Ugh. Monday morning at work... never really a good time to be alive, but today is especially hard. Today I am casting for a photo shoot. I usually love casting, something I get to do fairly often for all of our commercials, photo shoots, etc. I love finding the perfect person, which can be hard, especially condidering we cast non-union and don't pay a lot, so I feel like I'm finding undiscovered talent that will soon know better and be out of our league! Sometimes, however, it really gets to me. Like today. Trying to find the perfect slightly older dentist... like late 40s or 50s, salt and pepper hair, nice smile, trusting face. The problem is that with older people, they usually don't look as good. If they're not union and working all the time, there is usually somthing wrong. Like their teeth are bad, skin bad, or they're just batshit crazy and you can tell. With young Hollywood peeps, I don't feel as bad making them come in, because they're young and dumb and will figure out soon enough whether this acting thing is going to work out or not. But these older people are tough. I just had a guy come in, really talented, wonderful British accent, does a lot of Shakespeare festivals and such... but his smile was just not good. He looked like an uncomfortable chipmunk. And I don't like analyzing how bad he was, and saying thank you to him, knowing that he got his hopes up and came all the way out here and he's really sweet.
Anyway, it can be a tough job. Especially considering I don't know how I'm going to find the guy I need!
I think, also part of my problem is that it's Monday morning. After a lovely weekend of tons of yoga classes and encouragement and joy, it's hard to not be empathetic. I mean, in yoga, everyone goes and their own level and is successful doing as much as they can. Health and success is the goal, and everyone achieves it in their own way just by stepping onto the mat. It is so vastly different from coordinating all these actors to come in, getting their hopes up, dragging them in even if I probably know they're not exactly right, and then breaking them down and finding their bad points. I feel ugly about it.
Ok, gotta go put on a tough face and drop some of this empathy! I do feel that this emotion, which I hold close to me, is a double edged sword. While I love that I can read people and therefore help them in the best scenario, I also get bogged down in my own humanity by always knowing the feelings of others. I talked to my yoga studio instuctor, Denise, about this once. It's not something you can change, so the best you can do is try to keep your own self and your feelings sacred, you can feel what other people are feeling but not have it affect you. I remember feeling it from a very young age. Knowing so well how my sister felt about things and the unfairness of life. Lying in bed at night and listening to the adults talk downstairs and knowing, just from the tone of their voices, how they were feeling.
Ok I've gotta get out of this reverie state and get to work!
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