My amazing Sis-in-Law turned me on to R. J. Lewis, a local Brooklyn photographer who does Actor's headshots. It's been a while since I've worked with an actual headshot photographer. I am that asshole who goes to photography students because it'll be cheaper. But seriously, some of these headshot guys charge a ridiculous amount of money.
But not R. J.! THIS IS THE GLOWING REVIEW PART....
Not only was he incredibly affordable, but the price he charged bought me an entire day of shooting, wherever I wanted, however I wanted, with as many changes as I wanted. We weren't done until I was sure I had a new headshot.
And I did:
And it's goooooooooooooooood.
I highly, HIGHLY recommend him if you need headshots, engagement shots, weddings or whatever the Hell. He's amazing, and a really nice guy to boot.
And with the excitement of new headshots comes the big news:
After four years of loyal service, I have decided to retire Actor With a Business Card.com
I've decided instead to launch michelemcnally.com with a much more simple layout. Less gimmicks, less media. The old site was starting to seem like a bit of a clusterfuck. But don't fret, this blog will still serve as the place where we can let our hair down and say things like, "clusterfuck."
Right now michelemcnally.com is still a work in progress, but it's coming along quite well. Hopefully as my headshots and website become more professional, my career will follow suit!
So far, the results of my "Musical Mission: A Quest to be Cast in a Musical in the Next Year" has yielded equal parts good and super awkward auditions, leaving me with the conclusion that I should look into some voice lessons in the future, because I am seriously out of practice.
However, my musical mission must be put on hold for a while, but it's for a very good reason: I am working like a dawg.
The Play:
I am thrilled to announce that I have been cast in No Tea Productions' next show, "Space Captain: Captain of Space"!
The show is written by Jeff, co-artistic director of No Tea, and it is a Flash-Gordon-esque, 1930s space serial. This marks my fourth full production with No Tea and I couldn't be more thrilled to work with them again! I've been sporadically attending No Tea's writer's meetings since finishing Work: A Play, and I even wrote a short piece for the most recent Reading Series that we did in March. So I've been lucky enough to read the play as it was being developed and it is going to ROCK.
I play Princess Astra, daughter of the Evil King Xayno.
The show is multi-media, so it doesn't actually go up until August-September. Our first read-through is tonight, but we won't actually start rehearsals for the live-action stuff for at least a month. The majority of May and June are going to be used for filming all the video segments.
I am so FREAKING excited.
The Webseries: Recently I was contacted by a fellow graduate of SUNY New Paltz, who was working on a webseries called, "Sherwood." It's based on the Robin Hood myths, and he wanted me to play Maid Marian.
After a very successful IndieGoGo campaign during which we raised over $3,000 to fund the first season, we filmed the pilot in Upstate New York a couple of weeks ago.
I get to work with a couple of guys that I haven't seen since school, as well as some very talented new blood, and one of my former professors. And I get to use a kick-ass British accent.
The Boyfriend drove up with me, along with Best Friend Jen and Fiance Jared, who were getting their engagement photos taken in New Paltz. We all stayed the night in Poughkeepsie with Best Friend Cate and her Bearded Man, and the next morning we went into New Paltz, had brunch at the Bistro (across the street from the apartment I lived in with Cate senior year) and then we all went to New Paltz to see the closing performance of Cabaret.
I got to show The Boyfriend the campus, bought some $1 LPs at Rhino Records, and caught up with my Voice and Speech teacher, Nancy.
It was nice to go back up to school and be able to answer the "What are you up to" question with something other than, "Oh... auditioning, waiting tables, you know, making money..."
Suck it New Paltz, I'm working!
The Reading
Next weekend I am taking the train up to Poughkeepsie to be in an outdoor reading of two plays written by Best Friend Cate as part of her ongoing mission to make P-Town into more of an artist community.
The Short Film
Though I know I'm booked for the next couple of months, I still happened to come across an audition for a short film on Actor's Access.
We held auditions for Space Captain at Shetler Studios on a Sunday morning, and I came in to read with the actors. The audition for the film, "Broken Identity" was the next day, in the same studio and in the same room.
And after sitting on the other side of auditions for the first time since college, I was filled with a new level of confidence, mainly because my headshots actually LOOK LIKE ME. I couldn't believe how many people walked into the room looking NOTHING like the photo they submitted.
Also, it is never a good idea to send a naked picture out for an audition. You'd think that wouldn't need to be said. You'd THINK.
So I went to the audition feeling quietly confident. I was the first to arrive, and the first to audition. The role is small, and the script is still being developed, so in addition to my monologue, they only had one line for me to read. So I read the line, took an adjustment and read it again, and then I went home and cooked my Boyfriend dinner.
