I'm not a writer. I'm not a photographer. I'm a portfolio updater.
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Rejection
My play received its first rejection. In a way that was kind of comforting. Rejection is part of the process, and it might mean the end of the road for this project at this location, in the overall scheme of things it means that I'm still participating. I got a standard electronic rejection instead of silence! Although it was from a super-major theatre in New York where I had less than a one percent chance of even being read, let alone produced, there was still a bit of a sting to the form e-mail telling me that they were not interested. It may have even been automatically generated without anyone so much as opening my submission.
Still, it's tangible proof that I'm participating -- and that feels good.
Still, it's tangible proof that I'm participating -- and that feels good.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Salvage
I am cyclical. By that I mean that I immerse myself in something until I have absorbed as much as I can possibly hold...and then I'm done for a while. It's true with just about everything in my life, from writing to photography to pizza. Can't get enough...and then I'm done.
The photo above was taken in a period when I should have stopped. What you see is not what came out of the camera. I was uninspired. The lighting was uninspired. The model was uninspired. It was snowing outside and the only thing I really wanted to do was curl up on the couch and watch endless episodes of "Law & Order." Still, I felt like I needed to get some work done, so I hired a model and came up with an idea that simply did not pan out.
Still, I didn't destroy the files. I new that there was something there, and that in time I'd figure it out. Never say never is my motto.
And in the past year I've been studying magazines. In particular Vogue and Vanity Fair. I'm on a five-year mission to shoot the cover of Vanity Fair, and I have about three years and nine months left. That clock ticks louder every day. And it was in response to that clock that I hired a model and hung a backdrop. And then buried myself in other photographers' work for about a year.
I can't remember the layout, but it was in Vogue, and the image was similar to the above. Suddenly it became clear to me that photography did not need to be crisp and clean all the time. That sometimes, focus can and should be manipulated.
And I've decided that is a great philosophy to apply to life. Some things need examination and reflection. And some do not. And sometimes you just need to put things in a drawer and let them mature.
The more I look at this photo, the more I love it. It represents more to me than a model in a bad white jacket. It demonstrates much, much more to me than that.
It's all about focus. And timing. And patience.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
The Return of the AWOL Photographer
Oh, gentle reader, how you must feel neglected. And rightfully so. But do not think that just because I've been neglectful of you that I've been ignoring my crafts. Not true! Much has been going on!
Above, you see a headshot for Lars. Lars, along with a group of actors from Norway, came to study theatre in Chicago. The long and the short of their visit is that they each fell in love with Chicago and the theatre scene. And before they returned to Norway for the holidays and then to Berlin for more study, they contacted me to do their headshots. These were my kind of actors.
Of course the industry is quite a bit different in Norway than it is in the United States. Still these brash young actors weren't afraid to try something different in the way of headshots. Because we were in Chicago, we did the classic natural light mugshot that is required, but we also were able to do something that was representative of who each actor is an artist. Lars wanted something that was suitable for his music career as well.
A bit extreme? Perhaps. But for those actors who are wanting to work for experimental storefront theatre in Chicago, which headshot is going to get the director to flip it over and give the resume a look? This, or the natural light mugshot?
Monday, October 4, 2010
Submissions
I've been sending my stuff out for a while. Short stories, photos. Back in the day, as they say, I'd send out headshots and resumes. It's part of the gig.
But, back in the day, my stuff went into the mailbox on Monday and by Wednesday I'd be huddled by the phone waiting for the offers to come in. By the following Monday I'd be contemplating an MBA and wondering if I wouldn't be better off moving back to Des Moines. Sometimes silence is more brutal than rejection. At least with a rejection, there's an acknowledgement.
It's like auditioning. You can spend weeks putting together a repertoire of audition pieces, honing them down to ninety seconds and developing a matrix of combinations so that no matter what the audition situation you're prepared, and then spend months wondering why you're not being called back.
Then I went into human resources and spent weeks sifting through resumes and realized, more often than not, nine times out of ten, silence has nothing to do with the resume and everything to do with the target. If the target is very specific, the resume has to be too. If the target is very specific, then the headshot has to be as well. If the target is very specific, then the script/short story/novel must be as well.
