The Eternal Post-Holiday Season Question...

How long do you think I can keep my Christmas tree up before it becomes a real fire hazard?

I just love it, it's so cute and short and it keeps my apartment smelling less like cat litter, which is always a good thing.

But eventually it's going to be a little weird.

But seriously, look how pretty:

Best. Present. Ever.

My brother is the greatest brother on the face of the planet.

He bought me a video camera for Christmas.

The only thing that could have made this a more touching experience is if I'd opened all my presents and was lounging on the couch staring at all the crumpled wrapping paper on the floor, and all of a sudden Sean leans forward and says, "Say, what's that behind the desk?" and I go over and pull out a long, finely wrapped package with a bow, and open it up to discover that it's a digital camcorder. With a compass in the stock. And this thing that tells time.

Still, it was pretty awesome.

Therefore, more funny videos are pending. Stay tuned.

Fail/Success. At the same time. Weird.

Okay so I didn't get the part, but I got some of the best feedback I've ever gotten from an audition outside of college.

It was really surprising. I figured the only reason I'd even get a call would be if I got the role, and if I didn't I would just never hear from them again. They would go to that imaginary island where I send all the directors and casting directors that have never called me again. In that environment I imagine them battling for clean water and flounder while trying to stage a revival of "Song and Dance," all the while wishing they had a sassy twenty-something brunette with a kick-ass British dialect to play Emma.

But imagine my surprise when I checked my phone on my break on Saturday and I had a voicemail.

The voicemail (which I have listened to seven times and now have committed to memory) is from the director, Laura. She explains that they've decided to go in a different direction with Ophelia, the character for which I was auditioning. But THEN, she says:

But Michele, you are such a smart and talented actor. Rarely have I seen such smart, unique, inventive choices being made.

Woot.

So I can't count this one as a fail. It was a really nice kick in the Self-Worth. 2010 is going to be a good year I think.

Now I just need a new camera.

Audition Log 12/18/09

Audition: Getting Even With Shakespeare, a one-act play as part of the WinterFest 2010 festival.
Champions Studios

Note for the future: If there is a Non-Union open call from 6-9:30 ever again, DO NOT arrive anytime after 6pm. It's not like a party, you're not going to look like a douche if you're the first one there.

I saw "Avatar" that night, which is the source of my tardiness, but still if I'd hauled ass from Lincoln Center as soon as I got out of the movie, I could have gotten a decent slot. As it was I got there around 6:30 and all the slots were full, as well as a list full of write-in slots that went well beyond 9:30. Hopping on the bandwagon, I signed up for 10:45pm.

So now I was stuck with a dilemma, the Should I Stay or Should I Go question.

Normally, I feel like I would have just shrugged my shoulders and went home, accepting the fact that I got there too late and they wouldn't be able to see me. But I'd just seen Avatar in 3D, and spent a good three minutes in the middle of the movie crying because I wasn't IN that movie. Seriously.

So I was in the mood to audition for something.

I made a brief Starbucks run, grabbed a corn dog from Papaya dog, and I decided to hang out. If someone didn't show up, if people decided not to stay, you had best believe I was going to slip my ass in there.

As it turns out, the people running auditions were incredibly generous with their time. There was no one coming into the studio after them, so they said they would stay until closing, which was at 11pm. They bumped a few people to this morning, but they said they'd see as many people as possible.

I stuck around, played around with my phone and doodled in my notebook. The studio across the hall from auditions were having some kind of dance battle for inner-city teenagers. Awesome. It was like a clown car the way lines of kids in big puffy Northface jackets just kept piling in that room, and every time the door opened the hallway filled with thumping bass and the sound of "Hey! Ho!"

There were these three sassy black ladies in charge who sat in the hallway, and every time some kid would come out of the room, they'd grab him by the arm, lead him down the hall saying, "Keep it moving, these people are auditioning!"

Now, having attended Benjamin Cardozo High School, I happen to know that having that many teenagers packed into one room dancing to hip hop music was a bad idea, and it was only a matter of time before something happened, which in a crowded hallway like that in Champions Studios, would no doubt erupt into a stampede like at that America's Next Top Model call when someone yelled, "bomb."

Thankfully, it wasn't until about a quarter to ten, when most of the people waiting to audition had gone home and there were only a handful of us still sitting in the hall. A parade of kids came up to the door to join the dance party, and then all of a sudden, someone's up in someone's grill and before you know it:

Gang Warfare.

Well, it was actually like Little Miss Gang Warfare, because the fight was between two twelve year olds.

The sassy black ladies were very quick in using force to drive the rowdy teenagers out of the hallway, but I do feel bad for the girl whose monologue was interrupted by a chorus of, "Say it to mah face! Say it to mah face!" coming from the outer hallways.

Their tactic was brilliant too. They all had those bathroom air fresheners, like Lysol, and they just started spraying the girls with them. First in the torso, but when they wouldn't back off, they went for the eyes.

It was hilarious.

Needless to say, that was the end of the dance party.

I was one of the last people to audition. There were only two girls after me, one of whom had a Saturday morning slot, and was just hanging around on the off-chance they'd be able to fit her in. I'm sure they got her in right after me, because as I'd predicted, not everyone stuck around.

My monologues seemed to go well. They laughed, which after five straight hours of monologues, is surprising. For my Shakespeare monologue I decided to do Hamlet's "To be or not to be," but as one of those girls on "My Super Sweet Sixteen." I figured if anything else, it would be memorable.

And I was right, because they just called me an hour ago to call me back for one of the roles today at 1:30.

Sweet.

Tomatoes...

I am sitting in my apartment, drinking white wine and submitting my resume electronically to virtually anything that lists "Caucasian Female, 20-35" in the character breakdown.

Due to my spectacular falling down during the Christmas bar crawl I went on with my co-workers, the viewscreen on my camera has cracked! I can still take pictures, I just don't see what they look like until I upload them onto my computer. It's weird, it's like I've gone back in time to a day in which you got an envelope from CVS full of photos and you're like, "What the hell is this?" Old school.

But that means no videos for a while, which is a real shame. I had a few more rattling around in my brain, I was just procrastinating. Just goes to show you.

I do have $400 in my "Moving to LA" fund, which I've placed in a sealed envelope in hopes that I won't have to dip into it in the Christmas hustle and bustle. Maybe I'll buy myself one of them video cameras with the amusing commercials.

That burger song: Hilarious.

Audition tomorrow, immediately following "Avatar" in IMAX.

It had better be good, because if I go to this movie, and it doesn't stand up to the hype, and then I go to this audition and blow, I'm going to blame James Cameron. James Cameron will owe me.