Friday, July 06, 2007
FAIR WARNING FROM THE CASTING DIRECTORS
I just came from a meeting of Austin Alliance at which casting directors Donise Hardy and Beth Sepko reiterated to the agents and acting coaches the problems they are having with the lack of professionalism of Austin actors at auditions.
This has become such a problem that they are often embarrassed in front of their film and commercial clients. I thought I would pass some of their concerns on to you as a public service.
First of all...Austin actors are being routinely outperformed at auditions by Dallas and Houston actors, not to mention L.A. actors. This is bad, because we are trying to attract work here. But, more discouraging is that huge numbers of Austin actors can’t seem to focus on the most basic rules of auditions, such as:
*bringing headshots with resumes attached
*accurate resumes that list special abilities without lying
*being punctual
*bringing friends and family with them to auditions
*knowing how to stand on the mark, slate, do profiles,
handle scripts and accomplish the basic nuts and bolts of the business
*at film auditions, not preparing with the sides, bringing the wrong sides, not reading the script when provided
*at commercial auditions not knowing how to present themselves, relate to the camera, smile and be personable
The list goes on and on. They talked for two hours about how frustrated they are with the acting community here. The upshot is, Beth and Donise have decided, with unanimous backing from the equally frustrated agents, to “red card” actors who commit these and similar offenses. They are no longer going to baby actors who are unprepared, even for walk-on roles or commercial looks.
So, Fair Warning... develop a professional demeanor or forget about it. That’s the message our local casting directors sent us home with.
Most of the acting coaches feel that we routinely teach these basic audition techniques to people who take our classes frequently, but we want to help because a professional acting pool attracts business and the opposite, well...is the opposite! We want to work too!
I strongly urge you to learn audition skills. All of the acting coaches in town will help you. Donise Hardy has a commercial workshop you can sign up for. I am dedicating my workshops on Thursday July 26 and Saturday July 28 to auditions: how to get a good headshot, resume, and all the details of commercial auditioning as well as film auditioning.
Let’s raise the bar in this town so we all get more work!
Thanks.
Marco Perella
I just came from a meeting of Austin Alliance at which casting directors Donise Hardy and Beth Sepko reiterated to the agents and acting coaches the problems they are having with the lack of professionalism of Austin actors at auditions.
This has become such a problem that they are often embarrassed in front of their film and commercial clients. I thought I would pass some of their concerns on to you as a public service.
First of all...Austin actors are being routinely outperformed at auditions by Dallas and Houston actors, not to mention L.A. actors. This is bad, because we are trying to attract work here. But, more discouraging is that huge numbers of Austin actors can’t seem to focus on the most basic rules of auditions, such as:
*bringing headshots with resumes attached
*accurate resumes that list special abilities without lying
*being punctual
*bringing friends and family with them to auditions
*knowing how to stand on the mark, slate, do profiles,
handle scripts and accomplish the basic nuts and bolts of the business
*at film auditions, not preparing with the sides, bringing the wrong sides, not reading the script when provided
*at commercial auditions not knowing how to present themselves, relate to the camera, smile and be personable
The list goes on and on. They talked for two hours about how frustrated they are with the acting community here. The upshot is, Beth and Donise have decided, with unanimous backing from the equally frustrated agents, to “red card” actors who commit these and similar offenses. They are no longer going to baby actors who are unprepared, even for walk-on roles or commercial looks.
So, Fair Warning... develop a professional demeanor or forget about it. That’s the message our local casting directors sent us home with.
Most of the acting coaches feel that we routinely teach these basic audition techniques to people who take our classes frequently, but we want to help because a professional acting pool attracts business and the opposite, well...is the opposite! We want to work too!
I strongly urge you to learn audition skills. All of the acting coaches in town will help you. Donise Hardy has a commercial workshop you can sign up for. I am dedicating my workshops on Thursday July 26 and Saturday July 28 to auditions: how to get a good headshot, resume, and all the details of commercial auditioning as well as film auditioning.
Let’s raise the bar in this town so we all get more work!
Thanks.
Marco Perella
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Austin Industry News
Letter from Richard Linklater...
Dear Friend of Austin Film:As the founder and Artistic Director of the Austin Film Society, I would like to share with you how we have worked hard to make Austin Studios a professional production facility. Austin Studios has been home to two dozen films with budget levels ranging from $100,000 to $40 million, plus scores of shorter productions. Using rental income, we have made numerous upgrades over the past six years, including electrical and structural. Despite this progress, the fact remains that Austin Studios must make major capital improvements to be considered viable within the film industry.
That is why I am so pleased to share the news that Austin Studios is part of the bond package for the November 7 election.
If Proposition 4 passes, Austin Studios, a city-owned facility, will receive $5 million to make critical upgrades including soundproofing, air conditioning and digital infrastructure.