Generalities will get you sent to the 'no' pile. But if your resume/headshot/script/short story/novel doesn't hit the target, it's not because it's not good. It's not because it's not specific. It just simply does not hit the mark. They wanted steak and you're offering sushi. Next.
It took a long time to figure this out, but when I was an actor my job wasn't to be a star. My job wasn't even to work in a small, non-Equity storefront production of Hamlet to be seen by six people. My job was to audition. That was the work. And over the years I found enjoyment and satisfaction in simply auditioning. The preparation and the two minutes I had in front of casting staff was the sum total of the work. And I learned to love it.
I'd like to tell you that once I released all expectations of the audition I was cast more frequently. I wasn't. But I was less frustrated. I enjoyed being an actor more.
Now that I'm submitting my writing, it's the same thing. The job is the creation. The job is keeping organized and sending my stuff out. That is the work. The rest is whipped cream on the sundae. And pay is the cherry on top.
Of course, I can't deny that the goal was, is, and always will be not getting the cherry on top of the sundae, but landing in the bowl where that cherry came from. But that's a whole other post.
But, back in the day, my stuff went into the mailbox on Monday and by Wednesday I'd be huddled by the phone waiting for the offers to come in. By the following Monday I'd be contemplating an MBA and wondering if I wouldn't be better off moving back to Des Moines. Sometimes silence is more brutal than rejection. At least with a rejection, there's an acknowledgement.
It's like auditioning. You can spend weeks putting together a repertoire of audition pieces, honing them down to ninety seconds and developing a matrix of combinations so that no matter what the audition situation you're prepared, and then spend months wondering why you're not being called back.
Then I went into human resources and spent weeks sifting through resumes and realized, more often than not, nine times out of ten, silence has nothing to do with the resume and everything to do with the target. If the target is very specific, the resume has to be too. If the target is very specific, then the headshot has to be as well. If the target is very specific, then the script/short story/novel must be as well.
Generalities will get you sent to the 'no' pile. But if your resume/headshot/script/short story/novel doesn't hit the target, it's not because it's not good. It's not because it's not specific. It just simply does not hit the mark. They wanted steak and you're offering sushi. Next.
It took a long time to figure this out, but when I was an actor my job wasn't to be a star. My job wasn't even to work in a small, non-Equity storefront production of Hamlet to be seen by six people. My job was to audition. That was the work. And over the years I found enjoyment and satisfaction in simply auditioning. The preparation and the two minutes I had in front of casting staff was the sum total of the work. And I learned to love it.
I'd like to tell you that once I released all expectations of the audition I was cast more frequently. I wasn't. But I was less frustrated. I enjoyed being an actor more.
Now that I'm submitting my writing, it's the same thing. The job is the creation. The job is keeping organized and sending my stuff out. That is the work. The rest is whipped cream on the sundae. And pay is the cherry on top.
Of course, I can't deny that the goal was, is, and always will be not getting the cherry on top of the sundae, but landing in the bowl where that cherry came from. But that's a whole other post.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
The Reading
It has been at least a decade since I've attended a play reading. And today a group of actors got together to read a play. A play that I had written.
Oftentimes I have emotions that I don't know I'm having, but I usually have a sense that something is going on when I can't sleep. Last night I couldn't sleep. I drifted off sometime around five in the morning and tossed and turned until nearly eight. Then I got up and raced around the house, trying to get ready for everyone who was arriving. Arriving to read my play.
I have been working on this script off and on for the better part of a year. Sometimes getting nothing more than three or four lines of dialogue down at a time. The bulk of the work happened over the summer, in July and August. In the middle of August I began to feel my energy wane and I knew I needed a deadline. I set a reading date and began to think of actors I wanted to read to me.
I was lucky. With only one exception, I got the initial actors I asked to read. And in the one case where I was turned down, the actor had been given a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that nothing could interrupt, and my second choice wasn't really settling for a second choice at all. She was just someone different, who did a brilliant job handling some of the most difficult material in the script. But having the six actors agree to read these roles crystallized things for me. One character made a radical transformation -- for the better -- simply because I had a face for the character. And having six very talented and smart actors agreeing to read my script really required me to turn out my best effort. I've written a number of small pieces, but this is the first time I've written something that I really feel proud of. There is almost nothing of my personal story in this play, and yet hearing it today I could suddenly see myself all over it.
