Back in My Old Shoes, Part One

I grew up with a love for theater, movies, acting, music, dancing, the arts. Not due to my parents pushing, it was more of a "deep within me" love for it. 

I had planned on majoring in theater in college... but a lot happened {too long to get into this morning) so I ended up just getting my degree in Communications and put acting on... pause.

In January of 2007, I worked on the set of Fred Claus for two days! I was an extra and yep, you can see me between minutes 16:30 and 17:00 if you go frame by frame! I can spot myself now without going frame by frame... ha! I worked for two days on that set and they were: the best. days. of. my. working. life. ever. Top Two Days. Ever. I was finally at home. It was definitely where I was meant to be! Heck, I even made more money in those two days than I ever had in two days at any other job! Growing up, I had always told myself that after college I would move out to California and give myself two, maybe three, years to land some jobs. If I was working by the time my three years was up, I'd stay longer and see what else happened. Working on Fred Claus was the exact push I needed to know that this really WAS what I wanted to persue, and that I was really motivated now to do it! I was GOING to make it!

After being an extra, I started to seriously think about moving to California. {Please say "California" like Arnold, ok?} My lease would be up in July and I'd be free to roam the world. It'd be scary, exciting ~ I'd be fulfilling a promise I made to myself to never let myself wonder "What Could Have Been" about this. I wanted to chase my dream and make it my b.i.t.c.h. You know? The wheels were turning and I was in charge! At the very least, I figured I could probably make a decent living as an extra. As long as I could line up the jobs...

Three weeks later, my out-of-town boyfriend visited.
And we ended up creating two very wonderful little girls.

And my dreams of becoming an actress pretty much disappeared once I found out I was pregnant. Moms can't chase dreams like that, you know? The life of an actor is very last minute, very late night; it takes a lot out of you, and frankly as the new mom of twins ~ I no longer had the drive needed to chase the dream. Can you imagine moving your brand new family across the country just so you can selfishly chase the dream of becoming a Hollywood Star? Aside from all that, my newfound After-Twins-Mommy-Body certainly was no longer up to par with my Hollywood peers. {I know I should be proud of my body for having twins ~ but going from a sleek/probably underweight 85-90 pounds to... well, having twins, sure did a number on it!}

So life went on until April of 2009. {I had no idea at this point that I was pregnant. Of course.} The acting bug will never go away {acting on stage is like crack, seriously. once you start it's hard to go back to normal life}. I was perusing Craigslist for jobs. And found this guy who was looking for extras for this film they were going to start shooting soon. As things turned out, they gave me a lead role {we were really more of an ensemble cast than leads/secondaries} instead of the part of the extra that I had responded about. I signed on for the part and a couple weeks later we met with a photographer to shoot the promo photos for the movie. 

And by met with a photographer and the guys who were shooting the movie, are you ready for this, I met these guys (5 of them) at a warehouse (the photog's studio is there). In a sketchy part of town. It was only a few minutes from my house, I had my husband on speed dial, and he knew I'd be calling/texting him at half hour intervals so if I ever didn't text, he knew to alert the authorities, etc. It was a total chance. I seriously was taking a chance ~ but isn't the life of an actor full of chances? Chance is the only way I'm going to find my big break. And I just can't watch my dreams slip away ~ it's too sad for me. I had to take that leap. 

So when I saw them drive up to the building and I saw how nerdy they all looked ~ I really wasn't nervous anymore. :) They really AREN'T nerdy guys at all, but I didn't get any bad feelings in my gut {and I'm one that believes in the power of my gut feelings}. They totally looked like the people I hang out with ~ I was starting to get really excited!!

I unfortunately can't find the CD of images from the shoot, so I can't share those today. Sorry. Lame blog post without a picture. My bad. But we had a lot of fun and I knew that I was getting into something good!

~

Part Two of this story, including the trailer for our movie (and pictures if I can find 'em), coming later this week! Don't forget to come back and hear the rest of the story!