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Acting
I wanted to groan, but proper social norms dictated that I control my primal urges, at least until I could release my disgust in privacy.My friends invited me to their improve show, which I was immediately skeptical of, but I went out to support their “craft” and “career” choice. That, plus I’d heard that out-of-work actresses would fuck a writer for a role. So I put on silk shirt and one of those phony LA scarfs and tucked a notebook into my jacket pocket, which I could pull out at moment’s notice to scribble bullshit notes about future screenplay ideas. Nothing entices the ladies in LA like whipping out your pen and pad, except maybe your wallet.
Anyways, here I am at this terrible improv with a bunch of self-righteous actors. And I specifically mean actors- not comedians or improvisational performers or entertainers- but actors. There is a HUGE difference between entertainers and actors. It’s like the difference between reading a Pulitzer novel and a tabloid. Entertainers want to, well, entertain their audiences, while actors simply want to get paid. Or to get kudos for their acting. Actors are whores for praise. So between each sketch, they allow a few full minutes for applause, fueling their show like an asshole automobile. Which is I guess is why Hollywood is so fond of the Prius; they can personally relate to it.
To make matters worse, the audience in the small broken-down theater is comprised mostly of other actors who have been invited to the show by their friends on the stage, so there is an astounding abundance of assholes all around me. I may as well be a proctologist’s index finger. These pretentious fuckers keep laughing at all the jokes- more out of necessity to please the performers than any actual hilarity- while the actors are playing to their audience by breaking character to throw in industry lingo. I’m witnessing a gay 69 between these conceited actors with both sides blowing each other. And let me say; I’ve seen gay porn, and it didn’t make me as queasy as this sausage sucking. This is the literal incarnation of “ego stroking.”
And now they’re on stage playing actors. Seriously, they are playing characters who are actors. Why do actors think it is so clever to play characters with the same professions that they actually hold? Do you think a dominatrix goes home and ties her husband’s wrists to the bedposts while beating him with a riding crop? NO! They go home and try to push their work duties as far out of their minds as they possibly can- like the rest of us. Not actors. They think it’s edgy and hilarious. It’s even better if they’re pretending to be actors who are playing actors acting like actors in a sort of never-ending Penrose staircase of arrogance. I know Shakespeare said “All the world’s a stage,” but this is fuckin ridiculous.
Actors think it’s funny to play an actor because they’ve devoted so much time and energy to their art instead of learning skills relevant in the real world. Now they finally have an outlet for all of those pointless insider terms and gestures that nobody else understands or cares about, so they stuff them in performances for the same reason famous actors cram political references in public interviews- they only have two or three meaningful topics to talk about and are otherwise utterly dull. And all the laymen in the audience have to put up with these crappy, unfunny jokes while the fellow actors do these fake-ass laughs that are supposed to sound sophisticated.
I’m sitting near the back and the lights are shinning in the actors’ eyes so my friends can’t see me and I don’t feel obligated to crack up at every joke. Don’t get me wrong, some of the skits are quite funny, including one where the one guy describes a scene and the other actors silently enact the motions he is narrating. But then there are others that are just awful- and not even improv! They are rehearsed auditions that are being passed off as spur-of-the-moment comedy. And it might have be funny if it wasn’t being falsely advertised as improv.
If it sounds like I’m bitching and being overly critical; I’m not. On numerous occasions I caught some of the normal folks- supportive boyfriends, girlfriends, and family members- checking their cell phones, wishing the masquerade would end. I made eye contact with a cute brunette wearing a Soundgarden t-shirt after a particularly pathetic joke about putting out on the casting couch, which of course made the crowd roar with laughter. She was across the aisle, but I could tell she thought it was just as lame and self-gratifying as I did, so I simply rolled my eyes. She chuckled at that, which was a better reaction than the actors were getting.
Oh yeah, that’s another thing! Actors believe that their profession is difficult and only with years of training are you qualified to act. But I was in a play in 5th grade and rocked it. My little sister sang a jingle in a commercial she got in simply based on her looks and made a couple G’s from that shit, and she hadn’t so much as sang in the shower, let alone consulted a vocal coach. If you can lie, you can act, I always say. But, of course, actors need to be commended for their lying; patted on the back and given awards commemorating their spectacular lies.
When the rest of us non-actors lie, it is to get something. But it the result of the lying, not for the lying, if that makes any sense. It’s like this; at inter-mission, I approached the brunette and cracked a joke about the show. She laughed and admitted that she was an aspiring actress, but she did think actors could get pretty self-involved. I told her I was a writer, which is only a partial lie, and I sold that shit cause her eyes lit up and she asked what I was writing. I told her I had a TV sitcom lined-up for the future, which is a complete-bullshit lie. But that was all it took for her to give me her phone number. Should I have been given a Golden Globe or Oscar or SAG Award for my performance? The answer, obviously, is “no.”
It didn’t end up amounting to anything; she was just as boring as most actors. Ask an actor what made De Niro so incredible in Raging Bull and they will have a precise, well-rehearsed response, but bring up the economic climate and they’ll give a confused look, like a celebutante trying to grocery shop. Which is particularly ironic cause they all have service industry jobs making min wage plus tips, but don’t give a damn cause they’re only one gig from getting discovered and making millions. Anyways, I talked to her again after the show, and she didn’t even know who Soundgarden was! She just liked how the shirt looked! I wanted to backhand her, but just ripped up the number instead.
Afterwards, compliments were exchanged, which is to say that praise was dumped on the actors who in return lavished their friends for participating in the event. When everyone was done jerking each other off, my friends and I went out for drinks. I told them I really enjoyed the show and couldn’t wait for the next one as I sipped on a Gin-and-Tonic.
The two of them prattled on, recapping the entire damn thing- every single sketch. Loose from the drink, I interjected, asking why so many of their skits were rehearsed instead of ad-libbed. They looked puzzled and slightly offended, but responded that no true art is entirely spontaneous. Rappers have prepared rhymes for freestyle battles, comedians have material for a multitude of subjects, and painters have a vision in their minds at the outset of all projects. I pointed out how preposterous that notion was, that any great artist could create art on the spot, whether they were prepared or not. As an author, I know that when I sit down at a keyboard I usually have a general idea, but no clue where it’s going until I start typing. This example shut them up, probably because that was the extent of their argument and weren’t prepared with a retort.
Anyways, I felt rude for hurting their feelings, so I offered to pay the tab. I’m reaching for my wallet and my notepad falls out, which I had totally forgotten about, but the hot blonde waitress/model sees it and realizes I’m a writer and starts hitting on me, telling me that she like my scarf. I say all the right things back to her; say how difficult acting seems, how jealous I am of people who can go onstage in front of audiences to bear their souls, and that it takes a talented person to pull off a convincing performance. She’s totally impressed by me, so she jots down her name and number in my pad. Guess the night turned out to actually be pretty entertaining after all. And I didn’t need to take acting classes in order to invent that masterful fib.
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