Hello Fellow Fastlaners!
I don't believe I ever formally introduced myself.
I found out about TFF through forum member J. Scott' real estate blog while stumbling around his site. Man, am I glad I did that! This place was eye opening. It was the first time I'd associated with people who thought the way I did. With no apologies. I also realized something else...
I knew jack shit about business! Nothing. Zilch. Nada.
Oh I could quote stock prices, tell you who ran what corporation and which company was founded when but that stuff is trivial poppycock! Random data masquerading as knowledge. Or so I thought. Get the F*ck outta here! I didn't know shit!
Knowing what I know now, I would have handled my financial affairs with more intelligence when I was making a boatload of money back in the early 90's.
I was an actor. A working actor. Not famous, obviously, but recognizable to a certain extent. Here is my IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0751470/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1
I was 15 years old in 1986 when I started doing professional theatre around my hometown of Chicago. I worked steadily earning money doing industrial films, commercials and the aforementioned theatre gigs. Made some damn good money, too. $5,000 for two 12 hour days on an industrial film was not unheard of. I took most of the cash and paid my way at a private performing arts high school I attended, where the tuition was $8,000/year. I was hustling my a$$ off!
Upon graduation, I shot a NBC television film on which I earned my Screen Actors Guild card - S.A.G card - which marks you as a professional actor here in the States. The day after I finished that flick, I caught a plane to Los Angeles, checked in with my new agent and hit the pavement looking for work. I had $400 in my pocket.
I crashed on the floor of an apartment that was shared by three other guys, one of whom was a fellow actor I knew from Chicago. I would read the L.A. Times classified ads - remember those? - everyday looking for places at which to apply for a job to no avail. I couldn't get hired anywhere! And my little cash stash was dwindling. Quickly!
So imagine my surprise when I was informed by my actor friend that we had a week to vacate the premises. Turns out the two guys on the lease hadn't paid rent in months and the day of reckoning had arrived. WTF? I had no place to go and knew only one other person in town but she was staying with a childhood friend over the hill in the Valley.
I remembered a Help Wanted ad for a busboy position at a hotel - The Kipling Apartments they're called now. It was the the Kipling Hotel, then - near Downtown L.A. I spent the last of my cash on bus fare getting to that interview. The job compensation was room and board, plus free meals.
If you missed a meal shift, you were assed out. I'll never forget the condescension dripping from the manager's tongue when I told her about my acting ambitions after she asked why I was in L.A.
Lo and behold, I would find out what I was made of within two days of being hired...
Popular FOX Network television show, 21 Jump Street, sired a spinoff called Booker starring Richard Grieco. It was filmed in Vancouver. Pay was about $7,000 for the episode as a guest star. First class airline ticket and hotel room. But first, one had to get the gig. I requested time off from the new job, found someone to cover my shift and walked the 9 miles, round trip, to and from the audition.
I got a callback but there was one problem - I could only get someone to cover my hotel shift once a month! You've got to be F*cking kidding me! Once a month? I went upstairs to my roach-infested shared bedroom and sat on my bed, thinking. I could be a busboy in Chicago. I came to L.A. to act and, dammit, that's what I'm going to do!
I went back downstairs, found the pay phone - nostalgia - and called my friend, La Verne, who stayed in the Valley. She was not happy, having not heard hide nor hair from me in over a month. She promptly informed me that I could crash on her and her friend's couch but that she would also beat the black off me when I arrived because I hadn't stayed in touch.
F*ck it! She had a right to be mad - we were very good friends - and I would have to take that a$$ whippin'.
I went upstairs, shook out all my clothes to get rid of any roaches and packed my bag. I borrowed a couple of bucks from the front desk clerk and caught the bus to North Hollywood. When I arrived La Verne called me everything but a child of GOD, fed me a hot meal and showed me the bathroom. I took a hot shower and laid down on the living room couch and fell asleep.
I got up the next day and had a great breakfast. I didn't know what I was going to do if I didn't get that job but I would cross that bridge when I got to it. I went to the audition, went back to La Verne's place and sat on the couch/bed to watch a little television to calm my nerves.
At the time Richard Grieco had a Sprite commercial running and it came on. "I'm going to get the job!" I said to myself. Two hours later, my agent called me with the good news and two days afterwards I was on a plane to Vancouver, sitting in first class getting lit on bottomless Mimosas!
That was my first acting gig in L.A.
I had taken a calculated risk and it payed off. I was nervous as hell but I would have hated myself for not attempting to get to that callback audition. If all else had failed at least I took my shot! I've made a boatload of mistakes since that first gig in 1989 but a fate worse than death to me is "woulda, shoulda, coulda".
Thanks, @MJ DeMarco, and all the rest of you mods and regular contributors to this forum - you know who you are - who make this place such an inviting environment in which to share and learn. I'm not where I want to be yet, businesswise, but I'm getting there thanks to The Fastlane Forum.
Happy Holidays and Happy New Year! See you folks in Scottsdale.
