It Pulls You Under

About a month and a half into living as a working actress, making a couple of hundred dollars a week and letting my boyfriend support me financially, I finally break down.

There are a lot of things about life as a working actor that break people down. For most people, it's the rejection. It's constantly feeling like you're not good enough. For some people, it's the frustration of knowing that you are good enough, and nobody gives a shit.

I can deal with both those things. What finally got me last night was something different entirely.

In February The Boyfriend and I moved into a gorgeous one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn. My half of the rent is more than I was paying for my Queens studio apartment, but in February I had a steady job, making enough money to pay rent and keep up with my student loans, and still have money to put away in savings. Good for me.

But now, in this performance job that I ADORE, I'm barely making enough money to pay the rent. It's only thanks to my generous parents, a NY Lottery commercial and the payout from a class-action lawsuit that i forgot to opt out of that I've made it through July.

The Boyfriend, however, cheerfully tells me, "Don't worry about it, baby. I get paid tomorrow." And I love him, but the fact that HE has enough money to pay OUR rent does not make me feel better. WE should have enough money to pay OUR rent.

Nobody ever told me that the hardest shit to deal with in this life was going to be the Financial Aspect of it, and I call Shenanigans.

Why isn't that ever on an episode of Smash? Huh, Telsey? Why doesn't Karen Carpenter have her credit card declined trying to buy macaroni and cheese at a Duane Reade at 2 o'clock in the morning?

So last night I spilled fucking water on my fucking iPhone again. I am the biggest dick on the planet, and no one should ever give me anything worth over $50, because I will ruin it. Spoiler Alert: my phone is fine, I got it in rice right away and it only had a little bit spilled on it in the first place. But in my haste to rip open the rice bag, it exploded potato-chip-style all over the floor of the kitchen, and then I spent the next hour and a half crying. Like, snot-pouring-down-the-front-of-my-face, Irish-funeral-keening. The Boyfriend hugged me as I hyperventilated, and once I'd calmed down I went into the living room and fired off an email to Best Friend Cate. 

As previously mentioned, Best Friend Cate is an incredibly talented writer, who moved to Poughkeepsie when her boyfriend got a teaching job there. And she spent the first six months there living much like I am living now. Shitty job, not enough money, being supported by someone else, all the while with all this talent inside her, just waiting to be discovered.

To say her response made me feel better would be underselling it completely.

"You're doing everything you're supposed to be doing," she said, "and shit--you're only in the financial situation you're in because you took a chance on a job that is going to move your REAL career forward... You chose to work in a field where nobody gives a shit about you... You chose this--years of people not giving a shit, and having to balance the non-shit-giving with paychecks so that you can survive until people do give a shit... It's slow. It's called our twenties. We can't all be Lena Dunham.

"BUT look at Christina Hendricks. Maybe I'm biased, since she's the first woman I've ever wanted to motorboat, Vince-Vaughan-style, but she's in her mid-thirties and her career is only now taking off... Total nerd girl, too. She paid her dues. Am I saying it will take you another 8 years to get there? No. But it might.

"I love you. Hang in there. Remember that a big part of this is the transition period. It pulls you under."

Seriously everybody is being so fucking supportive it makes me want to throw up. In a good way.

So here is the part where I try to turn this incredibly depressing blog entry into an inspirational cry to action, whoopie. Perhaps I should include some quote about perseverance or never giving up or whatever. But instead I think I'll end with a message to myself.

Dear McNally,

Calm the fuck down. It's hard. It's supposed to be hard. If it wasn't, everyone would do it.

And yes, that was paraphrased from A League of Their Own.

Stop whining. If you're so worried about money, get a second job already.

Kaboom.

Space Captain: Captain of Space

Yes boys and girls, it's that time again! Rehearsals for Space Captain start this month!

I think it's the funniest we've done. It's based on the old Flash Gordon serials from the 1930s. The really old ones, before the movie with the Queen song. 

Space Captain is the fourth full-length show I've done with No Tea Productions, a small New York theater company that adopted me into its ranks three years ago after I played the title role in "Poppycock." (The title role was a woman named "Poppy," get your mind out of the gutter)

My invitation to become a resident actor with the company came at one of the founder's 80's-themed birthday party while doing shots of Jack Daniels and wearing artfully ripped T-shirts, side ponytails and a green fuzzy snap-bracelet, which I still have.

How do you say no to that?

Lindsey and Jeff, the couple that founded No Tea in 2007, are two of the coolest people I know. Their mission statement is to produce quality original comedies that so far have been written and developed by members of the company. I've attended the weekly writer's meetings myself, and wrote a short one-act that was performed by company members as part of a night of scenes resulting from those workshops.

The shows are good. They really are. Not only are they funny, but they're meaningful and original in thought and concept. And the people in the company are some of the sweetest, and most down-to-Earth theatre people I know.

In addition to being invited into the company of actors, after my first show with No Tea, I was even invited to Lindsey and Jeff's wedding!

The most astounding thing about this company is that Lindsey, Jeff, Jeremy (the Technical Director) and all of the other designers and crew pay for everything out of their own pockets. They never make their money back and I doubt they even break even most of the time. And this show is CRAZY AMBITIOUS.

It's multimedia, with video, live action and puppets, and thus much more expensive than any of the other shows they've done.

And so, they've set up an IndieGoGo fundraising page in order to help them make back some of the money that they are already spending to cover the costs of materials, performance and rehearsal space, etc.

I STRONGLY urge you to donate to this campaign. All the time and money and sweat and tears that these people have spent on previous shows have been given freely, just for the love of making theatre. The show will get made whether or not they make their money, but I think they deserve to get a little back.

To donate, visit their IndieGoGo page.http://www.indiegogo.com/NoTeaProductions-SpaceCaptain

Squeaking By...

Every time I go use the coinstar machine at the Food Emporium on 43rd street, there is ALWAYS some manager's discarded clipboard on it. Like the people in that neighborhood never have the need to cash in the coins they've been hoarding for months on end in order to get the $65 cash to keep their bank account from overdrawing. So we might as well use it as furniture.

This time though, some guy came in right after me to cash in his coins. First time I've ever seen anyone else use that coinstar machine.

I gave him a little smile as I took my voucher, a kind of, "Glad to know I'm not the only one."

He shrugged.