are inferior, we’re pretty amazing. Let our next sleight of hand be to make that myth disappear.
The sky isn’t evil. Try looking up
- Joss Whedon
Here is the link to the site this is on. As well as another link I encourage you to watch if you liked the above.
http://whedonesque.com/comments/13271
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYaczoJMRhs
Well, I've rambled on long enough. But before I sign off and go to the New Beverly Cinema to watch a double feature of "Raiders of the Lost Ark" and "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade" I'll leave you with...
Question Of The Day #265: How would you describe your parents marriage while you were growing up?
Take care all and T.T.F.N.