I have been wearing out my library card these past few weeks. Today’s libraries are kinda like free video stores, and I’ve been checking out loads of DVDs to watch in my spare time. I’ve also been reading screenplays. It’s lovely that watching movies is no longer wasting time for me, but is valuable research for my future film career. I’ve been studying the greats: Clint Eastwood, Robert De Niro, Marlon Brando, Christopher Guest (ok, so, maybe This Is Spinal Tap is more of a cult classic, but it still counts). Next up we have Denzel, Bogart, and a little Ethan Hawke (yummy) just for kicks. And I achieved a great success this week. I found one tiny zone in the living room of my apartment where I can pick up a fast enough unprotected wireless connection to stream video, as long as I don’t move from the edge of the couch. Oh, my darling Netflix, how I have missed you so! Lord, bless those who don’t bother with password-protecting their connections. Anyone remember the unprotected Big Dick network that only worked on top of the pillow on my bed in the Warrior house? A comedic goldmine if there ever was one. Protection is overrated anyway.
This weekend marks the halfway-point in my 8-week program. We bid farewell to the 4-weekers yesterday. They were Keren (la cubana), Burak (the Turk), and Dean (the ___________- you can fill in the blank yourself). Our class is down to 11 people now. We lost the Brazilian girl, Marilia, to thyroid surgery two weeks ago, so that’s four gone. (She didn’t die or anything. She just went back to Brazil.) Our guy to girl ratio has worsened, leaving three guys to eight girls. I think that’s one reason that me and Clare (the Aussie) decided to do a scene from Fight Club together for Scene Study class. And also because we wanted to fake-wail on each other. There is a serious dearth of good meaty roles for women. Google “scenes for two women” and all you’ll get is Mean Girls, 10 Things I Hate about You, or Romy and Michelle. Geez Louise (and Thelma). The scene from Fight Club is for two men, namely Edward Norton and Brad Pitt (double yummy) but we have tweaked it a bit so that two girls can play it. Sometimes you have to grab something you kind of like and then manipulate it into what you want it to be. That’s how romantic relationships work too, right? Yep, I thought so. Main reason I don’t have one right now.
As always happens when you force a mixed group of very different individuals to spend lots of time together in an enclosed space, our class has formed small groups of friends that hang out together outside of class as well. To be fair, we all intermingle well (is that redundant? How do you intramingle?) and there are a few loners, but outside of class, we are pretty segregated. My group is made up of five girls (sound familiar, Jane, Kate, Rach, and Ash?). It’s me, Clare, Keren, Heshi, and Siting. When we have days off from class, some combination of the five of us tends to gravitate together and go off and do fun New Yorky stuff. Add a random guy from class every now and then if you want. Two weeks ago we rode the ferry over to Staten Island, passing the Statue of Liberty, and walked around the Botanical Gardens there. Last Sunday, I met Siting and Heshi in Upper Manhattan to attend a free Medieval festival. It was a fateful day for Siting, because she tried her first turkey leg and also fell in love. With a knight on horseback. Named Bubba. She’s been relentlessly searching for him on Facebook ever since. Thursday of this week, we all five met in Central Park and had a picnic in the grass. We were joined by Jay this time too, though I’m honestly not sure how much fun he had being surrounded by all these screeching girls (some more screeching than others). He brought cheesecake to the picnic though, so he was warmly welcomed into the fold. And last night, as I have mentioned before, we injured ourselves walking all over Manhattan, trying to find some jumping 18+ nightlife. It was supposed to be a big group from class, but people kept dropping out at the last minute (and it’s a good thing they did or they too would have had to endure the suckfest) so it became just the six of us from the picnic. I am looking forward to the next four weeks when hopefully I will get the chance to branch out and get to know other people from class better as well as some of the filmmakers (if I ever get a call back from the open audition). I still don’t know many people in New York, so any connections I can make (to exploit) are very welcome.
I have enough money saved up to last me till December, if I can stay out of frickin H&M. However, I am getting antsy to start generating some income again. I saw a young woman on the street today, about my age, holding a sign that said “Homeless but not hopeless; Broke but not broken” and it chilled me to the bone. Although you would have to cut off a few of my body parts and probably lobotomize me before I would ever succumb to homelessness, seeing her there crouching on the sidewalk in the Lower West Side with her little cup of pennies really gave me a sense of urgency about getting on the ball and starting to make some money. Food would be easy to steal around here, since there's so much of it. But you can't really steal an apartment. Well, actually, I think you can. It's called squatting. We'll just keep that as a last resort. But seriously, I really need my own place. The apartment I live in now is fine for the short term, but living with other people is weird and stressful, at least for me, and I am feeling the need for some solitude. Especially since this apartment just took on another renter in addition to me, and now it’s five people fighting for the one bathroom. Yup, it’s time to move on. I’ll probably wind up in a $1,200 a month closet, but at least I will have my own bathroom. My very own tiny, cramped bathroom. To me, that’s real luxury.
