Cranky Actress Blog

I was recently talking to an actress friend of mine. I was telling her about the project I’m working on and how bare bones it all is. “I don’t know Cranky. It all sounds a little festivally,” she said. We had made a pact not to do any more festivals. You know, festivals that are aggravating from beginning to end. The festivals where you bring in the entire set, costumes and props for each performance and carry them out at the end of the performance and then back again for the next one. Those festivals. The festivals where you cannot get necessary information out of the people running it. The festivals where you end up paying your own money for rehearsal space and then they keep every penny of the door.
“I know,” I responded to her, “”They treat you like a child. They treat you like a desperate child. I’m tired of being treated like a desperate child. I AM NOT A DESPERATE CHILD. I’M A DESPERATE ADULT.”

Hence, I am working with a group who is gonna tech the afternoon of the first performance. So our first full run through of the play is gonna be opening night. When I asked about it, the director said, “Well, if we do it the day before that would cost us an extra eighty dollars.” You’re kidding me, right? I came THIS close to passing around a hat to the cast. There are six of us, so it would cost us $13.35 each. And I could go up to him and say, “Here. Here’s your eighty dollas.” But I didn’t do it, because these kind of bright ideas don’t go over big with the powers that be. It’s hard, but I’ve figured out I really need to keep my mouth shut like a lot.

“Go with the flow. Go with the flow,” I tell myself when I see people doing stupid stupid things. I’m a cast member. Directors don’t like cast members who have too many ideas. Directors LIKE cast members who smile a lot and don’t say much. Saying things takes time.

Also good is learning all your lines in a timely manner. I have to be off book tomorrow. I have been procrastinating. Hence, my apartment has never been cleaner. And I’ve called every long lost friend I can think of. And I did every machine in the gym. And I finished a mailing list I started in October 2008. And it is now 3:42 pm and there is no busy work left to do, so I am sitting with the script. And now the sun just came out for the first time in like a month and I’m thinking about the park. I wonder if Denzel Washington ever has these problems?

I better get it together. Because as a desperate adult I should be thankful for this role. Especially considering my personal axiom that if you are an actress over 40 and your character is having sex, grab that role.