Anthony aka Chitown
I don't believe I ever formally introduced myself.
I found out about TFF through forum member J. Scott' real estate blog while stumbling around his site. Man, am I glad I did that! This place was eye opening. It was the first time I'd associated with people who thought the way I did. With no apologies. I also realized something else...
I knew jack shit about business! Nothing. Zilch. Nada.
Oh I could quote stock prices, tell you who ran what corporation and which company was founded when but that stuff is trivial poppycock! Random data masquerading as knowledge. Or so I thought. Get the F*ck outta here! I didn't know shit!
Knowing what I know now, I would have handled my financial affairs with more intelligence when I was making a boatload of money back in the early 90's.
I was an actor. A working actor. Not famous, obviously, but recognizable to a certain extent. Here is my IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0751470/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1
I was 15 years old in 1986 when I started doing professional theatre around my hometown of Chicago. I worked steadily earning money doing industrial films, commercials and the aforementioned theatre gigs. Made some damn good money, too. $5,000 for two 12 hour days on an industrial film was not unheard of. I took most of the cash and paid my way at a private performing arts high school I attended, where the tuition was $8,000/year. I was hustling my a$$ off!
Upon graduation, I shot a NBC television film on which I earned my Screen Actors Guild card - S.A.G card - which marks you as a professional actor here in the States. The day after I finished that flick, I caught a plane to Los Angeles, checked in with my new agent and hit the pavement looking for work. I had $400 in my pocket.
I crashed on the floor of an apartment that was shared by three other guys, one of whom was a fellow actor I knew from Chicago. I would read the L.A. Times classified ads - remember those? - everyday looking for places at which to apply for a job to no avail. I couldn't get hired anywhere! And my little cash stash was dwindling. Quickly!
So imagine my surprise when I was informed by my actor friend that we had a week to vacate the premises. Turns out the two guys on the lease hadn't paid rent in months and the day of reckoning had arrived. WTF? I had no place to go and knew only one other person in town but she was staying with a childhood friend over the hill in the Valley.
I remembered a Help Wanted ad for a busboy position at a hotel - The Kipling Apartments they're called now. It was the the Kipling Hotel, then - near Downtown L.A. I spent the last of my cash on bus fare getting to that interview. The job compensation was room and board, plus free meals.
If you missed a meal shift, you were assed out. I'll never forget the condescension dripping from the manager's tongue when I told her about my acting ambitions after she asked why I was in L.A.
Lo and behold, I would find out what I was made of within two days of being hired...
Popular FOX Network television show, 21 Jump Street, sired a spinoff called Booker starring Richard Grieco. It was filmed in Vancouver. Pay was about $7,000 for the episode as a guest star. First class airline ticket and hotel room. But first, one had to get the gig. I requested time off from the new job, found someone to cover my shift and walked the 9 miles, round trip, to and from the audition.
I got a callback but there was one problem - I could only get someone to cover my hotel shift once a month! You've got to be F*cking kidding me! Once a month? I went upstairs to my roach-infested shared bedroom and sat on my bed, thinking. I could be a busboy in Chicago. I came to L.A. to act and, dammit, that's what I'm going to do!
I went back downstairs, found the pay phone - nostalgia - and called my friend, La Verne, who stayed in the Valley. She was not happy, having not heard hide nor hair from me in over a month. She promptly informed me that I could crash on her and her friend's couch but that she would also beat the black off me when I arrived because I hadn't stayed in touch.
F*ck it! She had a right to be mad - we were very good friends - and I would have to take that a$$ whippin'.
I went upstairs, shook out all my clothes to get rid of any roaches and packed my bag. I borrowed a couple of bucks from the front desk clerk and caught the bus to North Hollywood. When I arrived La Verne called me everything but a child of GOD, fed me a hot meal and showed me the bathroom. I took a hot shower and laid down on the living room couch and fell asleep.
I got up the next day and had a great breakfast. I didn't know what I was going to do if I didn't get that job but I would cross that bridge when I got to it. I went to the audition, went back to La Verne's place and sat on the couch/bed to watch a little television to calm my nerves.
At the time Richard Grieco had a Sprite commercial running and it came on. "I'm going to get the job!" I said to myself. Two hours later, my agent called me with the good news and two days afterwards I was on a plane to Vancouver, sitting in first class getting lit on bottomless Mimosas!
That was my first acting gig in L.A.
I had taken a calculated risk and it payed off. I was nervous as hell but I would have hated myself for not attempting to get to that callback audition. If all else had failed at least I took my shot! I've made a boatload of mistakes since that first gig in 1989 but a fate worse than death to me is "woulda, shoulda, coulda".
Thanks, @MJ DeMarco, and all the rest of you mods and regular contributors to this forum - you know who you are - who make this place such an inviting environment in which to share and learn. I'm not where I want to be yet, businesswise, but I'm getting there thanks to The Fastlane Forum.
Happy Holidays and Happy New Year! See you folks in Scottsdale.
Anthony aka Chitown
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