13259: The Weird Twists That Landed Me HEROES

Raw transcript:

It’s very weird how our business works.
Whatever performance business you’re in,
acting, voice over, writing, the things
that happen and are dependent upon other
things that happen.
Man, let me let me share one with you in
this episode of the VO Heroes podcast.
So, I’m just going to uh try and
summarize this really quickly. When I
first got to Los Angeles in 2003,
uh I, as I’ve said in other episodes, I
took the Abraham Lincoln approach. I
wanted to learn everything I possibly
could about the business. before I
started going out for auditions, um, I
was taking classes, I was doing
workshops,
uh, meeting with casting directors way
before I thought I was ready,
still taking, uh, acting classes at
Howard Fine. Uh, somebody recommended me
and I got called in for, uh, a show on
Showtime called Sleeper Cell.
And by by the way, bear with me and see
if you can follow this. This is kind of
weird. Um, so I go in for Sleeper Cell.
It was like on a Thursday and I I
absolutely did not think anything about
it. I thought, “Oh, well, this will be
an interesting experience. I’ve never
actually been in a big-time casting
director’s office.” And I went in and
she was really nice and and you know,
and said, “Great. I appreciate you
coming in.” And that was it. And I left.
Later that afternoon, I got a call from
her. Uh she said uh I don’t see any you
know um uh information for you. I I
don’t know uh what your availability is
and uh I want to book you on this. You
need to be on set tomorrow morning at
7:30.
And there were like so many things in
that and I’m like wait what? But I
can’t. She said why? Well, I’m I’m
already booked on a student film
tomorrow morning at 7:30 on a Friday
morning. And she said, “Well, you’ll
cancel the student film and you’ll go
work on set for this huge show for
Showtime.” And I’m like, “But I’ve
already committed.”
And she said, “If you don’t take this,
I’m I don’t understand you. I’m going to
be very uh likely not to call you in.
This is like, you know, okay. All
right.” So, uh, I I said, “Let me call
the student director
that I had, uh, for this and and see if
he can reschedule.” Here’s the thing.
This student film, I was playing a ring
master of a a traveling carnival and,
you know, the whole Jim Broadbent
um um, you know, uh, Mulan Rouge thing
with, you know, Manscara and and, uh,
you know, guideliner and lipstick and
all that stuff. And uh the student said,
“Well, we got this time slot before this
carnival that is actually coming to Los
Angeles is going to open at noon, and
I’ve only got that space, and if you
bail on me, I’m I’m going to be stuck.”
So, I had to call this casting director
back and say, “I really have to honor
this commitment that I had.” She was so
livid, so mad, um as I recall. Uh so
anyway, I went and I did the the shoot
the next morning. And the whole time I’m
thinking to myself, did I make the right
decision here? Okay, so many of you know
I I cast I got cast as the creepy evil
puppet master later, a few years later.
Um, and uh,
uh, I didn’t know why they even called
me in. I wasn’t worried about why they
called me in at the time. I was then
repped and I went in and somehow it
worked out and you know something
strange happened and I got the part. Uh
it wasn’t until after the uh the first
season I was in Heroes ended and there
was a cast party, a rap party that the
casting directors uh Jason and Natalie
took me aside. We were talking and you
know I just I said I I just am so
grateful for this. I have no idea why
you guys even, you know, looked at me.
And uh Jason said, “Oh, I’ll tell you
why. There was this clip on your reel
from some student film where you were
some, you know, circus ring master and
you were so creepy. We thought, well,
let’s bring him in.” Everybody in that
audition for that part for Heroes,
everybody in that room that day, very
recognizable. People had scared me on
television and films for years, you
know, just 20 or so guys who I could see
and in that part and who knows, but that
one clip from the student film,
which wouldn’t have been on my reel if I
had cancelled on that student and taken
the the first job I would have had and
not known Jack about doing the work cuz
it was three years earlier in in my
training.
You know, isn’t that a weird pachinko
machine kind of thing? Uh, you know,
they said, “Hey, we saw that clip and we
thought we’d bring you in.”
I can’t say that they were happy. I
can’t say that.
Have you talked to Kitty yet?
Friend of Joyce.
Kitty will talk to you. She loves cops.
That was it. That was the entire
capriccious nature of that weird uh sort
of trans transgression
uh of of of of doing something that I
had committed to. Um and who knows if it
had gone the other way. I might have
even been brought in for that if I
hadn’t done the student film, but I did.
And you can the the the lesson here is
there are so many odd unique
unpredictable things about what you have
chosen to do as a career.
Any of the people that I serve, actors,
voice talent, writers,
you can never predict how things are
going to turn out. You can never predict
the dependencies of one event over
another in your career. And I this is
one of those messages of please be at
peace with that because yes, it could be
very disappointing that you didn’t get a
part or you didn’t get brought in for
something or or but it can also be
extraordinarily
awesome when things just kind of fall
into place.
And I’m wondering if you’ve experienced
something like this where something that
you didn’t think was going to happen
happened or you thought was going to
happen didn’t happen
or you chose to do one thing over
another. I if you if anything like this
is resonating with you, let me know in
the comments below cuz I’d love to hear
these stories, these war stories of
things. Well, I didn’t know that was
going to happen. I didn’t I don’t know
that on my bingo card, you know. Uh let
me know in the comments below and do so
on vioheres.com. That’s where this uh
you know lives and that’s where all the
the conversation is polite and you know
we we respect each other there. Hit the
like button if you like what you’re
hearing. Uh subscribe to the channel.
Hit the notification bell if you want to
be notified when the next uh episode
comes out. You can also forward this to
another actor or voice talent who might
be a little, you know, frustrated with
how unpredictable our business is is and
and how this might be a an upside to
that. I don’t know. I’d love if you’d do
that. I’m David H. Lawrence the 17th. I
thank you so much for watching and for
listening and I will see you in the next
episode of the VO Heroes podcast.

(from YouTube)