Season's Greetings

There are two seasons kicking off right now. Pilot season and awards season. Okay, maybe there are three... I forgot about Winter. I guess that's happening too for most of the real world. But here in LA, pilot season and awards season are the only ones that matter. 

I've dabbled in pilot season, remember last year I got pinned for a role?!? That was pretty cool. But this is a whole new year and I'm still trying to squeeze my way in the door, and *surprise* it's a battle. I left my agency last fall (more on that later) so I'm heading into the next couple of months with only a manager. It's scary, but he's working like a dog to get me meetings. I have one scheduled for the end of the month. Fingers crossed.

Awards season however, still feels a long way off.  I have attended the Emmy's just by having good connections, but I haven't ever been personally invited by any Academies, and I definitely haven't been nominated yet.

I did however, manage to get into a gifting suite for the first time last week.  I wasn't actually invited to that either, but I was there for other reasons and got to watch the action. It wasn't as fancy as you'd think.  Maybe I was at a lower end one, but I hardly recognized some of the "stars" who were there. The whole thing was just kind of weird. Everyone had tables full of product displays and the guests were shuttled around to talk and take pictures with the product reps.  Then they got gift bags stuffed to the gills with free crap. Okay, I'll admit, that part was pretty cool. 

Eventually, one of the vendors turned to me and excitedly described how he got to meet "the guy" (he didn't know his name) "who played James Brown on that tv movie."

"No. He played Little Richie," his partner interjected.

"Oh, it was Little Richie? I thought it was James Brown."

I just looked at them. You don't even know who these people are!!! I so badly wanted to tell them that they'd seen me on TV too and I'm in an big movie coming up, so why the heck weren't they wanting to take a picture with me?! But then I realized I was thinking like a brat and and a bit of a bitter actor.  I just took a deep breath and said:

"Oh wow. That's cool."

I didn't really think it was that cool, but I am fired up.  Let's make some big things happen this year.  Not for the stupid gifting suites. (Little ol' me did end up walking out of there with a bunch of free crap and I didn't even have to take a picture for it.) 

No. Not for the gifts but for me. And for you. For the love and blood, sweat and tears we've put into this career. Because there are no reasons why we can't do it. Because we deserve a steady income, a fulfilling career and we are greater than the stack of invitations we have (or don't have) sitting in our mailbox.