The Lost Weekend

I started putting things in boxes and my mom admonished, "Hurry up!"

 

"It's not like we'll never be back," I protested.

 

"C'mon Eric.  You know we're all leaving.  We're not coming back..." so I continued to pack my boxes in East Longmeadow...

 

...and then I woke up.  This dream was indicative of the type of thing that would greet me in my sleep since I flew out here.  I've had several dreams in which I hadn't quite said "goodbye."  What was I doing out here?  Was I done in Boston?  Well, maybe I would find out later.  For that day, I'd be going to an actors fair.

 

It was, of course, sort of a job fair for actors.  The first thing I went to was Empowering Diversity, a panel on diverse casting.  The second thing I went to was a stand-up workshop and it was terrible.  But when I saw the mic stand I got excited as I hadn't done stand-up in three weeks and I was itching to get in front of people and tell jokes.

 

It was this guy with TV credits basically working us like an infomercial on how we can take our real life and turn into stand-up today!  He ridiculed what he called "the old-school of setup/punchline" in favor of "the new-school of premise/act-out."  This would make Boston old-school I guess.  He also said to write in the present tense and to say "you" instead of "I" so that the audience can relate to it better, dumbing it down.  Basically he was the worst stereotype of an LA comic abusing stand-up to get acting work.  It made me sad, although I did make a friend out of it.

 

He introduced a formula in which one picks something to talk about and then fills in the blanks of the following sentence: "What's _______ about _______ is that you _______."  The second blank is the topic, the third blank sets up the act-out and the first blank is one of the following words: weird, hard, scary, or bugs me.  Being the stick-in-the-mud I have the habit of being, I raised my hand.  My topic was hypochondria.  I was one of the only ones that didn't pick something sex-related.  My sentence was "What's ironic about psychological hypochondria is that it makes you into a paranoid neurotic."

 

"I used a different word," I said.  Our teacher said that 20% of the audience might be too drunk to understand a word like "ironic."  Let's say that's true.  That means 80% got the joke.  If 3/4 of them think the joke is funny enough to laugh at, then that's pretty good.

 

Basically, it seemed to me to be a stereotype of the actor using stand-up to get seen.  "Nobody wants to hear jokes anymore.  The purpose for the act-out is to show these industry folks your range."  Stuff like that pisses me off.

 

Then there was also the interview with Brad Garrett (Ray's brother on "Everybody Loves Raymond").  Naturally a bunch of people showed up to watch that.  It was very good, not anything I didn't already know, but good stuff to here.

 

Then there was the job fair stuff.  A lot of people with tables hawking their headshot, reel, and acting coach services.  Basically I filled out raffle tickets for things and took a few things here and there to look at later.

 

Originally, the plan was for my uncle Ringo to pick me up and he'd show me some rock clubs in the area and maybe I'd go to the Fake Gallery to check out Jim DeCroteau's show.  Jim DeCroteau was one of the original founders of the Comedy Studio.  But my uncle had a gig, so my other uncle, Aubrey picked me up and brought me to his sister-in-law's.  I had some barbecue and chatted with people I probably never met.  A couple of hours later, everyone went into the garage.  The floor was set up like a gym or a martial arts center.  Two of the kids were taking Tae Kwon Do and one of the other daughters was a dancer running for Freshman student council in high school.  So all of the kids went up and did something for everyone else and then it was my turn.

 

I told my usual jokes in a more conversational style to some success but won over the crowd by talking to the toddler who was yelling about something or other.  In situations like that with kids, I tend to talk to them like anyone else, taking whatever they say literally and seriously.  I usually get laughs that way.  A few "acts" later they asked me to do something else, so I demonstrated an excercise in physical humor I learned from Dan Bromberg back in Boston.

 

Sunday I went to eat and do errands with family and on Monday I was, more or less, by myself at my uncle's.  So I went to buy some stuff for my hosts of the past two weeks.  I bought both of my uncle's gas cards (and regular ones, in each I wrote a "thank you" note), my grandma a box of chocolates and my grandpa a nice container of peanuts.

 

Before I left on Tuesday, I went to give Lang and Lucky one more saucer of milk each and then I said "Goodbye."

 

I've noticed I've spent a lot of money, especially in the past week.  There were the groceries once I moved into my new place, there were the daily bus passes and the weekly one I bought today, there were the occasional meals and snacks out, and then all the supplies I forgot about.

