The Christmas Letter, 2011 version

Every year since 1999, I've written a letter to go in the cards we send out to family and friends. For those of you not on our Christmas Card list, here's this year's edition:

                                                                                                           

December, 2011

Dear Friends and Family,

            Hope.

            It doesn’t seem like there’s a lot of it out there these days.  I’m a big news junkie, and whether I’m listening to NPR,  reading The New York Times or watching The CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley, a lot of the time the news is just plain bad. The economy is in the toilet, both here and overseas, Congress can’t get its act together, and sniping and bitterness seem to be the order of the day. The daily struggle to find paying acting work doesn’t exactly help. Sometimes when I get really depressed I’ll search YouTube for something to boost my spirits, like Dr. King’s “Mountaintop” speech, or Judy Garland singing “Over The Rainbow”, but even those are tinged with the sadness of the knowledge of what will eventually happen to those people, and I can’t detach myself from that knowledge to truly have my spirits lifted.     

            And yet, despite the news, despite what I see on the horizon for me personally, I see hope. It’s tough to find sometimes, but it’s there. You just have to know where to look for it.

            I look for it in my daughter. Tina is in her last year of high school, and there are already a lot of endings: senior project (a playground for her bearded dragon, Falkor, which she got an A on), her last year being involved with Girl Scouts (she’s earned her Gold Award, which is as good as you can be in GS) and 4H, and transitioning from being a child with a heart defect to being a young adult with a heart defect, which is a new field of science. Yet there are also beginnings: touring colleges she wants to go to, the acceptance letters she’s received (Drexel, York and Rensselaer), and planning for what the next four years will bring her. Her future is bright and wide open, and I pray that she avoids some of the pitfalls that I fell into.

            I see it in my wife’s eyes. The last two years have not exactly been easy on Gail. We’re still dealing with the last legal vestiges of her car accident, as well as an operation on her left hand to deal with some of the pain from the nerve damage, and she tries to cope with the fact that her husband’s income is not what it once was, nor is his employment as steady as it used to be. Still, she sees progress, and still loves me, and we both know that I will do whatever I have to in order to survive.

            I hear it in the voice of the oldest daughter, Janice. She’s living on her own (dumping her loser boyfriend), working for the US Government in DC and becoming a more complete individual every day. She checks in with us every so often, and I marvel at how well she’s doing.  Not that I ever thought that she couldn’t, but I know how tough it is to do, and she seems to do it a lot easier than I did at that stage. For that, she has our respect, admiration and love.

            I see it in my grandson. Zachary is 2 ½, and for him, all things are new, and I get to see that newness through his eyes, and it’s exciting. His mother has decided to lead a different life from the one she promised to her husband years ago, and I’m afraid that Zachary will have to deal with the mess that this decision has made. His father loves him dearly, and wants the best for him, and so do all five of his grandparents. There may be someone out there with a better support system than he has, but I doubt it. He’s gonna make it.

            And, believe it or not, I think that I may have a future in this business of Acting. If we did an analysis strictly by the numbers, the evidence for such an optimistic appraisal isn’t there. I’m not exactly making Mariska Hargitay money, and our cash reserves are pretty low. Jobs are few and far between, and when I do get them it’s been as a background player, not as someone with a speaking part. I did make more money than last year, however, and more importantly, I’ve had more auditions than I did last year. Progress, however incremental, is being made, and while our financial planning still involves Publisher’s Clearing House, Mega Millions and Powerball more than I’d like, I can honestly say that things are looking up. My family loves me and we’re there for each other. With those gifts of God by my side and covering my back, we cannot- we WILL not- fail.

            This holiday season, when you look into the eyes of those most important to you, see if you can’t find the hope that they have for you. When you look at the people going about their holiday preparations, try to sense what means the most to them. And when you look into the mangers that become ubiquitous in December, know that in that face is where the last best hope of the world lies. Have a Merry Christmas, and as Frank Borman once observed, “God Bless all of you, all of you on the Good Earth”

                                                                                                            Peace & Love, 

                                                                                    Gail, Tina, Mike, Princess & Falkor 

“I alone know the plans I have for you, plans to bring you prosperity and not disaster, plans to bring about the future you hope for.”

Jeremiah 29:11

           

The perils of working with animals

Five years ago my daughter was bugging us for a dog. She wouldn't do so in classic kids fashion, like, "MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY can I PULEEZE have a DOG?" She was a lot more subtle. She'd get a hold of the classified section of the newspaper, turn to the section with Pets For Sale, and muse out loud to no one in particluar, "Hmmm...I see that there is a bulldog for sale...Mom, you used to have a bulldog, didn't you?" So when one of my coworkers had to give up the family dog becasue her then 18 month old son was allergic to it, I called my wife and said, "Tell me 'no'. " Well, she didn't, and in July of '06 we became owners of a dark haired, pure bred golden retriever named Princess, complete with her papers from the American Kennel Club. I'll never forget the look on Tina's face when this huge animal (95 lbs) with a bow around her neck bounded out of the van. She asked, "Who's dog is this?" and I said, "Yours." Her jaw dropped and she gasped for breath. Princess took a little while to get used to her surroundings, but pretty soon, she was a member of the family. Little did I think that she'd get to participate in the family business.

