Every website admin, whether he/she knows it or not, has the ability to track how people are getting to their site. Since I’m not really trying to attract new users so much as write a commentary for people who may already know me, I rarely check those stats. But after trying to figure out why I got an email about my excessive bandwidth usage, I decided to try it out. During June of last year (before I started blogging) my site had 2 hits. That means two people visited my site during all of June of last year. Whee! June of this year, I had over 4,000 hits. Since March, when I started actively pursuing acting again, my site has gone up an average of 1,500 hits per month. This is a direct result of blogging. Google, and other search engines, take note of every word you type#–after a complex algorythm determines who ranks highest, when you search for any word on my site, I should pop up somewhere. SO… if I type turtlepoop into my blog, eventually I will show up in a Google search for "turtlepoop". No kidding. Give them about eight days to go through my site again, then search Google for "turtlepoop". I’ll bet you I show up! Since there are only 13 sites currently returned for "turtlepoop", I’ll bet mine shows up near the top of the list.

I helped throw a party for my girlfriend this weekend, and it was a smashing success! Cessy, her roommate, suggested we make tacos and let everyone dig in on their own. I cooked and seasoned about six pounds of ground turkey, made some killer guacamole, and Cess and Holland dished up some of their signature from-scratch salsa and a homemade cake with homemade icing. The food was gooooooood! But it also meant I was very, very busy all day Sunday. And since yesterday was Holland’s birthday, I spent all day with her. We went to see The 40 Year Old Virgin last night and I have to say that I have not laughed that hard in a very, very long time. It was one of the most laugh-out-loud funny movies I have ever seen#–a little blue in parts, but very funny.

I want to point everyone in NY to my friend Holly’s show Place Crazy that will be at the New York Music Theatre Festival this month. She’s excited about it and says it’s going to be great, so here’s hoping! I’m going to see it at some point, though I’m not sure which night.

Today I sent mailings to several commercial agents. After reading for casting directors, and asking a lot of questions, I’ve learned that it really does matter who you employ as your agent. I always assumed that when a role came up (on a TV show or even for a commercial) the casting people sent a breakdown out to every agent in town. As it turns out, that’s not the case. A breakdown only goes out for roles that a CD is having trouble casting. Under normal circumstances, the CD either already has actors in mind to call in for the audition, or they call a few agents they work with a lot and ask for submissions from them. What does this mean for an actor? It means that unless you are with one of the agencies that gets called regularly from CDs, you’re not going to work as much as you could otherwise. And it means that your agent has to work that much harder for you… and you a lot harder for you as well.

Monday night, after a long day at As the World Turns, I met a bunch of friends in Bryant Park to watch Jaws. It was by far the best movie I’ve ever seen there#–the crowd was so into it! At first it was uncomfortable, the crowd being so incredibly large (about 12,500 people), but the sense of community just made the evening perfect. We got there at 5 o’clock and played Phase 10 until we all got hungry and split up to get food. The best parts of the movie were the cheers after "We’re gonna need a bigger boat" and the screams when Jaws finally launched up onto the boat and ate Quinn.

It was the last movie of the summer, and so worth the train ride home (getting stuck in Lexington Ave. station and arriving home about 12:30 AM).

I’ve started carrying around my crappy old digital camera so that I can post more photos. I’m a visual person, so it’s been bothering me that all my posts are so text-based and boring. Click on the image for more photos.

Apparently, the internets thinks I’m more woman than man:

I’m not really quite sure how to take that…

Today I sent out 6 headshots and resumes, with cover letters, to Casting Directors I have yet to audition for. I also sent out postcards to 28 Casting Directors I have either met, been referred to, or have already sent my headshot and resume#–updating them on what I’ve been up to recently (specificially the role I just landed in an indie film shooting in October#–I’ll provide more details as I can).

As I was preparing everything, it occurred to me that most people probably have no idea how much work this actually entails. My dad didn’t until he observed my preparing a submission packet one day. So I thought I would make some scans of the materials I’m sending out today, and share.

Actor Mailings

First of all, I didn’t name this post "Mail Merge" for nothing. There are a lot of Casting Directors out there, and keeping track of all of them can prove to be daunting. Every actor has a different way of doing it, but since I’m a computer guy I use a database. Every time I meet a Casting Director, I create a listing in my database:

Today I sent out a raft of query letters to potential agents. When I say "a raft" I mean only six. I’m of the opinion that you shouldn’t really send your headshot and resume to everyone listed in the phonebook. After all, nothing says "don’t work with me" like a lack of personal reference. I picked the agents I’m mailing to because a casting director recommended the agency specifically.

• Innovative (Huge agency, but deals in young adults)
• Paradigm (Another large agency, deals with people like me)
• TalentWorks (Not as big, but do a lot of TV deals)
• Frontier Booking International (Commercials, a little smaller, known to freelance)
• Abrams (A large agency, with a very active and known younger faces department)
• Gersh (Large agency, same as above)

I had some great meetings with another agency some weeks back, but they have their hands full with a couple of new actors a lot like me in type. That makes it hard for them to focus well. So I’m backtracking and doing another mailing.