6:19 PM - Tues 1/7/2020
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In my last entry, I noted my "stats" for 2019, as part of a revived "Year In Review".

I hadn't done an end-of-year wrap-in in a while, because I thought it'd just depress me (Which it totally would have). But, happily, 2019 provided me a couple of reasons to revive the tradition.

It occurs to me now, though, in this first week of January, that "stats" can be tricky - I basically "closed the book" on 2019...but then had two callbacks off auditions that happened at the end of the year, and one of those turned into (another!) commercial booking.

So, while those two callbacks, and that booking, happened in the New Year, I think they really "belong" to 2019, because that's when I had the initial auditions.

Why am I going on about all this? I don't know - I guess I just want to make some kind of point about how shooting two commercials in January makes it look like 2020 is kicking ass but it's really 2019 having kicked so much ass, at the very end, that it's rolled into 2020.

Anyway...

I'm shooting the commercial I booked last month on Thursday, and the commercial I booked earlier today sometime this weekend (And to my ear, that's one of the sexiest sentences I've ever written in here).

As you might imagine, I'm spending a lot of my time thinking, "How did this happen? And how can I make it happen some more?".

The most casual follower of "The Business" can tell you there are all kinds of "intangibles" involved in casting, so it's hard to say exactly what made the decisions go my way in these two instances.

But of the part I do have control over, what the two callbacks had in common was that I was loose and had fun.

And that is not always an easy thing to accomplish - It can feel like auditions aren't set up for you to do your best, or be in your best frame of mind as an actor. Often, it's kinda the opposite.

But these auditions (And subsequent callbacks) were not like that. Which was nice - I didn't feel I had to succeed "in spite of" the situation.

And I'm particularly impressed with how the most recent callback went, because I went to the wrong office, and was extremely...frustrated with myself, not to mention panic-stricken about getting to where I was supposed to be on time, as I drove to the place (There was no self-harming though, as I tend to do when stressed, frustrated, and angry with myself - another victory).

But I got there only slightly late, got a chance to personally say farewell to the Casting Director (Who recently announced she was getting married and leaving the business - This was literally her last day on the job), somehow went into the room cool as a cucumber, and had about as warm and cordial an interaction with the Director as I've had in recent memory.

So anyway, here I am, having booked two national commercials almost back-to-back (There was an 11th-hour callback for a Budweiser commercial Sunday night that, to my total lack-of-surprise, didn't go my way).

In any case, whether this success "belongs" to 2020 or not...it's pretty fucking cool.

Shooting the first of my commercials today (My call time is 3:00 pm)

I'm doing what I'm doing opposite a celebrity of some stripe, and it's all so secretive their name is not even on the call sheet (I think I have it down to two likely possibilities. Which I'm not going to share in here, because it's so secretive I'm scared to do even that).

The shoot is downtown, which is lovely (That said, I may further mitigate any possibility of stress by taking a LYFT there).

I was thinking about it yesterday...While it would be nice to be "further up the ladder" than I am, auditioning for series regular roles and major parts in movies, one nice thing about being at my level in a situation like this, there's not as much stress as you'd imagine on a day like this - I already showed them I can do what they want at the audition.

So now all I have to do is be the guy I was at the callback - Give them what I've got, do what I'm told, be pleasant and personable, and basically just "do what I do".

(And conceal my disappointment if the celebrity-in-question isn't who I think it might be, but instead is some sports guy I don't care about, or some pop star I'm too old to appreciate).

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