At 2am after a night of working hard on an online submission audition Hubby came to bed angry. Mad that he hadn't finished more. Angry that things weren't as easy as he'd hoped. Put out by how difficult it actually was putting together something that he could be proud of. Both Hubby and I are perfectionists.... Did I mention that? But perfection takes time, effort and stamina. Also perfection takes a RED camera, lapel mics and at least 3 chimeras and 4 bounces- not to mention a choreographer, 1st AD and editor. The reason professional things look that way, is because they have the money, smackers, yen and pesos to pay for it. I can shoot as much as I want on my HD iPhone 4, but it's just never going to look perfect.
On take 3 of shot #5 I realized it. The reason we want so much of ourselves is because we want more people striving for perfection. Being the poor and starving artists we know what we can do, why wouldn't we expect that or more from a film crew of 80. This is the fact that makes us perfect for this industry of try hard perfectionists. If there is something that I have heard in every interview- every performer wants the best art to be made for the effort they are making. Would you do a nude scene? The answer across the board= If it was important to the story line, and if it is artistically done I would have no trouble doing it. That comes from a performer who wants the best for each project. The face in front of a crew of people all pulling to make something beautiful. Something unexpected. The performance of the season. In every performance they do. A true artist, of the starving variety is a perfectionist.
The inner monologue of the striver, the performer who wants to be their best goes like this: "Are my eyes blinking too much, on the next line I have to hit a mark accurately so that I am at my best angle, when I get to that mark I have to gesture with my left hand to the clue, while also picking up the prop I need for the next scene. I have to exit the frame from the left. While holding this prop, so I can have it in the scene we're filming in 2 and 7/8th days. Oh and don't do that thing with you eye because you don't have that action until you turn around." Plus remembering lines and saying them with the same intonation 27 times in a row. You must be a perfect performer to even do the basics of this job. That's not even taking into account the crying and screaming- and making that look honest. Be you an ugly cryer like Halle Berry or the cryer that let's the tears roll freely without marring your still beautiful face. Or how about fight scenes? Those are supposed to seem spontaneous, but they've been practised until the crew was ready to fall asleep. This is a tough job. So, here's one going out to all the starry eyed youth thinking that you won't need math and science to be a famous actor. It takes so much more than that. Study social science, biology and athletics. Geography and History couldn't hurt either. So, if you're coming down this yellow brick road, please pack a survival kit, cuz this life is tough and unexpected. But the rest of us perfectionists are up for it, if you are:)
On take 3 of shot #5 I realized it. The reason we want so much of ourselves is because we want more people striving for perfection. Being the poor and starving artists we know what we can do, why wouldn't we expect that or more from a film crew of 80. This is the fact that makes us perfect for this industry of try hard perfectionists. If there is something that I have heard in every interview- every performer wants the best art to be made for the effort they are making. Would you do a nude scene? The answer across the board= If it was important to the story line, and if it is artistically done I would have no trouble doing it. That comes from a performer who wants the best for each project. The face in front of a crew of people all pulling to make something beautiful. Something unexpected. The performance of the season. In every performance they do. A true artist, of the starving variety is a perfectionist.
The inner monologue of the striver, the performer who wants to be their best goes like this: "Are my eyes blinking too much, on the next line I have to hit a mark accurately so that I am at my best angle, when I get to that mark I have to gesture with my left hand to the clue, while also picking up the prop I need for the next scene. I have to exit the frame from the left. While holding this prop, so I can have it in the scene we're filming in 2 and 7/8th days. Oh and don't do that thing with you eye because you don't have that action until you turn around." Plus remembering lines and saying them with the same intonation 27 times in a row. You must be a perfect performer to even do the basics of this job. That's not even taking into account the crying and screaming- and making that look honest. Be you an ugly cryer like Halle Berry or the cryer that let's the tears roll freely without marring your still beautiful face. Or how about fight scenes? Those are supposed to seem spontaneous, but they've been practised until the crew was ready to fall asleep. This is a tough job. So, here's one going out to all the starry eyed youth thinking that you won't need math and science to be a famous actor. It takes so much more than that. Study social science, biology and athletics. Geography and History couldn't hurt either. So, if you're coming down this yellow brick road, please pack a survival kit, cuz this life is tough and unexpected. But the rest of us perfectionists are up for it, if you are:)
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