Another day, another meeting with an agent. OK, so I've only had two meetings in two months but the phrase still stands. To be fair, the phrase 'another day, another trek down to south London' would be much more fitting. Until 5 weeks ago, I lived in south London and during that time no meetings or auditions were ever held there. However, the second I made the move to beautiful north London and now suddenly everyone wants me to make the arduous journey down to the other side of the river.
Yesterday was bloody miserable and the thought of getting on every form of transport that London has to offer made me come all over a little queasy. However, I kept in mind the lovely surprise I'd had the day before with the long trek being rewarded with the most wonderfullest of auditions and I set out. After all, this was a meeting with an agent. Even if they didn't like me and I didn't like them, it would be totally worth the jaunt. Even though it was just an initial meeting, I imagined I'd be in there for at least twenty minutes, chatting away about all the impossible things that I want to achieve and how little work I want to do to achieve these things. They'd go on for a good ten minutes about how great I am and how I'm just what they need to make their agency the best in the world. They'd get a bit excited about me and the rest of the company would all be brought in to gawp at me and I'd leave the meeting to the sound of rapturous applause and telephones ringing off the hook with a stream of job offers.
I imagine you'll be just as surprised as I was that this didn't happen. I was actually in the meeting for all of five minutes. And while it was a lovely five minutes, it was quite a shock that it was all over quite so quickly. I didn't even have time to run my BAFTA for Best Actress speech by them. I mean, the fact that I would chose to thank my parents, T and friends before them could be a proper deal breaker and would make things properly awkward in the afterparty. But instead we spent those five minutes idly chatting about things that are supposedly a lot more important such as my CV, headshot and what kind of work I want to be doing. Apparently these things matter a lot more. But anyway, after an enjoyable 300 seconds of chat, an audition was arranged for some time in the quite distant future so not all bad.
To be fair. I should be used to these bafflingly brief meetings. An audition I did for a patriotic gas company was quite possiblt the shortest on record. Somehow they were running amazingly late and I had a thirty minute wait to go in. I took very little notice at how quickly people were going in an out and waited patiently like the actress who is desperate for work that I am. Finally they called me in, I had the chance to say my name to camera, do profiles and hands. I then had to lift a box and put it back down again and that was it. What? I did three years at drama school. I spent weeks learning how to be a penguin. Months on how to be a cow. Years on how to be a human being. Didn't they want to see any of this? Sadly my face and box lifting skills weren't enough for them and I never heard from them again. Had they asked for my penguin then I'm sure things would've been different.
This afternoon sees yet another trek down to the southern regions of this glorious capital city as I start filming tonight. Check back tomorrow for at least one guaranteed calamitous tale of on-set buffoonery...
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