A Starving Artist CAIIIIIIIIIN'T SAYYYYYYYY "No"

So.  You've found yourself doing the good Proactive Actor-thing and you're at a workshop, hoping to make some kind of professional connection.

Good.  Good for you.

You're sitting next to a friend: a lovely woman who happens to be stupid gorgeous and ridiculously talented to boot.  And hilarious.  And all-around glorious.

This is excellent news.

You look down at your sides ("script"):  they're pretty bland and kinda lame, but no matter.  You know this shit.  You have goddamn excellent instincts.  You're gonna kill it.  End of story.

(End.  Of.  Story.)

You glance towards the agent whose workshop you're attending as someone else is preparing to read for her.  Said agent is fucking with her Blackberry.  It is instantaneously apparent that she could give less than two shits about her being there, and fewer shits about your being there. 

(...Wait a minute...)

"I heard she's a total bitch," says Glorious Friend.
Aw.  Super, says You.

And once you absorb this information, once you acknowledge exactly how little is really at stake in this given situation and that this supposed "paid audition" has turned into an instance of Hey there, _________ Agency, here's me handing over $40 in exchange for you not giving a fuck, there's a thing that starts to happen.  This kind of wave that washes over you all of a sudden, all without warning and forceful-like, and has a tendency to hit you even harder when you're hangin with a friend.  A chick-friend, anywho.  ...An actress-friend. 

Here's the arc in great/slightly exhausting description (picture it like the literal cresting and crashing of a wave, try it, it'll be fun):

--The water is calm = Shiiiiit, I got this.
--It's getting choppy = Wait.  I don't think this chick even wants to be here.
--Choppier = I mean, I'm still gonna do me, regardless...but why, really?  Why?!
--Choppier still = Fuck this.  This girl sucks.  These people suck.
--A wave begins to build = Fuck it.  I'm just gonna be a critic today.
--...Quickly = We are gonna be critics today. 
--It's cresting = ...But should I get catty about it? Noooo....
--It crests =  ....YES!  LET'S GET CATTY!!!  I CAN'T HELP IT!!!!  AHHHHHHHHH!!!!
--AND it crashes = OH!! So satisfying.  This cattiness is so SATISFYING! GUH!

...I wish I were lying, kids.  I do.  I wish that this weren't a place that we find ourselves in, a thing we resort to.  But, alas, this precise thing actually happens.  To the best of us.

It, in fact, happened.  Tuesday.

Glorious Friend and I both went up and did our scenes towards the beginning of the session. (Side-bar:  Said session was supposed to go until 9:30, it ended before 8:30.  These things don't happen.  Ever.  Example #368 citing this agent's lack of desire to be with us any longer than she was required to be...to get paid.  Fine.  Anyway...).  We weren't feeling great about it, about any of it, and I know that I personally felt a strong urge to throw my hands in the air with a ginormous FUUUUUUUUUUCK THIS!  and check out.

However.  I know better than that.  And am simply not one to not give my all to something, regardless of fruitless I feel my efforts may be.   Lame-sounding or not, it's true, and I mean, it is just a smart idea to look professional.  Always.

Truthfully speaking, both Glorious Friend and I gave it absolutely everything we could, regardless of the cold-ish kinda stupid environment; we were at a workshop, after all, and were still hoping to garner some kind of learning experience from it, at the very least.   So,we both took the agent's pseudo-notes to a tee, and ended up looking pretty good.  Really.

Once that was over, however, we busted out some pens and blank sheets of paper and were overcome with the aforementioned cattiness.  A cattiness that, as we were watching other scenes, led to exchanges like this:

"Hair."
Yes.  Unfortunate.

Blush.
"Oh dear God."
Orange.  There is only orange.

Boobs.
"Right?!  Amazing."
I would like those.
"They're gorgeous. ...And she is terrible."
Correct. 

This continued throughout the very vast majority of class (and was interrupted by one lovefest we had over a girl who was so wonderfully Melissa McCarthy-esque, that it will be goddamn criminal if someone doesn't pick her up soon...ahm sayin), and it didn't really feel like there would be an end in sight.  

But, there is always is.  And it always tends to happen when someone either does something so foolish or asks something so remedial that you cannot help but feel:
A) sad.
B) angry.
C) a combination of both.

And there she was, our last scene of the workshop:  Glary BigHead.