Austin-based crews want to keep working here, and through Proposition 4, it can happen. You will be receiving an email soon from "I'm for 4," the political action committee working on behalf of Austin's film industry to get Proposition 4 passed. That email will tell you how you can help make this dream come true for film production in Austin.
Please forward the email to anyone you think would like to help. If you can, make a donation to the political action committee. Or volunteer your time for the campaign. Most of all—please get out and vote YES on Prop. 4 on November 7.
Sincerely,
Richard Linklater
Letter from Richard Linklater...
Dear Friend of Austin Film:As the founder and Artistic Director of the Austin Film Society, I would like to share with you how we have worked hard to make Austin Studios a professional production facility. Austin Studios has been home to two dozen films with budget levels ranging from $100,000 to $40 million, plus scores of shorter productions. Using rental income, we have made numerous upgrades over the past six years, including electrical and structural. Despite this progress, the fact remains that Austin Studios must make major capital improvements to be considered viable within the film industry.
That is why I am so pleased to share the news that Austin Studios is part of the bond package for the November 7 election.
If Proposition 4 passes, Austin Studios, a city-owned facility, will receive $5 million to make critical upgrades including soundproofing, air conditioning and digital infrastructure.
Austin-based crews want to keep working here, and through Proposition 4, it can happen. You will be receiving an email soon from "I'm for 4," the political action committee working on behalf of Austin's film industry to get Proposition 4 passed. That email will tell you how you can help make this dream come true for film production in Austin.
Please forward the email to anyone you think would like to help. If you can, make a donation to the political action committee. Or volunteer your time for the campaign. Most of all—please get out and vote YES on Prop. 4 on November 7.
Sincerely,
Richard Linklater
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
BATTLE CRY:
"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly so that his place shall never be with those timid souls who know neither victory or defeat." Theodore Roosevelt
FIGHTIN' WORDS:
It is so easy to be a critic. It is so easy to point out another's faults. All someone must do is open his mouth and speak. That's it! Nothing more is required. It takes no skill, no training, and no education to be a critic. Just a mouth full of words. So don't listen to 'em. Who cares what they say: their opinion is tarred to begin with. Be proud that you have the guts to even get into the arena. So few others will. It's lonely at the top, as you probably already know from the criticism you have no doubt had to deal with from the day you decided to go after your dreams. After all is said and done, though, it's better to die trying than to die crying in regret. Be never more timid. Get up, stand up, and run out that door. Take those actions you know you have to make. --Monroe Mann
"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly so that his place shall never be with those timid souls who know neither victory or defeat." Theodore Roosevelt
FIGHTIN' WORDS:
It is so easy to be a critic. It is so easy to point out another's faults. All someone must do is open his mouth and speak. That's it! Nothing more is required. It takes no skill, no training, and no education to be a critic. Just a mouth full of words. So don't listen to 'em. Who cares what they say: their opinion is tarred to begin with. Be proud that you have the guts to even get into the arena. So few others will. It's lonely at the top, as you probably already know from the criticism you have no doubt had to deal with from the day you decided to go after your dreams. After all is said and done, though, it's better to die trying than to die crying in regret. Be never more timid. Get up, stand up, and run out that door. Take those actions you know you have to make. --Monroe Mann
Friday, July 07, 2006
myth of the little king
About the time the Industrial Revolution was really getting into gear, political revolutions were everywhere replacing kings with parliaments, presidents, and promises. The key promise was that the common man would one day soon be king. He would possess for his own the kingly prerogatives of power, leisure, and security - power over his station in life, the liberty of leisure, and the security of property. - Zen and the Art of Making a Living
It would seem that many things have gone wrong with this promise, or dream. One thing it has done is separate me from my 'work'. Work has become something I must do in order to create the life I believe I should have, the life my society is geared toward. My leisure time, and the benefits I want from work, enable me to spend more time away from work. hmmmm. What about creating a life where my work is my life and my life is my work, and viewing work as a life passion?
Leisure, and the promise of the kingly life, has been dangled in front of our noses since the Industrial Revolution. It is always just around the corner. "We were promised that we would be little kings, and yet it seems we have so little control over the direction of our lives. The little king is a prisoner of his own 'freedom' - from responsibility and conscience. His inner life is barren and hollow; his humanity, atrophied; his creativity, flat."
(Victor Frankl) For too long we have been dreaming a dream from which we are now waking up; the dream that if we improve the socio-economic situation of people, everything will be okay, people will become happy. The truth is that as the struggle for survival has subsided, the question has emerged: Survival for what?
