If you live in L.A., you've been a victim of it. Laws should be scribed by men and women of vast intelligence to help curb the insufferable brutality of such an inhospitable end-product. The polar opposites of coddling and enabling must be employed whenever possible to fend off the notion that such an act is not only acceptable, but encouraged. Dogs and cats should join forces -- like the Afghans did against the Russians, or Canada Proper has done against Quebec -- to assist in the policing and ultimate prosecution of such offenders. If you're an Angelino, the regulations will have arrived at too late a time. You may be already actively seeking some form of mental counsel to help with the pain brought forth by the encounter... and encounter you might not soon forget, though you desperately desire to.
It's not a crime, per se. But, in a sense, it very well should be.
It's the "B List A Hole", and he or she is coming to a cafe table, bus bench, or park path near you.
It's not lost on me that, in this day of age, if a struggling actor lands a small role on a sitcom, television drama, or indie flick, he or she has every right to be elated. With the economy the way it is, every dollar counts, and every role -- no matter how infinitesimal -- may ultimately spawn a major career. They've reached a milestone, and sharing their prideful happiness with the rest of us is fine.
Just don't pretend you're anything more than what you are.
A role is a role, as a graphics or illustration job is just that... a job! If I'm particularly proud of my work, I'll share some non-sensitive aspects of it with my friends. But, I've NEVER cackled like a rooster at sunrise about how I'm the second-coming of Bill Watterson or David Carson or Ken Sugimori. I've never donned a black mock turtleneck and mock window-shopped for a BMW M3. I've got great months, good months, bad months, and shit months. I'm as humble as possible, for I know this is true -- there are going to be times when things aren't so hot, and somebody is going to waddle up next to me and spit out that timeless classic "So.... are you working hard or hardly working?". They find it humorous, and it was -- in 1972! Either be humble about your success, or risk shoving a dump truck full of humble pie down your gullet 6 months from then when life has taken a 180.
But Mr. and Ms. B List A Hole don't care. The switch to their spotlight is in the "on" position, burning a 10 million candlepower blast of blinding heat right in our face. Where jeans and a tee were once acceptable, now they must dress for success, as well as the inevitable papparazzi. The local coffee dive is now simple an "office". Their Honda Civic has been upgraded to an Acura, which is just another way of saying they bought a Honda with leather and a Star Trek badge. You cannot hold a conversation with them for more than a minute without them hard-selling their amazing ride aboard the Tinseltown Express, and holding the story and subsequent derivatives of it long after the interest had passed.
You want to be happy for them -- you vividly remember their struggles -- but at the same instant you can't help but wonder exactly how much money they're making, and how much success they're achieving, playing a secondary character in a third-rate sitcom on a fourth-rate cable channel that only masochists dare watch. Yet, 849 other actors DID cattle-call this role, and departed with their proverbial tail between their legs. I suppose the old saying "flaunt it while you got it" applies.
After all, who knows how much longer the Time Warner Cable 101 Leased Access channel will survive.
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