 

For example, I had to buy a pump for my inflatable mattress and so I went around town on a bus pass until I finally found the Big 5, the local sports store chain.

 

That night, I went to see a show at the Improv.  There were people I knew from Boston there that night including Erik Charles Nielsen and a comic who had already left Boston by the time I started, Dwayne Perkins.  I saw another fellow that was an open-micer in Boston three years ago who was now working at the Improv.  I told him where I moved to and he chuckled, "That's ghetto-adjacent."  I mentioned how close it was to everything though, which it was and he agreed dismissively.

 

Though I got there too late to see Erik Charles Nielsen, I did see Dwayne Perkins.  There were two shows, the Ivy League Comedy Show and the Community College Show.  I think my first impression of LA comics so far is "There are a lot of jokes about highways and Mexicans."  So I'll try not to tackle either of those two areas.

 

As I walked home I saw a man walking his dog and asked for directions.  He told me that the part of town I was living in wasn't bad, but that part of the street I lived off of "could get a little flaky."

 

The next day I went to the Museum of Television & Radio.  When I was at Emerson, I'd catch some of the museum's broadcasts in which a TV show's cast would answer questions via satellite from colleges all over the country.  I also knew that the museum was a library of television and radio programs that anyone could go watch, as featured in the fim "Comedian" when Jerry Seinfeld watched Richard Pryor's appearances on "The Ed Sullivan Show."

 

This was the first place I could think to visit to apply for a job because I thought it seemed like a great place and it seemed not unlike my job at Emerson College's Media Services department.  I went there and asked about any possible jobs and was told there was a temp position available soon and to fax my info there.  But in the meantime I decided to watch some episodes of a show I'd always wanted to see, but didn't, "Doctor Who."  After perusing the Al Hirschfeld caricatures on the walls, I left for my apartment where I'd prepare some things to be faxed.

 

Fortunately there was a Kinko's near the place where the film festival I got invited to would be.  So after I faxed my resume, two letters of recommendation, and an enthusiastic cover letter I grabbed all my little papers and folders and ran to the venue.

 

Well, not all of my stuff.  I was hungry and grabbed a slice of pizza to tide me over until the pre-show party.  As I looked through my wallet, I realized I needed to go back to Kinko's.

 

When I finally did go to the festival I saw someone I recognized from the showcase I did two years ago.  She squinted and asked, "Eric?"  We talked for a few minutes before I realized that she was to check people's names in line and I was not in line.  So I started to walk towards the back of what had now become a large group of people when the first person and line and my old friend convinced me that I could stay near the front because I was there the whole time anyway.

 

The only person in front of me was a casting director and I introduced myself by asking nervously, "So, uh, did you make one of the films?"  I was fairly certain that this woman didn't, but I thought it'd do as a conversation starter.

 

I'm really not good at these party things.  But there were people that recognized me that I didn't remember at first, like the woman who booked my plane, hotel, and rental car.  Well, not rental car.  I wasn't old enough to rent a car two years ago.  On November 10th, I'll be able to rent one though.  So, yipee!

 

I told the person who invited me where the apartment I moved into was and she said, "Oh really?  I live about two blocks away.  We're neighbors."  I felt better about where I lived.

 

So this was the Comedy Short Cuts film festival put on by NBC and one of the comics I played with in New York and LA two years ago, Wil Sylvince.  There were seven films and I liked most of them.  "Pria" had heart, but perhaps too much heart.  I really liked it though.  "Osama Bin Laden: Behind the Madness" was much better than I was expecting and an intricate little film.  "Equal Opportunity" and "Afterschool'd" both presented clever takes on our perceptions of ethnic stereotypes while remaining very funny.

 

Over the next couple of days I emailed some of the people I reconnected with and got some advice on which shows to go to such as The Center for Inquiry (formerly the Steve Allen Theatre), Improv Olympic West, Upright Citizen's Brigade Theatre, The Fake Gallery, ACME, and and this show at a Ramada on Vermont Ave.  (I believe that's 1401 N Vermont Ave. to be precise.  Use Metro.net to find the proper bus route).  I'll be going to that one tomorrow night, if you or anyone you know anyone is interested.

 

Other than that other exciting things I did this week included getting my library card and waiting for the cable guy.  Which is why I'm able to write to you now from my apartment.

 

I had a dream last night.  I don't remember what it was but it was not related to saying goodbye to New England.  Everything's going to be alright.

 

Thank you, I'm Eric Cheung.  I'm on MySpace and Live Journal.