In The Trenches—The Founder’s Daily Report: Day 282: Preparing for a Dream!

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In The Trenches—The Founder’s Daily Report:  Day 282:  Preparing for a Dream!

Day 282:  Whew!  What an experience that was!  Pulling off the audition tape for the Tyler Perry audition took us all day yesterday.  All day.  I will never again take for granted what casting directors do!

I began by working via Face Time with my ridiculously generous, amazingly talented and very successful actress friend in NYC.  Oh my gosh.  She was a lifesaver!  What a pro!  She went through each scene with me.  She helped me plan out lines of sight with the scenes with multiple characters in them—where to look, what looked good, etc.  She advised me on how to work with the camera and helped me with my performance.  She gave me tips on how to prep the material and sent supportive texts throughout the day to see how it went.  Do I have the best friends or what?  THANK YOU, Ridiculously Generous, Amazingly Talented and Very Successful Actress Friend!  I love you!

I had a blast figuring out what this character would wear.  I had found an outfit that was perfect but then it didn’t work on camera because it blended too far in with the color of the background.  In the end, I went with a simple black top and pearls.  It looked the best on camera and it felt right.

In character in a frame from the Avid.

Uh-mazing Romantic Partner was also a pro!  He was not only camera operator but he was also my reader!  He is usually pretty goofy when he reads audition sides with me or runs lines with me for roles.  But this time, he didn’t clown around.  He was really good!  I think he might have a future as an actor.  Insert smiley face here.

The best part of it was we did it as many times as either of us wanted to get each scene really strong—or at least, we felt it was strong.  Uh-mazing Partner transferred the footage from our camera’s P2 card to the Avid system.  We watched down all of the options, made our choices, he cut them together, added black and title cards in between and then made a Quick Time file.  We sent off the file to my manager at 10:30pm last night.

I’ll say it again, all day this took us.  What a reminder of how much work actors put in just to be considered for a job!  I don’t know how Ridiculously Generous, Amazingly Talented and Very Successful Actress Friend does it!  Well, that’s not true.  I know how she does it.  She believes in her dream!  If I think about what she goes through, all of her intense and hard work for seemingly no guarantee of a return, I realize she is constantly preparing for her dream.  Her dream is to be a working actress and her audition process, although grueling, is what gets her to her own personal dreamland.  Tomorrow, she’s got a table read for a Vince Vaughn film she is cast in.  How fun is that?!?  She is always preparing for and working for and creating her dream and that is exactly why she’s living her dream.  So inspiring.

Deep breath.

And speaking of dreams…I’m on to the Declare Your Dream Experimental Motivation Project Discussion and Workshop!  I have exactly 36 hours to get everything ready.  I can do this!  We have a nice guest list of lovely folks coming and I can’t wait to share an evening of dreaming with each of them.  If you are in Los Angeles tomorrow at 7pm, please join us for an evening of dreams, dreaming and dream declaring to foster motivation.  In the meantime, keep constantly preparing for your dreams so you can constantly be living them.

Until tomorrow, create from what you have…preparation for living your dream.

Kelli Joan Bennett is a filmmaker, actress, writer, entrepreneur, advocate for creative thinking and Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Think Outside The Box Inside The Box Media.

4 Comments

  1. Love it, Kelli! You look gorgeous and grounded and I’m sure the audition submission rocked! I see it for you. Your dream is manifesting right before all of our eyes…

  2. I second that you look breathtaking! Good luck!

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