And two days later I found out that I booked the role.
Booyah.
So hopefully there shall be much more to blog about in the coming months than awkward musical theatre auditions.
I've been waiting until the craziness of the holidays to be over before posting my new headshots for all to see.
After my unfortunate encounter with the Bitchy Headshot Photographer Who Shall Not Be Named, I told the story to one of my colleagues at The Restaurant, and he recommended the very talented Keri Shean.
Keri is a student at the Fashion Institute of Technology, and she'd taken some photos for him and his band. She and I exchanged a couple of messages via Facebook and quickly set up a time and place to meet.
She was great to work with. She really listened to what I wanted the shots to look like, and jumped in with her own suggestions. She was the one who suggested we shoot on the Highline, the above ground railroad tracks that now serves as a park.
We ended up having to push our shoot back a week. It was beautiful weather up until the day we were supposed to meet, and then it was pouring. So we met on the same day next week, only to find the skies frighteningly overcast.
We were only able to shoot for twenty minutes before the rain started. I tore through blouse changes like a house on fire. (I was wearing a flesh-colored tank top underneath everything, but I still got a few uncomfortable stares).
She promised we could meet again if I didn't get what I was looking for, but when she gave me the CD a few days later, I was impressed at how much we got. I ended up choosing all my shots from the pictures we took in those first twenty minutes.
Here they are, still sans-Photoshop to take away the Fiona Apple-esque bags under my eyes. The McNally Eyes, my father calls them.
I think they are a nice assortment of McNallys. Counting the one at the top, I have six altogether, so I can choose which one I think best fits the casting I'm submitting for. That's almost a McNally for every day of the week. Monday through Saturday, and then for Sundays, I can use this one:
The next time you're on Pandora, type in "Sunny Came Home" by Shawn Colvin. Almost every song that comes up on this station is guaranteed to make you go "Oh YEAH!" and regress to sitting in your room flipping through your CD collection while putting off doing your Social Studies homework. Some favorites so far have been "Sex and Candy," "She's So High," "Story of a Girl," "One Headlight" and "The Way" by Fastball (you know this one, trust me).
It's doing its job right now, which is to distract me from what I believe to be a rejection from a headshot photographer.
What happened: I went to a wonderful workshop recently with a Commercial casting director who gave me some wonderful feedback. Among that feedback was the fact that I need new headshots.
For one thing, my hair is much different. It's about twice as long and I think I'm going to keep the length in hopes of doing a sexy, Sophia Vergara kind of thing. But also I only have one shot, and she asked me, "Is this your commercial or legit headshot?"
I believe my exact reply was, "Huggghhhn."
SO I've decided that this time around, I'm going to get at least five different pictures to be mixed and matched according to the role I'm submitting for, and lucky for me, she recommended a photographer.
I reached out, and we started talking about when we could shoot. He wanted to go right away, but I wanted a little more time. For one thing, I need a hair cut. Right now it's looking less like Sophia Vergara and more like I haven't had a spare $30 to get a trim in the last year and a half. For another thing, though I was getting a HUGE discount due to my referral I still needed about a week to pick up the dinner shifts at The Restaurant that would give me the available funds.
SIDE NOTE: Jewel's "Foolish Games" just game on. This Pandora station is like a Highlander flashback.
So though he suggested that we shoot Monday, I sent him back an email saying, "This Monday is actually not good for me." Which was very true, since I had tickets to go see an Andrew Bird concert in Poughkeepsie with Best Friend Cate. "How does next Monday work for you?"
He'd suggested Monday on Thursday the 13th. I sent my response on Friday the 14th. I didn't receive a reply until that Monday the 17th, which was the day he'd wanted to shoot:
And that was it.
So, I sent one more reply, starting with the phrase, "Ha ha," as if the snarkiness was all in good fun, and offered a few more days that would work for me and thanking him for his patience with my scheduling issues, but I have heard nothing from him since.
Now, in response to the headshot drama, I've found a new photographer who is fabulous and much more patient. As soon as I shoot with her I'll post links to her stuff and our photos. Also she's much cheaper so suck it "professional" photographer who shall not be named.
Now, I haven't posted any names but I still had a lot of trouble deciding whether or not to post this entry. I'm hesitant to defame or "call someone out" on this blog. But let me just say, almost everyone now has a blog or a Twitter or a LinkedIn profile or what have you. Not all of us are lucky enough to have an assistant editor of the New York Times who was once quoted using a homophobic slur to camouflage them in a Google search (thanks Michele McNally!) So my feeling is, Don't Be a Dick. Because if you are, chances are someone is going to blog about it. And next time they might not be nice enough to not use your name.