The myth of the little king and the values that it inculcates - ambition (power), consumerism (leisure), and security in conformity - give us a prescription for how we are supposed to live our lives. To want something different from this is to enter the dark forest of uncharted experience. Joseph Campbell put it like this, "You don't have to go very far off the interpreted path to find yourself in very difficult situations. The courage to face the trials and to bring a whole new body of possibilities into the field of interpreted experience for other people to experience - that is the hero's deed."
The hero, in living her own life, in being true to herself - radiates a light by which others may see their own way!
Here's to living truth, and living the hero deed!
About the time the Industrial Revolution was really getting into gear, political revolutions were everywhere replacing kings with parliaments, presidents, and promises. The key promise was that the common man would one day soon be king. He would possess for his own the kingly prerogatives of power, leisure, and security - power over his station in life, the liberty of leisure, and the security of property. - Zen and the Art of Making a Living
It would seem that many things have gone wrong with this promise, or dream. One thing it has done is separate me from my 'work'. Work has become something I must do in order to create the life I believe I should have, the life my society is geared toward. My leisure time, and the benefits I want from work, enable me to spend more time away from work. hmmmm. What about creating a life where my work is my life and my life is my work, and viewing work as a life passion?
Leisure, and the promise of the kingly life, has been dangled in front of our noses since the Industrial Revolution. It is always just around the corner. "We were promised that we would be little kings, and yet it seems we have so little control over the direction of our lives. The little king is a prisoner of his own 'freedom' - from responsibility and conscience. His inner life is barren and hollow; his humanity, atrophied; his creativity, flat."
(Victor Frankl) For too long we have been dreaming a dream from which we are now waking up; the dream that if we improve the socio-economic situation of people, everything will be okay, people will become happy. The truth is that as the struggle for survival has subsided, the question has emerged: Survival for what?
The myth of the little king and the values that it inculcates - ambition (power), consumerism (leisure), and security in conformity - give us a prescription for how we are supposed to live our lives. To want something different from this is to enter the dark forest of uncharted experience. Joseph Campbell put it like this, "You don't have to go very far off the interpreted path to find yourself in very difficult situations. The courage to face the trials and to bring a whole new body of possibilities into the field of interpreted experience for other people to experience - that is the hero's deed."
The hero, in living her own life, in being true to herself - radiates a light by which others may see their own way!
Here's to living truth, and living the hero deed!
Saturday, June 10, 2006
Dear Acting Buddy,My automatic timer is ticking. I set it to go off in 15 minutes. In 15 minutes I’m going to stop doing this newsletter and I am going to do the dishes. Except after two minutes the kitten started sharpening its claws on my favorite Louis Shanks chair and I took it on a field trip to the back yard.
I am resetting the timer. I want an orderly office and orderly home. I asked for a miracle and now I am banking my hopes on this timer.
Actors and other self-employed people are totally dependent on themselves to handle their unstructured time. That’s usually not a problem because most of us are crazy busy with creative endeavors, but sometimes the only person making us rise and shine is Guess Who? Our homes and offices can turn into colossal messes. I hate not being able to find my stuff.
Two minutes to go and then I’m going to do a little marketing for 15 minutes. Staple the resume to the headshot - address the envelopes to the productions on the list below that are happening in Texas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma. Could we please pass those incentives?
BRRRRRRRRNNNG. It’s going off now. This little sucker is LOUD. See you later, Buddy.
Okay, the envelopes are ready. But, the kitchen is way out of hand -- that’s next. I set the timer. When the timer goes off you HAVE TO change to something else. That’s the rule. If you don’t follow the rule — your nose will fall off. You can come back to memorizing your lines later. This will help with burn out. This will also prevent you from spending four hours locating lids for all the jelly jars under the sink because you are procrastinating rewriting your script.
Depending on my frame of mind it is either AMAZING what can gets done in 15 minutes or pitiful.
Executing tasks 15 minutes at a time helps combat -- all or nothing -- thinking. How many projects don’t get started because we fear the time commitment they will require?
BRRRRNNNGGG!
I have taped a sign next to the timer. STOP WHINING!I wish to make a renewed commitment to give up the drama. This is very difficult for us drama addicts. We must remember to save all that Drrraaammmaa for the stage and the camera.
Running late to class, leaving the directions for the audition at home, staying up way too late so you’re a wreck the next day, party, party, party. Making the new headshot session a great big stinking deal. Sound familiar?
So this sums it up. Be good to you. Stretch your arm out, put your first three fingers together turn your hand so it faces you. Say your name and say, little person in there, I love you! then kiss your fingers. Set the timer again. Be sure to include breaks. Get adequate sleep. Stop all unsalaried drama.
On another note, two Avatars in India, Sri Amma and Bagavan say tomorrow on Friday a blessing in the form of an energy transmission is coming from Heaven to awaken mankind's hearts to Love and Connectedness in relationships.
