Just back from a rehearsal, but for some reason I seemed to be having something of an off night tonight. It just happens sometimes - anyone else reading this who acts will know what I mean - it's not that you can't concentrate, you DO concentrate, it just has no effect! No involvement or engagement with the scenario or the characters, idk why. Maybe cos I'm knackered lol.

Got back late this afternoon from Wales, where I was visiting my family, chiefly my grandma on my dad's side. She lives in a little caravan in my aunt & uncle's garden, the idea being that she still has some degree of independence and so do they, but she turned 90 this spring and she broke her thigh recently so it's been a bit strained up there. She does need to be looked after, to a greater degree than she would like to think, so it's wearing the rest of the family down a bit; still, at least there are a few of them (my dad's 2 sisters and their husbands, and sometimes my cousins who don't live there any more but can be around). Given all that going on it was surprisingly pleasant, though the fact that I didn't do very much is probably connected lol. I was only there for one full day, in which we went out for lunch and then I went to the book club my aunties both attend for dinner, which was surprisingly interesting considering I hadn't read the book!

In other news I got an e-mail today from the research team at the hospital, who used to do regular assessments while I was receiving CBT for my eating disorder. I knew I was going to have an assessment around now because it will have been over a year since I finished the programme, I can't remember when I officially finished because we did quite a bit of hopping around and stopping and starting. I have a funny feeling this is the 2-years-after-end-of-treatment one, but that can't be right because I know I finished officially in 4th Year...anyway, soon I will have to go up to the hospital and be asked loads of awkward questions about my eating and my thinking and all that bollocks, which I'm not looking forward to, but I already know that my answers are going to be drastically different from what they were last time.
And there's something comforting in that.
x

Sometimes I don't know if I'm doing the right thing...

...and this is one of those times.

I've been in contact with this guy who is has written, and will direct and star in, a low-budget film. He advertised for amateur actors/actresses which is why I got in touch. And part of the whole low-budget thing means not doing anything through agencies, which is great in that it gives me a chance without an agent, but it also means we know nothing about each other.

Now, I've known from the start that this film will involve a sex scene, and initially I waved it off because I was really interested in the project and, you know, sometimes as an actor you have to do that and that's the end of it! The problem is, of course, that he wants to know before the auditions what the applicants look like, including what they will look like in that scene. i.e., what you look like naked. And fair enough - he knows what he's looking for and he doesn't want to invite people to audition if they're going to turn up and not look right. That's his prerogative as a director.

BUT. I'm just not entirely comfortable with this. If I had no doubts about the legitimacy of him and this project, I wouldn't be worried - but I do, so I am. It turned out, when I pushed with questions, that when he said there would be a sex scene he meant that we as actors would literally have sex, at which point I was in a way quite relieved because it made the decision easy: I'm not prepared to do that, so I'm not interested. Dilemma about whether or not to send him the photos he's asking for: over. But he ended up backing down, saying it could just be acted, and I could keep my underwear on if I wanted under the sheets, and all you'd see would be side shots, back shots and possibly (=probably) my chest. Now see, that's the kind of nudity that frankly every actor is probably going to encounter at some point anyway, so if that's all there is to it, then maybe I don't mind. He was very keen for me not to drop out, to get me in for an audition anyway, because I've made it clear that love for acting is my only motivator and he likes that. And I'm thinking that maybe I would go for a smaller part instead if I was offered one.

In the end, I sent 2 photos which are in no way 'sexy' (lol), but put it this way, he was wanting to make sure that I don't have some crazy skin disease/am not covered in scars (you have no idea how much I lol'd inside at that), and people see that much of my body every time I go to the beach in a bikini anyway. I did make sure that my head/face was not in them, juuuust in case - I wanted to make sure they were just photos of a body, rather than identifiable photos of me, if they're going anywhere via e-mail.

But the fact remains that his attitude doesn't really make me feel comfortable, and I know literally nothing about him and have no-one's word but his that he is who he says. His e-mail address doesn't even have the company name or his surname in, for fuck's sake, and he doesn't have a website either. He asked for some references for the plays I've been in, and I asked for some from him, which he said he'll provide after the auditions. Hmm. Maybe I'm worrying over nothing, but I can't shake the impressions of "I bet you're loving this, getting all these girls to send you photos of themselves", know what I mean?

Gah. I just don't know if I'm doing the right thing. Because if there's one thing I learnt from Russia, it's to get the hell out the first bad feeling you get. And I do have a bad feeling about this, but I don't know if it's worth persisting a bit further at least to find out more. I just. don't. know.

Madness never seems like madness to the mad

I've just been reading a really fascinating article on schizophrenic hallucinations by Yvonne Nahat. This is not something I have any personal experience with, but her writing is fantastic and it just draws you right in. There was a particular paragraph on madness that I got so excited about I had to tweet immediately! (OK, that doesn't take much. But STILL.) Because I can't say I know about schizophrenia, but I sure know a thing or two about madness, and it is so incredibly difficult to express. I think she hits the nail right on the head:

Would anyone have said to me "Yvonne you are ill you must see a doctor," I would have thought the person talking to me has gone mad and does not realize the magnitude of what is going on here! Madness never seems like madness to the mad. It is an unshakeable reality or a reality that shakes everything, things become rearranged, they reach a new order or constellation. The music from the Hurricane film is on: "Nobody knows what trouble I've seen.......he had to fight developing his natural right....a freedom bigger than life a freedom with many dimensions........I am the inescapable, the unintelligible, the unnegotiable, the unchallenged.....I AM TIME.... I hold no prejudice......you can't conceal me....cover me run from me ......I AM TIME.....many have wasted me but now you're facing me.......I AM TIME .......I can't even explain the pain.....imagine if your life were like a hurricane."

I think that should be put into acting textbooks, for those who've never personally ventured outside sanity trying to understand a character who frequently does. Maybe it's just me who finds that so eloquent, because I already know exactly what she's talking about; maybe somebody to whom that is all new would make no sense of it at all. But reading that felt like sitting down after 3 hours on your feet doing something stressful which you've now finished. Just... Aaaaaaaaaaah. :)

For the full article: http://www.archetypewriting.com/articles/psychology/Hallucinations.htm