Beware. Explore Talet is scammy

So I know we're all signed up with all these different casting websites in order to get out there and book those auditions. Backstage still dominates in my book, but there are quite a few that I check. One that I've been a part of for a while is called Explore Talent.

It cost $30 something dollars every other month I think. Which isn't bad, but it's still money. I rarely use it. The site itself is a mess. It's poorly laid out and I have never gotten anything from it. This is one of those sites thats supposed to email you with possible roles that you match as well as automatically submit you for ones. it has never done that.

I should have cancelled my subscription a long time ago, but it fell through the cracks and I forgot about it. Out of the blue I get an email concerning my CC info. My card was declined because since the time of joining I've moved. So my billing address no longer matches. I'm not going to renew beacause honestly, it's a crap site.

But here is the kicker.

I get a call from a casting rep about a project with great money. Modelling for all these top name clothing companies. I'm pretty sure they already have their models. But I call anyway. Bear in mind this came to me the day after the email about my account lapsing. Hmmm

SO I give it a day, google the number. Lo and behold its for EXPLORE TALENT. Not a casting agent, EXPLORE TALENT. Hello scam to get people's money.

So I call. Cammie..(i think thats how it's spelled) went on and on about how great this project is and could pay up to $8,000. Woohoo. "Oh wait. it looks like your account needs to be updated. i'd love to submit you for this, but you'll have to pay the membership fees again. Would you like to? It'll be $49.95."

...

...

...

NO.

Click.

So quite the racket. All those people who don't renew must get this same call promising this amazing gig.

Hooked ya.

They call, pay whatever fees, supposedly submit and...nothing.

My advice to you all...don't use Explore Talent. It's just not good.

A slice of Life Filming

So filming has begun. Actually began on Tuesday, but I'm too tired when I get home to talk about it and somehow it's suddenly Thursday night. It's a great crew with some fun characters, but everyone seems to know what they're doing. My fellow actors also are right on the ball. Should look great when it's all done. Also...Red Camera. Yeah. Cool.

So here are some pictures. This is the outside of the Pizza place where my character works. Located down in the west village on Bank and 11th.

My beautiful co-actor Michele McNally's character, Lisa, lives here in this amazing Soho loft. Oh how I want to be rich and trendy sometimes. Lisa is the character that mine, Alex, is infatuated with. But the poor guy can only bring himself to smile when he sees her.

Here are some members of the crew shootin' the shit, waiting. So much light. And an odd amount of fedoras hanging randomly around the apartment.

So 3 days down 4 more to go. And then some fillers. I think we made some great headway today, so hopefully the next few days will fly by.

In other news, I'm part of a new Shakespeare company called BoAr. But something tells me it is not going to last long. I've already missed the first rehearsal and will be missing the second (this sunday). This was also the company that during my audition the guy in charge told me "Never look us in the eye. It's distracting." Excuse me? Never? Thats a bit rash, don't you think? Never? I am proud to say i flat out said, "well, its all preference really, and besides, you're my audience. Of course I'm going to look at you." They cast me anyway. Be even though I have yet to attend a rehearsal, I'm still on the fence. I'll let you know.

I much prefer Shakespeare Anywhere.....

I'm in a MOVIE!

Yes that's right. I'm in a film. I've had a slew of auditions lately. One I thought I was a shoe in for, yes didn't get cast. Which is interesting, I know a lot of the other folks who weren't cast ..(thank you for not BCCing your rejection email Ms. Casting director)..I stalked them all. A lot of people I've worked with before and are really quite good classically. So I feel less like poop than before.

But on the upsaide I'm in a film. I auditioned last Sunday and was told I'd be called back either Monday or Tuesday. I heard nothing so of course i wrote it off. I received a call from the director on Thursday saying he showed my tape to the producer and just like that...I got the part! Gotta love that.

The film is called "A slice of Life." I'll post more info as I get it. For now all I know I got is the part. And It's the lead. He's a Pizza delivery guy who falls for a regular customer. She is an up and coming Hollywood starlet and of course he doesn't know how to talk to her.

Let the fun begin!

Submissions...and stuff

I hate the term "submissions." I feel like it puts me (us all) in a subserviant position. As if we are offering ourselves up to the gods of casting. Going forward I think we should say that we sent our information off in order to grant a casting director permission to call us in. A little wordy, i know. I'll work on it. A colleaegue of mine suggested we just call them 'smiles.'

I kinda like that. For now..smiles.

So i sent some smiles off. I've started making it a weekly chore. I send out at least 2 smiles. I'm looking for an agent, who isn't. And i'm looking to be cast. Again, who isn't. I've actually gotten some great results from mail out. People say all the time, don't do mail outs. They're just wasted headshots. Thats partly true. But if you're submitting for a specific project or agent/casting director that you would really like to work with, then do it! I have this renewed faith in the US postal system.

I sent out a smile to low budget indie film. You kinda write it off but pat yourself on the back for having made it to the post office before 5. Well a few days later I recieved an email inviting me to come in for the audition. It works!