This weekend marks the halfway-point in my 8-week program. We bid farewell to the 4-weekers yesterday. They were Keren (la cubana), Burak (the Turk), and Dean (the ___________- you can fill in the blank yourself). Our class is down to 11 people now. We lost the Brazilian girl, Marilia, to thyroid surgery two weeks ago, so that’s four gone. (She didn’t die or anything. She just went back to Brazil.) Our guy to girl ratio has worsened, leaving three guys to eight girls. I think that’s one reason that me and Clare (the Aussie) decided to do a scene from Fight Club together for Scene Study class. And also because we wanted to fake-wail on each other. There is a serious dearth of good meaty roles for women. Google “scenes for two women” and all you’ll get is Mean Girls, 10 Things I Hate about You, or Romy and Michelle. Geez Louise (and Thelma). The scene from Fight Club is for two men, namely Edward Norton and Brad Pitt (double yummy) but we have tweaked it a bit so that two girls can play it. Sometimes you have to grab something you kind of like and then manipulate it into what you want it to be. That’s how romantic relationships work too, right? Yep, I thought so. Main reason I don’t have one right now.
As always happens when you force a mixed group of very different individuals to spend lots of time together in an enclosed space, our class has formed small groups of friends that hang out together outside of class as well. To be fair, we all intermingle well (is that redundant? How do you intramingle?) and there are a few loners, but outside of class, we are pretty segregated. My group is made up of five girls (sound familiar, Jane, Kate, Rach, and Ash?). It’s me, Clare, Keren, Heshi, and Siting. When we have days off from class, some combination of the five of us tends to gravitate together and go off and do fun New Yorky stuff. Add a random guy from class every now and then if you want. Two weeks ago we rode the ferry over to Staten Island, passing the Statue of Liberty, and walked around the Botanical Gardens there. Last Sunday, I met Siting and Heshi in Upper Manhattan to attend a free Medieval festival. It was a fateful day for Siting, because she tried her first turkey leg and also fell in love. With a knight on horseback. Named Bubba. She’s been relentlessly searching for him on Facebook ever since. Thursday of this week, we all five met in Central Park and had a picnic in the grass. We were joined by Jay this time too, though I’m honestly not sure how much fun he had being surrounded by all these screeching girls (some more screeching than others). He brought cheesecake to the picnic though, so he was warmly welcomed into the fold. And last night, as I have mentioned before, we injured ourselves walking all over Manhattan, trying to find some jumping 18+ nightlife. It was supposed to be a big group from class, but people kept dropping out at the last minute (and it’s a good thing they did or they too would have had to endure the suckfest) so it became just the six of us from the picnic. I am looking forward to the next four weeks when hopefully I will get the chance to branch out and get to know other people from class better as well as some of the filmmakers (if I ever get a call back from the open audition). I still don’t know many people in New York, so any connections I can make (to exploit) are very welcome.
I have enough money saved up to last me till December, if I can stay out of frickin H&M. However, I am getting antsy to start generating some income again. I saw a young woman on the street today, about my age, holding a sign that said “Homeless but not hopeless; Broke but not broken” and it chilled me to the bone. Although you would have to cut off a few of my body parts and probably lobotomize me before I would ever succumb to homelessness, seeing her there crouching on the sidewalk in the Lower West Side with her little cup of pennies really gave me a sense of urgency about getting on the ball and starting to make some money. Food would be easy to steal around here, since there's so much of it. But you can't really steal an apartment. Well, actually, I think you can. It's called squatting. We'll just keep that as a last resort. But seriously, I really need my own place. The apartment I live in now is fine for the short term, but living with other people is weird and stressful, at least for me, and I am feeling the need for some solitude. Especially since this apartment just took on another renter in addition to me, and now it’s five people fighting for the one bathroom. Yup, it’s time to move on. I’ll probably wind up in a $1,200 a month closet, but at least I will have my own bathroom. My very own tiny, cramped bathroom. To me, that’s real luxury.
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