As the cast began to read, I was nervous. It took every ounce of control I had not to ask them to stop, thank them for coming and tear up each copy of the script. I heard very little of the first two pages because I kept thinking to myself, "Who do you think you are? You have no business telling a story." Then practicality kicked in and I began to time the script. I had to trust that the actors could carry it.
The first ten pages, which probably accounts for the first fifteen minutes, I decided were terrible as they were being read. It wasn't the actors' fault. They had brittle dialogue in an overly dramatic story. It creaked with exposition. I could hear clunker lines that didn't fit. There were phrases that were painfully over-written and the first half is riddled with redundancies.
And then one of the actors read a line, and it was right. There was emotion connected to it. And not just an actor indicating an emotion that she felt should be part of the line. It was the bud of an actual emotion. And suddenly actors who had never met before today connected and I could see the relationship. And they laughed. The actors laughed where I intended laughs and found laughs that I didn't know were there.
And when we finished, I fed them. And then we spent more than an hour talking about the play. And I listened. I asked a few questions. I'm grateful that I didn't have to explain too much, but these smart, talented actors confirmed my own opinions on a lot of points, pointed out a couple of crucial areas that need attention, and they talked like actors. I loved it.
Today was one of the best days of the year, and I have to thank Julia Maish, Nina O'Keefe, Sally Eames, Chad Ramsey, Shaun Baer, and Nat Swift for working for the price of a taco and providing me the input I needed to finish this play. I wish I had the opportunity to work with these actors to put this play up on the stage. It can never happen. Lives and professional obligations simply will never allow me to work with this collection of actors on this script, but I am incredibly grateful that I got to work with them for an afternoon. Incredibly grateful.
The finish line isn't nearly as far away as I feared it might be, and not as close as I'd like. But now I am ready for the hard work. And because of today I now feel like I have the right to tell this story.
Oftentimes I have emotions that I don't know I'm having, but I usually have a sense that something is going on when I can't sleep. Last night I couldn't sleep. I drifted off sometime around five in the morning and tossed and turned until nearly eight. Then I got up and raced around the house, trying to get ready for everyone who was arriving. Arriving to read my play.
I have been working on this script off and on for the better part of a year. Sometimes getting nothing more than three or four lines of dialogue down at a time. The bulk of the work happened over the summer, in July and August. In the middle of August I began to feel my energy wane and I knew I needed a deadline. I set a reading date and began to think of actors I wanted to read to me.
I was lucky. With only one exception, I got the initial actors I asked to read. And in the one case where I was turned down, the actor had been given a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that nothing could interrupt, and my second choice wasn't really settling for a second choice at all. She was just someone different, who did a brilliant job handling some of the most difficult material in the script. But having the six actors agree to read these roles crystallized things for me. One character made a radical transformation -- for the better -- simply because I had a face for the character. And having six very talented and smart actors agreeing to read my script really required me to turn out my best effort. I've written a number of small pieces, but this is the first time I've written something that I really feel proud of. There is almost nothing of my personal story in this play, and yet hearing it today I could suddenly see myself all over it.
As the cast began to read, I was nervous. It took every ounce of control I had not to ask them to stop, thank them for coming and tear up each copy of the script. I heard very little of the first two pages because I kept thinking to myself, "Who do you think you are? You have no business telling a story." Then practicality kicked in and I began to time the script. I had to trust that the actors could carry it.
The first ten pages, which probably accounts for the first fifteen minutes, I decided were terrible as they were being read. It wasn't the actors' fault. They had brittle dialogue in an overly dramatic story. It creaked with exposition. I could hear clunker lines that didn't fit. There were phrases that were painfully over-written and the first half is riddled with redundancies.
And then one of the actors read a line, and it was right. There was emotion connected to it. And not just an actor indicating an emotion that she felt should be part of the line. It was the bud of an actual emotion. And suddenly actors who had never met before today connected and I could see the relationship. And they laughed. The actors laughed where I intended laughs and found laughs that I didn't know were there.
And when we finished, I fed them. And then we spent more than an hour talking about the play. And I listened. I asked a few questions. I'm grateful that I didn't have to explain too much, but these smart, talented actors confirmed my own opinions on a lot of points, pointed out a couple of crucial areas that need attention, and they talked like actors. I loved it.
