So anyway, I've started casting for my latest film opus. I put out a casting notice on a Dallas film casting message board, and people have been emailing me headshots and resumes ever since. Now a couple of years ago when I'd get resumes from Dallas-area actors, there were usually at least one of the following three credits on the resume: "Walker, Texas Ranger", "Slap Her, She's French" or "Serving Sara" (which was almost always referred to as "Servicing Sara", which would make no sense since the movie is about a process server, but that's neither here nor there). This time around, I've found the credits people have are getting a little different. I mean, sure there's still several people with "Walker, Texas Ranger" on their resume, but more and more, people are having reality shows on their acting resumes. For example, I got a resume and headshot today from one Shannon Oliver. Now, I had no idea who this person was, but I opened up her resume, and she's got "The Bachelor" and "The Bachelorette" on her resume. It's pretty much her only credit (aside from hosting some cable access show here in Plano). So I call a female friend of mine who watches these reality shows religiously, and she gives me the whole scoop on this Shannon Oliver and her stint on the first Bachelor. There's another guy (Matt) who was on that "Paradise Hotel" show. He's submitted his headshot and resume to me, as well. So that got me to thinking. Here are these people who do have some degree of fame. This Shannon Oliver is probably pretty well known among a certain group of television watchers. And yet despite having that fame to trade on, she's sending her resume to me in an effort to get a role in one of my quickie productions. A role that pays no money, and, in this case, a role that has no lines, no real chance to even really act. So, it just seems weird to me that a person with some degree of fame couldn't parlay that into something better than playing a dead woman in a local movie for no money. Of course, she did graduate from Texas A&M, so that may well explain it. I do wonder if a lot of these reality show contestants think of their stint on television as a pathway to bigger and better things in the acting world. I have a friend who moved out to Hollywood a year or so ago. His first "gigs" out there were on dating shows ("The Fifth Wheel" and "Blind Date"). I recall talking to him about them, and he acted as if these were opportunities to shwo off for casting directors, etc. As if some big movie guy is going to see it and say "Hey, that kid on that Fifth Wheel with the yellow leisure suit, we gotta get him for our next picture". I guess I'm conflicted on the whole thing. On the one hand, I don't know how a person can expect to go on something as stupid as a dating show and expect to translate that into an acting career. But on the other hand, I would think that the fame, however stupidly limited, would lead to something better than one of my pictures. I am tempted to hire this Shannon Oliver just so I can use her as a marketing tool, though I'm not sure it would necessarily help the picture.
What do John Ritter, Teri Garr, Tom Selleck, Farrah Fawcett, Jaye P. Morgan, Bob Saget, Murray "The Unknown Comic" Langston, and Cuba Gooding, Jr all have in common? All were on The Dating Game before they became stars.
The question would be, though, is whether such appearances helped get their careers going or was just something they did on their inevitable rise to fame. I doubt any of them thought, "Hey, I'll go on the Dating Game and get discovered" The Dating Game was on for 21 years. With at least four contestants on each show and over 2,000 shows, having ten or twelve people who eventually became relatively well-known performers or actors is not all that surprising. Just like if my friend goes on to become a working actor, it won't be because he was on Blind Date.
My guess would be that being on the Dating Game was something they did while still trying to get established. Like the saying goes, there's no such thing as bad publicity. However, the point I was trying to make was that struggling actors have been using vehicles such as these long before there was a "reality tv" craze.
I think it was probably more of the fact that they shot the Dating Game in Los Angeles, which has a high concentration of aspiring actors, and it was a way to make a couple of bucks and potentially get to go on a trip. I doubt any of them put it on their acting resumes because it was never an acting gig and most of these people were wanting to be actors. It seems today that we've got a whole lot of people whose only desire is to be famous. They don't care how they achieve that fame, and their desire to be actors is less an appreciation of the craft of acting or a love of acting itself, but simply a means to an end (to be famous). And they seem to beleive that any exposure is as good as another to achieve that (i.e. if they're on Blind Date, people will appreciate that as an acting performance, even though it is anything but).
by the way, project greenlight is open a in a few weeks for those of you with scripts and for those of you willing to get humilated on national TV.
I'm having to turn a lot of people away without auditions as it is. I got swamped with headshots for this one for some reason.
Do you really need to put an ad out and ask people for resumees just for playing as a dead person? Only if you want to see people's mug.
I was Twiki on "Buck Rogers". Yes, that's me in that suit. So, do I get the job or what? LOL...this was obviously a joke. I always wanted to be Twiki.
I can't believe I didn't think to ask you whether I needed to put out a casting notice or not. Personally, I thought it was valuable to what I was trying to do. Apparently I was only wanting to look at people's pictures, rather than actually trying to cast actual roles in a movie. How the dead person looks is important, but I included that role with all the rest of the roles in one big casting notices. I didn't specifically ask for a resume from the people who wanted to be the dead body, I just had a general comment at the end about sending headshots to a certain email address. But the dead body is in a lot of the movie. And I do appreciate the resumes since they usually have a person's physical stats on it (and since the other actors have to carry the dead woman around from time to time, it's better to get someone who's not all that heavy.) And it's nice to know when they've got credits because that shows they were professional enough to show up in the past and treat it with some degree of respect.
I'm confused. What does a dead body have to do with the clever romantic escapades of a group of trendy young urbanites? PS: Don't hire the Paradise Hotel guy. Everyone on that show, with the exception of Dave (and maybe Keith) was a major idiot.
One of the trendy young urbanites is into necrophelia. I do have other ideas from time to time. I already did the young unbanites movie, now I'm doing the dead woman in the living room movie. It's a natural progression. He didn't have the right look I was going for anyway.
And from that, you naturally assumed that my putting out a casting notice was solely to collect pictures. You sure seemed to "know" more than I told you in that post.