Mailing out smiles work!

Of course now we play the waiting game. But at least I feel like I'm getting somewhere.

Along with that, I also recently shot a music video for an emerging artist named Tinu. They needed sax players, and I figured why not. The video will be up and about sometime in mid October. I'll go ahead and post it when its live. But what an easy bit of cash. Go in, pretend to play, and leave. That simple. The song is ok, but I'm sure you'll all make fun of it when you hear it.

Charlie Paladino "Best of" Clip

So for those of you that have been following this blog or for that matter even my career you know that I was part of a web series that lasted about 5 episodes. I know you are all avid fans and following my work like fiends. So in honor of you all whom can't get enough of the thrilling antics of an up and coming (?) actor wading through the steamy streets of NY, I've created an exciting little clip reel of my character from the web series. I thank you for all the support. And Charlie thanks you ladies out there for all the love letters.

A World of Her Pwn premiered on the escapist website and ran for a good strong 5 episodes. 3 of which my fun loving character, Charlie Paladino, was featured in various wacky situations for moral support to Samantha Mason's Sam character and for pure comic relief. Looking back on these few episodes, I'm proud of my work and proud of my character. He was a fun energetic gamer who threw himself into everything.

So enjoy the best of Charlie Paladino, poor guy is now retired, but it sure was fun while it lasted.

Oh that darn wakky Charlie.

AWHP was created by Douglas Mackrell and Samantha Mason

Produced by FishPaste Productions

Directed by Douglas Mackrell and Dan Brosnan

Featuring:

Samantha Mason

Brian Morvant

Patrick Pizzolorusso

Jenelle Sosa

Candace Yoshioka

Corey Pierno

Joey Nova

Sebastian Ferrante

Matt Gray

It aired on The Escapist Magazine's website.

Stage Combat

This is such a long time coming. A few years ago I had the pleasure (?) of working at the NY Renn Faire. I know I know. I only did it for a year then flew the coop. I was hired as a fighter. Thankfully there is some video that survives of those fights. They're not the best choreographed, but when you're playing in the round it's really difficult to make a fight look THAT good to everyone. Some one is going to see a feint, or a knap, or notice that your blade goes nowhere near your opponant. But it's still good fun.

I started trying to compile all the video I have of me in order to piece together a reel. This will not make the cut...see what I did there with the sword fighting pun? But I stumbled on it. It simultaneously made me cringe from memories of bad pay, over acting, and mead; as well as smile because of a very small group of friends I did make while I was there. You five know who I'm talking about. So without further ado.....

Fight Fight Action World Go!

** Updated and made the video NOT private. I'm smart I am. Thanks for pointing this out Mr. Schwabe

Samantha Mason in Backstage

So my dear dear friends ha, Samantha Mason, has been featured in an article on Backstage. Yes, you read that right, FEATURED! A general congrats is in oder, I think. We can all use press and exposure and I'm just insanely proud of all the work she has done. Not to mention that one of the main points of her piece is the webseries that I was fortunate to be a part of.

So here is Sam's part of the article:

Game On!

Samantha Mason turned to the Internet for her five-episode series, "A World of Her Pwn," which premiered on the gaming site The Escapist (www.escapistmagazine.com) last November. ("Pwn" is gamespeak for a humiliating defeat.) Mason played the semiautobiographical role of a game-site transcriber who is drawn into the worlds of various games.

The Escapist had sponsored a contest seeking original content, so Mason and director Douglas MacKrell conceived the idea and storyboarded the pilot one day in a New York diner. Their idea won, and the show soon went into production.

The site paid for the series on a per-episode basis, which was unnerving for Mason, who put her career as a classical actor largely on the back burner to work on the show. The production values fluctuated from episode to episode, Mason says, depending on "how my bank account was looking that month and how much time we had."

Each episode was supposed to be five- to eight-minutes long, though at times Mason and MacKrell went as long as 10. "Advertisers on the site don't want series to be too long," Mason says, "because they think people will turn it off and won't see their ads come on afterwards."

Whether the series will continue beyond the first five episodes is unsettled. But Mason has been approached to create a new series for another company. "It's really opened a new realm that I hadn't experimented in a lot before," she says.

Simultaneously wearing actor and producer hats proved challenging. Though she knew the scripts intimately, having participated in the development process, she would sometimes turn up at shoots realizing she hadn't fully memorized her lines.

Filming in New York certainly provided an embarrassment of talent and other riches. For one episode, Mason posted a call for background performers on "Ghostbusters" fan sites, seeking aficionados who owned their own costumes. Nine people showed up. In full regalia. "I thought, 'Only in New York City could you put out such a specific call and get such an overwhelming response,' " she says. "I had to turn people down—I had too many Ghostbusters!"

Many of the city's best filmmaking resources, it turns out, come without gigantic dollar signs attached. Perhaps the discouraged Woody Allen could learn something from New York's shoestring auteurs.

Read the entire article here