First Time "On Avail"

Since Monday, I've been "on avail" for a commercial. In case you don't know what that means [note: I didn't know until very recently], it means that I've passed the audition, but don't have the booking yet. It's a limbo state.

The audition was in Los Angeles (on January 30th). A week later (February 6th), the Casting Director called (actually, one of her assistants called) to tell me they'd like to put me on avail for the shooting dates next week (February 13th and 14th). I called to confirm, and am now playing the waiting game.

This is part of the deal.

No matter how far I go, and no matter how long I stay in this industry...

This is part of the deal.

Everybody goes on auditions, waits for call-backs, waits to get put on avail, and waits to get bookings. It doesn't matter if it's for $750, or $7.5 million dollars, everybody is waiting for the phone to ring.

This is part of the deal.

I knew that before going on my first audition (on January 9th, by the way). During a class last summer (Commercial Auditions, Second City), the instructor (Tom Booker) taught us the ropes, and prepared us for this.

This is part of the deal.

Fine. I know that. You know that. Whoever you are, you probably know that. And if you didn't know that before, you know that after reading the last several paragraphs.

This is part of the deal.

The thing is, no matter how much I repeat that to myself, it's still hard. Okay, not hard in a back-breaking sense. Not hard in a losing-a-loved-one sense. Let's get some perspective here. It's hard in its own way. It's not exactly excruciating. It's not exactly numbing, death-defying, heart-breaking, or fill-in-the-blank-with-your-favorite-pain-ing.

Nonetheless, it's no cup-of-tea, either.

With that said (yeah, I said that), it sure beats the living shit (yeah, I said that, too) out of not doing it at all.

While I was driving back from another audition earlier this week (was it yesterday? time is off-kilter at the moment), I had a huge smile on my face. Why? Because I had only started submitting myself for auditions in December (file under: it's about time), had only gotten my first audition(s) in January, and was suddenly in the position of being in the running for two projects at the same time (that's "simultaneously", for those of you looking for a single word rather than four words).

In the whole grand scheme of things, this may be no big deal. But in my little scheme of things, it's pretty cool. My expectations were set low by the folks "in the know" (no rhyme intended). That is, you see, some folks who do this for a living have been kind enough to share some ratios with me. And based on those ratios, I didn't expect to get many auditions in the beginning.

For one thing, I don't have representation. And without representation, it's harder to get auditions.

For another thing, even when you get auditions, you're not supposed to sit around waiting for the phone to ring. It doesn't ring very often. What you're supposed to do is just keep submitting, hope to get some responses, and just keep going out on auditions, knowing that once in a while, you'll get call-backs. Maybe 1 out of every 20 times.

So, when I got a call-back on my second audition, I was pleasantly surprised. Even though I felt like I was right for the part, I was still in a state of disbelief when the voice in the recorded voicemail told me that they'd like to put me on avail.

The thing about ratios is that they're not evenly distributed. Since I've got a degree in Mathematics, I know that kind of stuff. You know it, too. You just may not know the theorems behind the stuff. Am I getting too technical here, talking about "stuff"?

The point is (on top of my head, but besides that)... I said, the point is that 1-in-20 doesn't mean _exactly_ 1-in-20. It means that in the long run, you're doing okay if you get 1 callback for every 20 auditions [note: your mileage may vary]. In the short run, you might get 1-in-2. Or you might get 1-in-100.

This is part of the deal.

No matter what, it sure beats the heck out of not doing it. Oh, did I already mention that? And did I already mention that another reason I had a smile on my face driving back from another audition this week was because this was all just a thought in my little head last year? No magic was involved. We all have the power. Think it, then do it. It's that simple.

One thing I didn't mention (but am about to mention) is that there's a "cosmic" reason I'd really like to score this particular booking.

My mom's birthday is February 13th.

Wouldn't that be a cool story to tell on David Letterman's couch? Or chair. Whatever kind of furniture it happens to be, or whatever host happens to be sitting on the other side of the desk, it would be cool to talk about the fact that when my mom died, it really drove home the point that life is too short, and that my mom and dad often talked about me "missing my calling" when I quit pursuing a career in Hollywood, and that my first "break" (be it little or big) in Hollywood was a commercial that shot on her birthday.

As my dad said, the thought makes me happy and sad.

So, I may not be in control of what happens here, but am still holding out the hope that the above story will become part of my bio in the future.

Until they call to tell me they've released me from the avail, it's still possible.

And if they don't book me on this one, there's a whole world of possibility around the next corner.

That, too, is part of the deal.