I am what I imagine myself to be.
I’m thinking of seperating my Technology blog entries from this main site and just concentrate on Life, Acting, and the arts. I could then create a seperate blog just for my tech journal… anyway…
Quick notes:
A new gaming console that relies on Broadband and a hard disk to download and play games.
http://www.infiniumlabs.com/
Jump from a plane and fly like superman!
http://www.freesky.de/SKYRAY.html
To my surprised I already received a response to my inquiry about the ad for Asian Male Models. The response was so quick I have the suspicion it was automated. Well regardless, the call is for tomorrow between 10-12pm in Hollywood. That ain’t gonna work for me. I have rehersal w/ my acting partner in Santa Monica tomorrow, plus I need to collect my 4×8 headshot proofs from my commercial agent in Los Angeles so I can take the photos to the lab in Hollywood and get them processed and blown up to 8×10’s and take them back to both my theatrical agency in North Hollywood and my commercial agency in Los Angeles to get final approval on which picture I will be using. This is a big pain in the ass driving all over LA and trying to keep up appearances at my contracting job in Santa Monica. Ah well…
0 CommentsA good friend of mine, who is also a struggling actor, passed me an email pointing out an ad on Craigslist.org looking for Asian Male Models for a cell phone ad. I am always wary about modeling calls that don’t come through my agent. Unfortunately there are too many people here in LA running some kind of scam or trying to take advantage of actors and models. I responded to the ad but will always be skepticle and cautious…
ClosedThe major discussion about my performance on Sat, was the accent and my “costume”. Tom thought my accent was good and was glad I was reading poetry for my superlative, but pointed out a couple of times he felt the accent slipped. He also felt that I was being held back both emotionally and physically because of my concentration on the accent. I agree. I found myself trying to find the right phrasing of sentences for how a native Jamaican would say them. This kinda took me out of the full responsiveness to my partner. Tom also took issue with my shirt again (this time I had made a shirt w/ the Jamaican flag printed on the front). He wanted to see some special way of dressing as if I was going to do spoken word. I told him that this is what I would wear if I was a Chinese Jamaican poet. Once he realized that I was wearing the Jamaican flag he thought the shirt was ok. His whole point is that everything in a scene must be thought out and must mean something. Nothing in a scene must be purely coincidental. Although a little frustrating, I thought this whole exercise was good because I was able to expose my acting coach and the class to something new and different - an alternative Asian character who is not typically Asian but mixed with the flavor of the Carribean.
0 CommentsFor class tomorrow, Tom wanted me to do the Jamaican accent again but wear a Bob Marley t-shirt to indicate that I am Jamaican. Instead, I bought fabric pastels from the art store and a plain white t-shirt and I made a shirt w/ the Jamaican flag printed on the front. I was going to put the Chinese symbol for China on the back of the shirt but it’s 3am and I’m too tired to do that.
For the improv scene tomorrow I will be wearing my Jamaican t-shirt and reciting Jamaican spoken word poetry. My situation is that I’m Chinese Jamaican and have been living in the states for a couple of years. I am a poet and a musician. A couple of months ago my best friend passed away in a car accident. He too was a Jamaican poet living here in the states. As a tribute to my friend I am reciting one of his pieces at a big poetry slam coming up. While rehersing this piece I will be expecting my brother to show up because he’s in town and we are going out to dinner.
My acting partner is my girlfriend whom I’ve been seeing for a couple of months. She knows about my friend passing away. We don’t live together. She will be asking me to marry her and I have to justify a reason to say “no”. The reason I can’t marry her is because I’m not in love with her and I recently met someone else.
0 CommentsUnlike Bruce Banner in The Hulk, if you get hit by gamma rays you will die. That’s why the DOD (Department of Defense) is developing gamma-ray weapons - so they can “revolutionize warfare”. They say gamma-ray weapons are an exotic form of nuclear weapons. As if nuclear weapons weren’t enough. Yeah, let’s find more ways to send the world into oblivion and create death and destruction like the world has never known. That sounds like a great idea!