Two weeks after we'd gotten her, I get a call from my then agent. Seems that they were filming a Blue Cross commercial in Philly and they needed background actors with dogs. I called the number that they gave me and booked the job. They didn't need a "professional" dog, just a normal one. So I found myself on Kelly Drive with Princess, playing a dog walker in the park. It was a nice warm day, and Princess enjoyed being out and about with everyone. Unfortunately she didn't make the final cut, partly because they used me in another shot. Sigh.

It was then that I realized just how much of a people magnet this dog really was. Normally I go onto set and I settle into a chair and hang out until called for. Not this time. The crew, the kid actors and their mothers, and hot girls who wouldn't talk to me on a bet, all wanted to pet and talk to this dog. She got so much attention, it was a little mind blowing. By the end of the day, between the attention in holding and the walking on set, she was exhausted. I drove home with a snoring dog in the back of my car. She didn't even stir when I cranked up the radio, which was playing Maynard Ferguson at the time.

It would be years later until she was called again. I booked a day with her recently on "Fiona's Tale", aka "The Amazing Spider-Man". The casting notice specifically asked for people with a dog, and I duly submitted. They called me and asked if I had the dog. I said yes, and they were happy. I went to NY for a fitting, and on the call sheet next to my name, it said "Man with Dog". When they called on Friday to confirm, I got ready for us to go up to Brooklyn on Sunday. I arrive on set and the first thing the PAs say to me was, "Why did you bring your dog?" Turns out that they didn't need her, but no one from the casting office bothered to tell me. After much consternation and more than a few phone calls, it was decided that I would indeed get paid for bringing the dog, but they decided not to use me at all. I spent 12 hours on set, getting paid to babysit my dog. Not a bad gig, but I would've liked to have been working.

The day wasn't a total waste, however. Near the end of the night, Martin Sheen, who plays Uncle Ben in the new movie, was over at the craft services table getting a snack. Having heard over the years that he was approachable and a nice guy, I plucked up the courage and took Princess over to crafty. I stood on the side, ostensibly looking for a Coke or some sort of sugary treat (it was close to midnight at that point), when Martin asked, "Does the dog like cheese?" I stammered out some sort of affirmative answer and he gave me cheese to give to Princess. He then held out his hand to me, a nobody in this business, and I shook it. This was around the time that Charlie was having his issues, so I stammered out that our family was praying for his "if you don't mind a bunch of Lutherans kicking in." His reply was, "We'll take whatever we can get." It was probably the most memorable encounter I've ever had with a star, certainly he was the biggest star I've ever met. He was totally cool to me and my dog, and if all stars were like that, this would be a great business to be in.

This past Monday Princess and I worked on the new NBC series "Smash". Once again, The Big Fuzzy Dog was a hit in holding (The Gershwin Hotel) and on set (Madison Square Park). Debra Messing and Christian Borle petted her and wanted to know all about her (didn't want to know who I was, though...). The PAs made sure that Princess had her on camera moment. Whether she'll get it or not I won't know until next year, but I had fun showing off Manhattan to my country reared dog, and I think she had fun also. It'd be nice if she'd get some face time, but somehow I don't think it matters all that much to her.

It was torture...

I worked on "Imogene", which stars Kristin Wiig from "Saturday Night Live" and Darren Criss from "Glee", on August 9, 2011. It was by far the least physically strenuous project I've worked on in a while, and given how much mileage I'd put on the car that day, I needed to take it easy on set.

Call time was 7 AM up in Yonkers at the Empire City Casino, a place I'd never heard of before. Turns out it was right next door to Yonkers Raceway, where they race trotters. This is where instead of the jockey being on the horse's back, he's riding in what looks like a rickshaw. I remembered seeing ads for the Raceway on TV when I was a kid, but had never gone there. The casino was a relatively new edition, with slot machines being the prime attraction for the gamblers. I'm not much for casinos, though I would sometimes go with my ex wife & her sister to Atlantic City. The whole atmosphere depresses me, even though I used to win at the slots. Maybe it's the feeling of desperation that I'm picking up on that turned me off. In any case, if I wasn't working there, I never would have gone for the fun of it.

Normally when I report to work I drop off my stuff, fill out my paperwork and then head for craft services, but because of the restrictions the casino put on production, we had breakfast first before we went to holding. That was fine by me, because the picnic tables we sat at had a nice view of the track, and I got to watch the trainers exercise the horses. My friend Sandee Clark Bengel was there, which made it nice. I don't know as many NY actors as I do Philly ones, so having someone I knew on set made it feel a lot friendlier. I think it had been a while since she had been on set, because she asked me if I should tip the guy making our omelets. While I'm pretty sure that he would've appreciated it, I chucked to her, "No".

Once we we fed, it was time to get to holding. Before we could enter the building, though, we each received a sticker that said "Imogene Crew". Wearing these stickers meant that casino security would let us go wherever we wanted without giving us grief. It also let production make sure we weren't gambling when we weren't working. We had to remove them once we got to set, of course, so that the camera wouldn't see them, which made them impossible to stick back on, but no one thought of that.

