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MIKE RANDLEMAN, PERFORMER

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The REAL Actor's Life

When I graduated from ole Rector High School in 1980, my drama mentor, Ms. Gail Burns, gave me a copy of Charlton Heston's autobiography The Actor's Life. I loved that book and still have it on my shelf, even though it is a paperback, and I hate the smell of old paperbacks. The book contains excerpts of Mr. Heston's journals from 1956-1976, when he was remembered more for parting the Red Sea than a bad toupee-wearing NRA spokesman. However, a better title for the book would have been the The WORKING Actor's Life. The real actor's world is a mac & cheese-eating, agent-hunting, workshop-taking, picture-buying, 90% unemployment-fest of ups-and-downs unrivaled by Wall Street or Disneyland. Grab a cold one and enjoy my journal This Actor's Life, aka Slights Real and Imagined.


SATURDAY, AUGUST 25, 2000

STRIKES, STRIKES AND MORE STRIKES!
This is beginning to upset me...



Can you spot Actorman's ample backside?


The smell of desperation is the world's worst cologne. My shipment just arrived from Avon.

The whole town seems to be awash in this scent and it is growing stronger every day. We are now in the fourth month of the commercial strike AND this was suppose to be the easy one. The Writers Guild goes out in May and then the actors again and maybe the directors after that. The overworked rumor mill has the unrest lasting until early 2002. Plenty of time for folks to lose that house, miss that car payment or, as in the case of one portly Falstaff, blow his nest egg.

The unions have sent out directives to their members to prepare for the long siege. Don't make any major purchases or incur unnecessary expense. Go to the library instead of buying books (always good advice). I refuse, however, to use the 2-ply toilet paper.

So how am I approaching this doom-and-gloom scenario? Quite honestly, by sleeping 12 hours a day. I appear to be one of those folks that can't function in an unstructured environment. I worked for 10 years at a sports publication to get to the point where I could pursue my dreams full-time and I spend my days sleeping and reading. Noble pursuits true, but not ones that pay well. I am reminded of the last time I didn't have a day job in the early '90s. Instead of writing the great American screenplay (an oxymoron, I know), I would sleep for hours, only waking to watch Bonanza and to call the bookie for the evening sports lines. There was a reason that I did little acting my first few years here. And slowly, I feel myself sloughing toward Virginia City again. How many times can you watch Hoss and the Leprechauns?

Slowly, I am trying to shake this Ponderosaian funk. Taking classes, working on my mail order bride screenplay and auditioning for summer stock theatre. I never did any summer stock when I was in college and I have always felt I missed out on an important actor's rite of passage. I had my first Equity cattle call last week for some theatres back east and the dude never looked up once. That kind of took a lot of the romance out of the whole idea. But, I am determined to plod ahead and somewhere next summer I will be trodding the boards.

Of course, not all is doom and gloom. The shot on the Val Kilmer movie, "The Salton Sea" went A-OK. And, though I think my lines will be lost to a voice over by Mr. Kilmer, I looked damn good as a 60's truck driver on speed. Kind of Cousin Krispy from Southern Culture on the Skids thing going on. People keep asking me if I was allowed to look Val Kilmer in the eyes. I guess the word is that he is difficult on the set and you have to avoid making direct eye contact. Well, I had no such problem. Mainly, because he was not there that day. The film has good bloodlines and some big names behind it. Though I predict it will be a hard film to market because it is not easy to pigeonhole.

And, like old man river, "The Tonight Show" keeps rolling along and, occasionally, I hop on for a quick ride. Last night I was a naked Survivor groupie. Big guy naked=big yucks. That goes back to the Greeks. Or, at least the Romans.

Well, the picket line beckons. "No Scab Mommies! No Scab Mommies!"

Till next time, Batter Up!

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