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The ninja adventure yesterday was short and sweet. I always expect these things to be more formalized, and generally a bigger deal than they actually turn out to be. Maybe I've just watched too many movies. :p
Sidebar: I don't know what it is about people in the entertainment industry here in the Northwest, but they're apparently huge flakes. I was giving them the benefit of the doubt by assuming that the flaky ones were just the inexperienced TFP models from Teh Internets--see also: our first model, and many others after her--but apparently, it's not just them.
I arrived at the venue 20 minutes early, so I'd have time to warm up, and... there was the casting director guy, and his assistant. One older lady was packing up and leaving, and that was it. I got to go early, because nobody else was there to audition! They'd been auditioning people for several hours, but they'd had maybe 10 people in before me on their check-in list.
As I was leaving, I also heard casting guy and assistant tossing out names of people who were on the schedule, and debating about whether they thought those people would actually show up to their call. WTF? It's almost as if it's *expected* that the bulk of the candidates will flake out on their call. How do those people get any work? Maybe it's because this is Oregon and not L.A., but these people must be keeping themselves pretty well-fed on their food service jobs, if they're willing to be so flippant about a PAID GIG. ;p
ANYWAY, since I was auditioning early and all that, I filled out an info sheet, had my headshot taken, and stretched out a bit. While I was stretching, I got to look at the storyboard for the commercial, which looked like it could be pretty funny. When I turned to the second page, however, one of the frames specifically mentioned that the ninja was supposed to get excited and "backflip out of the frame."
As some of you may recall, I cannot do backflips. Or at the very least, I don't have enough belief in my overall jumping ability to attempt a backflip. They only show up occasionally in advanced Southern forms, so I've had no reason to try, and I rather like the fact that I've gone 26 years without suffering serious spinal injury. ;p
They had a video camera set up in the middle of the performance area, and they had me stand there and tell the camera about my experiences in martial arts, dance, and acting. They had me do some tests for making various facial expressions, or rather, eye expressions, since ninjas have most of their faces covered. I'm all about making crazy faces, and they seemed to dig what I did with that. I did a couple of sections from my broadsword form for my sword demonstration, and they dug that, too.
Then, the inevitable question came up: "so, can you do anything like, backflips or back handsprings...?"
Um, crap.
I basically told the guy that I didn't know if I could, and I'd never really had cause to try it (which, true) and offered to do some wushu jumps instead. I added some cool flourishes that worked well, but I completely forgot to do my jump outside kick, which is my best jump (grr), and I suspect that the other jumps weren't quite what they were after.
Anyway, callbacks are supposed to be on the 26th, which is basically right after I get back from Berkeley. Yecch. I don't think it matters much, though, because:
Expressiveness on camera? Check.
Mad sword-wielding skills? Check.
Mad back-flipping hops? Uhhhh...
Yeah, I'm thinking that I'm not going to be a ninja this go-round. But it was a funny little mid-week jaunt, anyway. :)
Sidebar: I don't know what it is about people in the entertainment industry here in the Northwest, but they're apparently huge flakes. I was giving them the benefit of the doubt by assuming that the flaky ones were just the inexperienced TFP models from Teh Internets--see also: our first model, and many others after her--but apparently, it's not just them.
I arrived at the venue 20 minutes early, so I'd have time to warm up, and... there was the casting director guy, and his assistant. One older lady was packing up and leaving, and that was it. I got to go early, because nobody else was there to audition! They'd been auditioning people for several hours, but they'd had maybe 10 people in before me on their check-in list.
As I was leaving, I also heard casting guy and assistant tossing out names of people who were on the schedule, and debating about whether they thought those people would actually show up to their call. WTF? It's almost as if it's *expected* that the bulk of the candidates will flake out on their call. How do those people get any work? Maybe it's because this is Oregon and not L.A., but these people must be keeping themselves pretty well-fed on their food service jobs, if they're willing to be so flippant about a PAID GIG. ;p
ANYWAY, since I was auditioning early and all that, I filled out an info sheet, had my headshot taken, and stretched out a bit. While I was stretching, I got to look at the storyboard for the commercial, which looked like it could be pretty funny. When I turned to the second page, however, one of the frames specifically mentioned that the ninja was supposed to get excited and "backflip out of the frame."
As some of you may recall, I cannot do backflips. Or at the very least, I don't have enough belief in my overall jumping ability to attempt a backflip. They only show up occasionally in advanced Southern forms, so I've had no reason to try, and I rather like the fact that I've gone 26 years without suffering serious spinal injury. ;p
They had a video camera set up in the middle of the performance area, and they had me stand there and tell the camera about my experiences in martial arts, dance, and acting. They had me do some tests for making various facial expressions, or rather, eye expressions, since ninjas have most of their faces covered. I'm all about making crazy faces, and they seemed to dig what I did with that. I did a couple of sections from my broadsword form for my sword demonstration, and they dug that, too.
Then, the inevitable question came up: "so, can you do anything like, backflips or back handsprings...?"
Um, crap.
I basically told the guy that I didn't know if I could, and I'd never really had cause to try it (which, true) and offered to do some wushu jumps instead. I added some cool flourishes that worked well, but I completely forgot to do my jump outside kick, which is my best jump (grr), and I suspect that the other jumps weren't quite what they were after.
Anyway, callbacks are supposed to be on the 26th, which is basically right after I get back from Berkeley. Yecch. I don't think it matters much, though, because:
Expressiveness on camera? Check.
Mad sword-wielding skills? Check.
Mad back-flipping hops? Uhhhh...
Yeah, I'm thinking that I'm not going to be a ninja this go-round. But it was a funny little mid-week jaunt, anyway. :)