Anyway, once wardrobe approved my clothes (which included the same polo shirt that I used on "Arthur" and "How Do You Know?"), on to the set. Inside the casino was this bandshell that looked like a minature version of the Hollywood Bowl. The seats in front ot the shell for the audience were thick padded leather, and very comfortable. We were each given a "drink" to hold, in my case a Scotch replica, and led to our positions. Kristin Wiig was in the row behind me, Sandee two seats to her left, separated by a short, bald guy in his 50's named Mike Russo. He & I had a lot of fun comparing notes; I especially liked his story about getting a booking for "Boardwalk Empire", and when he gave the casting person his SAG number, they said, "Ooops, I've got the wrong Mike Russo!" "Was it you?", he asked me. "I wish!" Gotta love it.

The scene had Kristin's charcter going a casino to see her boyfriend, played by Darren, as the frontman in a Backstreet Boys tribute band. It starts out with a Brittney Spears tribute singer doing her thing, then an emcee bringing on the faux Boys. Both performers lip synched to tracks specially recorded for the film (I know this because they sound nothing like the original records). All we had to do was look like we were enjoying the whole thing and not get hit by the camera on the crane passing right by us. It's not exactly my kind of music, but I had fun. The AD liked it when I mouthed the words to the Brittany tune, so we might see that in the final cut. I really liked that they got the feel and the moves of the real thing. I spoke to three of the Boys at crafty later, and they said they had rehearsed this bit for eight hours to get it right, and it showed. I thought that the Boys & Brittany did a great job, and told them so when I got the chance. There also was a Spice Girls tribute band there, but I didn't work on that scene.

I have to mention something about my friend Sandee here, who is either the bravest, the most foolhardy or the most naive person on set. There are two rules that are pretty much always followed: never take pictures on set and never talk to the stars unless spoken to first. Somehow she managed to do both and get away with it. When Kristin took her seat, Sandee introduced herself & shook hands, adding, "I'm just an extra here." Talking like that to Bruce Willis, for example, can get you fired. Kristin proved that she's a nice person by treating Sandee courteously, which is an asset in my eyes. The other was getting pictures. Sandee said, "Oh, I've got to get one of Darren for my girlfriend!" She did get one, which also shows the back of my head, proving that I was there. She also got one of her, me & The Other Mike Russo back at holding, but that got lost into the ether.  

      

It was a short day in terms of hours, as we were wrapped before rush hour. Heading home was slow: the George Washington Bridge is not exactly the fastest route anywhere, and add to that traffic and a light rain, and you had conditions that lend themselves to crawling (it was so slow that two homeless guys were begging for change while sitting on the on ramp. THAT should tell you something!). It was early enough, though, that i thought I might be able to make my film class in Philly that night. I had called Heery Casting, where I was taking  the class, the day before to let them know that I wasn't gonna make it. Our early dismissal changed everything, so I headed for class. Unbeknownst to me, they'd cancelled the class for that week, so when I showed up, the building was dark. Oh, I gave the teacher hell the next week! He seemed to like my dedication, but at the time it was rather annoying. I drove home and got me as good a night's sleep as I could. Sitting down in a casino all day can really wear you out!

There's a first time for everything...

Welcome to my blog! This is my first time dong something like this, and it may crash and burn if I've got nothing to say. Still, let's give it a shot.

I'm an actor, singer & musician who lives in Bucks County, PA, with my wife and daughter. For twenty five years, ever since I graduated from Berklee College of Music in Boston, I made my living on the retail side of the music business, first as a salesman for Sam Ash Music, then as a phone monkey for JW Pepper. I walked away from Ash in 1996 after they realigned the commision system, making it tougher to bring home a decent salary, and got fired from Pepper in 2009. After talking with my wife, we decided that I should finally try to make a living in one of the most famously insecure businesses in the world. So far it's been...interesting, to say the least. We've managed to survive, and I hope that we can start to thrive in the not too distant future.

What do I hope to accomplish here? Good question. Maybe a sense of completion. You see, my wife has for years told me to write down the stories of my doings on the various movie & television sets that I work on, rather than having to listen to them all of the time. A friend of mine around that same time also asked me what it was like to work with a fairly famous photographer; five pages later, I thought that my wife might be on to something. So I created a file that lists the gigs more or less in order and I tell about what happened on the days that I worked. Problem is, I rarely go back and finish entries, and I have a backlog from the past two years to enter into that file. So what I intend to do is 1) finish what I started, 2) comment on jobs as I get them and 3) be entertaining. The last I'll leave for you to decide.

By the way, if you're looking for a boatload of snarkiness here, forget it. Most of the people I meet in this business-hell, most of the people I meet in life-are pretty cool. I have no problem calling out someone if they're being less than gracious to work with, but I think that you'll find it's rare when I do. Generally, I have a good time when I work, despite the conditions and the hours and the pressure that everyone seems to feel on a set. I hope you have a good time reading this.

Here we go!