Sound & the Furious

Sound: Yesterday I got another very L.A. experience. My former neighbor, who is a composer and does the music for one of the hottest shows on television, invited me to watch a studio session as he recorded a score for the show. Of course, I said yes and as he showed me around the studio, I saw gold records from many of the rock icons of my youth. Classic albums such as Motley Crue's Girls, Girls, Girls and Guns 'N Roses' Use Your Illusion I were recorded in the same studio.

It was really interesting to see him (and his dozen or so amazing studio musicians) work. David had composed the music in advance and the musicians (all strings: violins, violas, cellos, bass) were seeing it for the first time. And it was amazing how few takes it took to get it the way David wanted. They would play it, he would make a couple adjustments, they would play it again, and that would be it. Man, musicians/composers/musically talented people in general just amaze me...

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The Furious: Me. Well, not really furious. But, today was one of those days that can be a little demoralizing. First of all, the extras casting director from that project I have been working on was upset that I couldn't make one of the days upcoming since I had another commitment. Never mind that I hadn't been asked before to 'set aside' that day or the fact that last time I was asked to set aside days for him - 15 of them in fact - I worked exactly 2, having to give up other jobs during that time since I was 'on-call.' I know out here the ideal is the "career extra" so you can work background all day everyday, day or night, without any pesky things like getting notice, or auditions, classes or ACTING ambitions of any kind. So, the sooner I can actually get some work, the sooner I can stop worrying about angering an extras casting director because I --gasp! -- actually want to act.

Then, I had a meeting with a very good agency, and it just didn't really go well. My reading was okay but at least 2 standard deviations worse than I had just done it out in the hallway... Sigh, it was good experience anyway, and hopefully I can take what I learned into my next meeting -- should I be lucky enough to get another one...