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Tuesday October 02, 2007
Clendenin up the aisles
I was booked on
10 Items or Less,
a sitcom that aired five episodes on TBS, and picked up for another eight episodes.
Starring its writer/creator/producer,
John Lehr,
after a short while on set I recall having caught an episode or two when it first aired, due to character actor Bob Clendenin also starring in it.
He said hello to me at breakfast, and remembered me from our major barn scene in Dude, Where's My Car?, and Bob also remembered Mike Beardsley, even describing Mike to make sure he was certain about whom we were speaking.
I had a 7am calltime and, being way up in the valley, I didn't want to risk any delays, so took the first 163 right to the location, arriving at 6am.
With no basecamp in sight, I waited a bit at a nearby donut shop.
I was surprised no one was arriving.
I then wondered if they could be behind the grocery store, and sure enough, with no signage to given any indication thereof, there was basecamp.
The recording neglected to point that out, and there's no signage on Sherman Way to know to go to the back.
I had a nice warm breakfast in the brisk, pre-dawn darkness.
I was to play a grocery-store shopper, as was
Lisa Littman
(aka Lisa Denke), who arrived around 6:30am
(I would work with Lisa again, two years hence).
The third background shooper was Ditria Winburn, whose ride got lost and got her there slightly late, but thankfully with no worries about that.
Both ladies are with Booked Talent as well, so we could "only" praise the service and not recommend it to any of each other, as we were already in with the elite [g].
On set, one of the ADs reminded me of Matt Rebenkoff from Garfield but turned out to be Dale Stern from Curb Your Enthusasam.
We filmed two of three scenes, the middle one being filmed upstairs in an office.
For the first scene the ladies did some crosses whilst I browsed greeting cards.
I was deligent in choosing the same cards in the same order in an effect to preserve continuity, which was tricky as this is one of those Improv Series, where actors made the dialogue "more real" by altering their lines from take to take, though the scene-goal was the same, I could still time when to pull out and examine what cards.
Predictably, I stayed frequently with cards of cat photos.
After lunch the ladies and I chatted and networked and shared various information of casting directors.
I called the hotline for Jeff Olan, and found a gig perfect for me for the next day.
I called but found the voice-mail full.
I called Booked, to see if they could submit me, and learned for the first time that Jeff Olan does not use calling services.
Great.
No wonder I "never" get any casting through Jeff Olan, even though he declared he'd Get Ne More Work, when we spoke at the
San Fernando Film Festival
screening of
Strictly Background,
at which the documentary feature won for Best Documentary. Having dropped by there some months earlier to update my info with them, the two women handling the front effectively kept me from actually Saying Hi to Jeff.
I figured I might have t'drop him a hardcopy letter.
One of the security guards allowed us to use what normally would be changing rooms in which to relax, as the coolness of twilight would begin to desend.
As overtime arrived, we were brought in for the third scene, for which the three of us crossed.
As I was the only male, I had to be held back a bit as I was becoming a Bit More Obvious [g].
We were wrapped at 7:20pm, and Lisa graciously offered to drive both Deet and I back to our respective domiciles.
Good thing too: Hollywood Bowl traffic was a nightmare, and we had to go around it.
The 163 bus would have been stuck there for quite some time.
I got home in time to watch Chuck and Heroes before turning in after a pleasant day, for which hopefully I'll actually be paid, if AFTRA didn't plan to just suck up my entire pay on the premise I "owe" them money towards the "reinstatement" fee of $1300+ (were it just the back dues I know I owed, I'd be far more sympathetic and understanding).
Is it any wonder so few real actors work AFTRA shows...?
(As it was, I did receive my full compenation for labour.)
On a quasi-related note, just before this was uploaded as a report on my MySpace blog, I got called, notified I was booked the next day on
Still Waiting,
the sequel to Waiting.
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