1 CommentI just heard the news while driving in my car. New York, Cleveland, Ohio, Detroit, Michigan, Toronto and Ottawa have lost COMPLETE power. Authorities are claiming a natural occurrence of a power grid failure at a Niagara power station. No terrorism is suspected…
THEY SAY this is not terrorism, but something tells me it is. Even if it isn’t, it demonstrates that it is possible to take down a lot of cities to a grinding halt. And if it is terrorism, would authorities admit it was? I suspect there will be casualities from heat and unruliness. If they can’t restore power by tonight, I fear for people’s personal safety. There could be looting and civil unrest. This is all just crazy. If you saw this in a movie you would think it was over the top and that it could never happen in real life.
I pray this whole thing is resolved quickly and safely.
0 CommentsThe improv went well last night. The critique that I received from Tom (our teacher) was that my partner started swearing at me and disrespecting me and I wasn’t surprised. If my relationship with her is a good relationship (which it was suppose to be), then I should be surprised that my sister is talking to me that way and disrespecting me. I also need to be curious why my sister is treating me this way and why she doesn’t care that she missed our mothers birthday. This could then lead me to suspect that she is on drugs again because of her erratic behavior. Tom also mentioned that I was pretty solid and specific with my anger but he wants me to connect a little deeper with my pain. Overall, the general note for me is to be a little more curious of behavior and what is being said, and connect more with the pain.
0 CommentsHere’s an outline for the improv I will be performing in class tonight:
My partner and I are brother and sister. She is my younger sister. I am an adopted kid. Our parents adopted me first because they thought they couldn’t have kids. A few years later, my sister was born. I love my sister very much, but she has been struggling with a drug problem since college. For the past couple of months she has been clean. Last night was our mother’s 50th birthday party and she never showed up. My mother was very sad that her daughter didn’t show and I couldn’t even get a hold of her. In the improv, she now has to justify why she didn’t show up at the party. My surprise for her is that our mother had a heart attack and is now in the hospital.
0 CommentsLast Saturday in acting class I decided to try something a little different. Since we are working on acting impediments (diseases, conditions, accents) I wanted to surprise my new acting coach and classmates with a Jamaican accent. I’ve been playing around with the accent ever since I heard the sounds of reggae from Shabba Ranks and saw the movie “Cool Runnings” (their accents are terrible in the movie). I wanted to see if my new acting coach would say “you shouldn’t do a Jamaican accent because you don’t look Jamaican” (translated: you’re not black). Well, he actually thought it was good! Although, at first he couldn’t place the accent. Probably because he’s not familiar with it, which a lot of people are not. Luckily, the majority of my class did recognize the accent and thought it to be pretty good. The thing that annoyed me though is that he told me to try the accent again next week, but the next time wear a Bob Marley t-shirt. I guess my “asianess” was throwing him off and the only familiar Jamaican thing to him is Bob Marley. Although, to be fair, before reggae became popular in the early 90’s, Bob Marley was the only Jamaican thing I knew as well. But now that I have researched it more, I have discovered that Chinese immigrated to Jamaica way back in the early 1900’s. Chinese people make up a small percentage of the population and there are a lot of Jamaicans with Chinese heritage. For example, the emerging hot dancehall reggae artist Sean Paul. I’ve also discovered that there are a lot of Chinese Jamaicans living in Canada as well. Chinese people really get around…
I’m thinking of making a t-shirt for the next time I do the Jamaican accent in class. It will say “I am Jamaican”, or “I am a Chinese Jamaican”. Maybe that will help my acting coach realize that I’m doing a Jamaican accent and that not all Jamaicans are rastas or wear Bob Marley t-shirts. I’m also trying to learn some patois to really mix it up!
Bigups to all the Chinese Jamaicans out there!