Amma and Bagavan ask us to intention these thoughts:
May all individuals come together as families,
and families come together as communities,
and communities become one humanity.
Amen to that.
Mona
www.thebizonline.com
I am resetting the timer. I want an orderly office and orderly home. I asked for a miracle and now I am banking my hopes on this timer.
Actors and other self-employed people are totally dependent on themselves to handle their unstructured time. That’s usually not a problem because most of us are crazy busy with creative endeavors, but sometimes the only person making us rise and shine is Guess Who? Our homes and offices can turn into colossal messes. I hate not being able to find my stuff.
Two minutes to go and then I’m going to do a little marketing for 15 minutes. Staple the resume to the headshot - address the envelopes to the productions on the list below that are happening in Texas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma. Could we please pass those incentives?
BRRRRRRRRNNNG. It’s going off now. This little sucker is LOUD. See you later, Buddy.
Okay, the envelopes are ready. But, the kitchen is way out of hand -- that’s next. I set the timer. When the timer goes off you HAVE TO change to something else. That’s the rule. If you don’t follow the rule — your nose will fall off. You can come back to memorizing your lines later. This will help with burn out. This will also prevent you from spending four hours locating lids for all the jelly jars under the sink because you are procrastinating rewriting your script.
Depending on my frame of mind it is either AMAZING what can gets done in 15 minutes or pitiful.
Executing tasks 15 minutes at a time helps combat -- all or nothing -- thinking. How many projects don’t get started because we fear the time commitment they will require?
BRRRRNNNGGG!
I have taped a sign next to the timer. STOP WHINING!I wish to make a renewed commitment to give up the drama. This is very difficult for us drama addicts. We must remember to save all that Drrraaammmaa for the stage and the camera.
Running late to class, leaving the directions for the audition at home, staying up way too late so you’re a wreck the next day, party, party, party. Making the new headshot session a great big stinking deal. Sound familiar?
So this sums it up. Be good to you. Stretch your arm out, put your first three fingers together turn your hand so it faces you. Say your name and say, little person in there, I love you! then kiss your fingers. Set the timer again. Be sure to include breaks. Get adequate sleep. Stop all unsalaried drama.
On another note, two Avatars in India, Sri Amma and Bagavan say tomorrow on Friday a blessing in the form of an energy transmission is coming from Heaven to awaken mankind's hearts to Love and Connectedness in relationships.
Amma and Bagavan ask us to intention these thoughts:
May all individuals come together as families,
and families come together as communities,
and communities become one humanity.
Amen to that.
Mona
www.thebizonline.com
Wednesday, December 21, 2005
Rehearsals are well underway for the 2006 production of Dark Goddess. I will be working with Ma'at this year. An Egyptian Goddess of Truth and Balance.
We finished the first two weeks, which in this show, consists of individual research and experimentation. Dark Goddess is a collaborative process, with each actress contributing substantially to her role.
We finished the first two weeks, which in this show, consists of individual research and experimentation. Dark Goddess is a collaborative process, with each actress contributing substantially to her role.
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
"RoeTip # 16
QUOTE: 'And those who would see wonderful things must often be ready to travel alone.'
- Henry Van Dyke
TIP: We've all heard the expression, 'It's lonely at the top.' Guess what? It is. The reason a rare few of us get to the top is because we dare to dream and do things others wouldn't, couldn't, and didn't do. Don't expect others to understand you. I've always believed that if someone tells me I shouldn't do something, then that probably is a reason to go ahead and do it. If it bucks the system, I'm usually a big fan. Go against the grain. You must have such a strongly burning confidence within you that rejection becomes a mere annoyance, rather than a roadblock. Set your eyes on the prize, and go for it, and don't let anyone in your way stop you. Yes, you can get to the top. Yes, it's going to be a long and winding and lonely road. Yes, I look forward to seeing you there.
Meet you at the top!
- Monroe Mann "
QUOTE: 'And those who would see wonderful things must often be ready to travel alone.'
- Henry Van Dyke
TIP: We've all heard the expression, 'It's lonely at the top.' Guess what? It is. The reason a rare few of us get to the top is because we dare to dream and do things others wouldn't, couldn't, and didn't do. Don't expect others to understand you. I've always believed that if someone tells me I shouldn't do something, then that probably is a reason to go ahead and do it. If it bucks the system, I'm usually a big fan. Go against the grain. You must have such a strongly burning confidence within you that rejection becomes a mere annoyance, rather than a roadblock. Set your eyes on the prize, and go for it, and don't let anyone in your way stop you. Yes, you can get to the top. Yes, it's going to be a long and winding and lonely road. Yes, I look forward to seeing you there.
Meet you at the top!
- Monroe Mann "
