Actor Growth

I will be volunteering for that video tomorrow and one thing I realized was that the person didn’t give me any details in terms of what I should wear. I suppose this isn’t too big of a deal since it is just a PSA, but usually for auditions it can be a more stressful decision.

For example, some people go in just as themselves which doesn’t help in making them look like the character or vice versa some people try to dress too much for the part which makes casting directors oversee you for other potential parts.

I think I am just going to go with casual. People often say that wearing black highlights your face more, so I think I will be going with that direction.

So I was looking into this sport called parkour which seemed kind of interesting as by the looks of it you are trying to get to point A to point B through real life obstacles as fast as possible. Essentially, I saw people climbing poles, jumping across various platform, etc.

I’m always interested in learning new things that help to develop the mind and body which is why it kind of interested me. It looks like it could be very useful for people who want to get into stunt work in film as well.

Apparently in the new James Bond movie there is a scene in the beginning where someone is running across buildings and all utilizing this sport. Just thinking if it would work with my schedule though as I currently try to attend another martial arts class everyday to try and get the most out of it.

So the Vancouver Asian Film Festival is supposed to start soon and I received an invitation by a couple of people to attend. Doesn’t look like I will be able to attend at this point though due to other arrangements, but maybe that will change in the last minute.

The top three film winners from the Mighty Asian Moviemaking Marathon will also be shown again at this festival. I have some friends that are attending, so maybe I’ll get to see some videos of the event at minimum.

While working on Farewell Atlantis it was very neat to talk to the different types of people who were working on the film as background performers. I was meeting people such as script writers, artists and even real estate agents.

Many people say that background work is a good way to break into the business. I think that notion is true when it comes to networking with others. This is why too I always find it amazing like with that little ruffle that I saw on set as you never know who you could be talking to which should give you more of a reason to be nice to everyone you meet.

Most often too when you see people reading a book or watching something on their laptop, I have found that they would rather be socializing to meet new people. I have personally never met an anti-social person on set before. I have even seen business exchanges happen on set. So if you ever do even simple things like the background work, take the opportunity to meet as many people as possible I’d say.

Over the past few days I have been hearing so many people talking about this on how so many roles that are meant to have an Asian male playing the lead along with an Asian lady never seems to end up that way. Instead, the Asian male is replaced with a Caucasian actor and so in most films that have a couple’s role you won’t see an Asian male as the lead.

Conceptually I personally don’t see the problem as you see multicultural relationships all the time in this day in age. Of course, the biggest reason I hear all the time why you never see an Asian lead in these types of situations is because North America in general is not ready or able to relate to or sympathize with an Asian male playing something that doesn’t have some kind of crazy action role in it.

In many ways though I would say the Asian film making community is not doing enough to break these stereotypes and in many ways contribute to it. For example, during my participation in that moviemaking marathon one person told me how he was so disappointed that the character I portrayed didn’t start physically fighting back more and that some people criticized how it seems like I had no form of training when it came to say fighting.

I then looked at him and said “When was the last time you saw two business people say whip out crazy weapons and start fighting each other with high flying martial arts?” Similarly I then made him think more by saying how the story was about a guy that wasn’t a fighter but in the end he used his brain more and ended up fighting very well that way. Then it kind of clicked to him where the film was trying to be more realistic and that everything he saw began to make more sense. Sure enough, he was a person of Asian descent as well.

I even mentioned it before too where one of the roles that I have yet to play is something revolving around a dedicated romance/drama genre and sure enough auditions for these types of roles are virtually nil even from an independent circuit. The ironic thing is that there are a ton of aspiring filmmakers who are Asian here as well and usually when the script does revolve around a couple even the Asian filmmakers write the script to have a mixed couple too. So with that, how can there really be complaints from the Asian community?

It’s mostly just a matter of doing more work and getting our faces out there. Even for myself, since I do a lot of drama roles people often are shocked at that as it is not as usual to see that from an Asian in North America. Just a matter of the filmmakers being open minded at this point I’d say.

It’s raining here in Vancouver today and I was supposed to act in a film where my character is sitting at a bus stop area. As a result, the film has been rescheduled to shoot tomorrow morning. Kind of makes my schedule a little more hectic as I had an audition tomorrow too.

I get to play the lead character in this one and so I was excited about doing it. The production people were really understanding too as they were willing to work around my time if necessary. Fortunately, the people that were interested in auditioning me were able to re-schedule me for a different time as well.

This is actually the first time where I was in a film where it is weather dependent and had to be delayed as a result. First time for everything.

Film delay due to rain for a short film that I am in.