One thing that this town has in spades is out of work actors. They’re everywhere, clogging our freeways to get to auditions, renting out our bars for their networking events, shutting down our industry with their strikes… however, if four years in film school has taught me anything, it’s that out of work actors are desperate enough to do just about anything.

All you need to do is put a notice up on LACasting.com and you get literally hundreds of submissions, each and every one of them ready to do what it takes to “get their big break.” A crafty person can use this to their advantage. Say you’re moving, and you need people to carry your boxes and furniture around. Well, just post a notice for a “student film” about “a person trying to find themselves while moving out of their apartment”. When they show up to “set”, show them their “props”, and then follow them around with a camera while they provide you with free labor.

The possibilities are endless. As long as there’s a camera, it counts as a film. Looking for a new girlfriend? Why not have some auditions. You don’t even have to worry about them giving you their number, because it’s right there on the headshot. And then on your first date (i.e. the first scene of your “student film”), just have someone sit at the table next to you with a camera. You can even take them out without a camera and call it a rehearsal. And if she won’t put out, just write in a sex scene. By the fourth or fifth date they’ll probably have forgotten that they’re supposed to be acting, and then they’ll just be your real girlfriend.

You could cast a whole entourage if you’re short on friends. And, in many ways, they’re better than real friends: you can choose what they look like, tell them how to act, tell them how to dress, and, if things don’t work out, you can just fire them. But be careful, because if SAG strikes not only will your new girlfriend dump you, but all your friends will abandon you too. And trust me, you really don’t want to have to settle for non-union.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 29th, 2009 at 11:21 pm and is filed under LA Rave. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.