"Glary BigHead" is the Native American name I have given this chick-subject for the following two reasons:

--I first ran into Glary BigHead in the lobby outside of a callback audition last week.  I was minding my own business, studying my sides, futzing with my hair, like you do.  Glary BigHead walks in; she was clearly called for another audition altogether and plops her bags down next to mine...and glares at me.  And sneers.  Continuously, for an upwards of five minutes.    Having lived in New York for awhile now, I know this move.  This is the move of a person who is attempting to throw off your game because they don't trust enough in what they're about to bring to the table.  It is a silly move, and it automatically designates this person as a silly bitch.  The Glarer.  Hence:  "Glary".

--"BigHead" comes from...well, her head is simply too big for the rest of her body.

So, up walks Glary BigHead to the front of the room, panning across the space and sneering at all of us as she does so.  She is poised, she is ready-ish, she tosses her hair and says to the agent:

"So, excuse me.  You sent me these two scenes, but you didn't send them to me in chronological order.  I'm assuming that I am, in fact, supposed to do them chronologically.  Right?"

...

The agent looks aghast, Glorious Friend and I grab each other's knees, Melissa McCarthy-esque bows her head in shame.

Agent:  Well, how did I send them to you?

GBH:  They're out of chronological order.

Agent:  Well, I sent them to you in the exact way they are in the script.

GBH: ...Yeah?

Agent:  So, do it like it is in the script.

GBH: ... ... ... ...Oh.  (She clearly doesn't get it.  Tosses her hair, fluffs her boobs, assumes the position...and the room collectively sighs a sigh suggesting "Oh you poor, disillusioned, stubborn thing.")

(Glary BigHead, just listen to the woman.  Smile, nod, and listen.)

And the girl takes her advice, she does the two scenes in the order that they were meant to be done.  But you can see in her eyes that she's already written off the agent's credibility.  She's projecting that she knows more than woman leading the workshop does.  Without saying the word outright, every inflection in her voice, every ounce of Glary BigHead's body language is saying "No".

Her scene tanks.  Tremendously.  And thusly, the evening ended on the sour note of her suckage.


I don't get why she openly resisted her so much.
"No.  No, me neither."
Just go with it.  Always.
"It's easier."
Always. 

I thought about this a great deal yesterday--yesterday, which was kind of a big deal for me...

Yesterday was my first day at Upright Citizen's Brigade. (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

(!!!)

A word on why I wanted to take class there: ... ... ..

....Alright, frankly, there are a number of things that I could say.  Yes, I think I'm funny-ish but could be funnier, but you know that already so we don't need to go into that.  Yes, I read the Bossypants   and want to live my life as parallel to Tina Fey's as is humanly possible, but you already knew that, too, so I'll stop.

In searching for what I felt would be my most appropriate next step to take professionally, I wanted to find something that was as much the antithesis of my grad school-experience as was possible.  ...Let me rephrase:  I wanted the sense of ensemble to be the same, but I wanted the process and the overall message to be different.

I knew within my first ten minutes of my first class yesterday that I had made the perfect decision.  It was like a breath of fresh air, it was light, it was buoyant, and largely because of this one single rule:

"Say Yes.  To everything."

I, personally, have never really had a problem doing this, in acting, in life...for better or for worse.  I have always just found it an easier thing to say, and far more fun to try something as opposed to resisting it.  But, other people have had problems with me feeling this way, in classroom settings. 

In grad school, I was yelled at by a particular instructor during one of my end-of-semester-evaluations regarding this very thing.

"Angela, you're always saying 'Yes' to everything I ask of you.  Why do you do that?" ...Really, I promise you, this was asked.  With concern.
Um.  Why not?
"No.  I want you to ask more questions.  Fight with me more.  Doubt me.  You don't have to agree with everything I say."
...No.
"...Are you being a smart ass?"

And I just didn't get it.  I might feel shitty about my given circumstance, and I might feel shitty about your role in it, but if your position is higher than mine and you give me a suggestion, I'm gonna take it.  Why do you want me to fight with you?  Why do you want me to doubt you?  Who gets anywhere when that happens?

And then yesterday, I found myself in a classroom studying a process that only functions around that precise mentality.  We are not allowed to say "No", or "But", because the second that we do, we're done.  The scene is done.  There is nothing to work with, because that one word, "No", has determined that no one will be able to work with you.  You have shut everyone and everything else off.

...

I feel like I want Glary BigHead to familiarize herself with that idea.  Or, at the very least, eat a burger.  (...And learn how to act.)