Today was one of the best days of the year, and I have to thank Julia Maish, Nina O'Keefe, Sally Eames, Chad Ramsey, Shaun Baer, and Nat Swift for working for the price of a taco and providing me the input I needed to finish this play. I wish I had the opportunity to work with these actors to put this play up on the stage. It can never happen. Lives and professional obligations simply will never allow me to work with this collection of actors on this script, but I am incredibly grateful that I got to work with them for an afternoon. Incredibly grateful.
The finish line isn't nearly as far away as I feared it might be, and not as close as I'd like. But now I am ready for the hard work. And because of today I now feel like I have the right to tell this story.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
The Creative Process
Right now, it's all about the words for me. Except for paying gigs, I haven't touched my camera in weeks, but I find I'm not thinking in images right now. I'm thinking in words and concepts. I'm hoping that one cycle informs the other. I think that it will.
The Void Dance is resting right now. The latest draft was finished about two weeks ago and I have eight copies printed, ready for the reading next Saturday. I have sworn not to touch it until I hear it. I'm very lucky that I have six very smart, talented actors coming over to read this script to me. They've had electronic copies for about two weeks and I've not heard a word from any of them. I'm hoping that doesn't mean they're all trying to figure out graceful ways to back out. Or that they've taken one look at the script and then immediately went blind from the horror I've perpetrated on the page. It probably just means that none of them have read it yet.
But if all goes well, there won't be too much revision to the structure of the play and if there is anything major that needs to be done, it's simply style and word choice. I know there are two major chunks that I want to take a particular look at once the reading is over.
So far one person has read it and provided sparse, stoic feedback. "Good play. Strong characters." And she identified one of the sections I also feel needs attention. But she's insanely busy and I'm taking the fact that she started it, finished it, and was able to provide four words of comment as a good thing. I hope it's a good thing. I want this script to be better than good.
So, to distract myself I've started on another script. Eleven characters. While it is in no way biographical, details from my past are informing how it's flowing. Void had a very clear structure even before I started writing. This one...not so much. I'm sort of feeling very Kaufman and Hart, but I don't think that a modern, three-hour comedy will sell today. Still keeping the Chicago non-Equity theatre in mind, so for me it's critical that all eleven characters are compelling and dynamic so that good actors will want to play them. Technical requirements to a minimum. Focus on the text and the actor -- the cheapest commodities in Chicago Theatre.
But I can begin to feel the pull back to the camera. I have two projects cued up, and I'd like to get them both shot, if not edited, before the end of November. The end of November feels both a life time and twenty minutes away.
OK. Back to work.
The Void Dance is resting right now. The latest draft was finished about two weeks ago and I have eight copies printed, ready for the reading next Saturday. I have sworn not to touch it until I hear it. I'm very lucky that I have six very smart, talented actors coming over to read this script to me. They've had electronic copies for about two weeks and I've not heard a word from any of them. I'm hoping that doesn't mean they're all trying to figure out graceful ways to back out. Or that they've taken one look at the script and then immediately went blind from the horror I've perpetrated on the page. It probably just means that none of them have read it yet.
But if all goes well, there won't be too much revision to the structure of the play and if there is anything major that needs to be done, it's simply style and word choice. I know there are two major chunks that I want to take a particular look at once the reading is over.
So far one person has read it and provided sparse, stoic feedback. "Good play. Strong characters." And she identified one of the sections I also feel needs attention. But she's insanely busy and I'm taking the fact that she started it, finished it, and was able to provide four words of comment as a good thing. I hope it's a good thing. I want this script to be better than good.
So, to distract myself I've started on another script. Eleven characters. While it is in no way biographical, details from my past are informing how it's flowing. Void had a very clear structure even before I started writing. This one...not so much. I'm sort of feeling very Kaufman and Hart, but I don't think that a modern, three-hour comedy will sell today. Still keeping the Chicago non-Equity theatre in mind, so for me it's critical that all eleven characters are compelling and dynamic so that good actors will want to play them. Technical requirements to a minimum. Focus on the text and the actor -- the cheapest commodities in Chicago Theatre.
But I can begin to feel the pull back to the camera. I have two projects cued up, and I'd like to get them both shot, if not edited, before the end of November. The end of November feels both a life time and twenty minutes away.
OK. Back to work.
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