Acting Political

Well, now it's pretty much certain - I didn' t book the Orbitz spot, either as "Masters Degree Guy" or "Tour Member".

Bummer. I could have used the infusion of cash.

But life goes on.

Speaking of "cash"....with $94.93 worth of ad clicks (As of moments ago), I'm a heartbeat away from a "Tales Of A Character Man" milestone - my first check (If/when you hit $100 in a given month, Google sends you a check early the following month).

This isn't just a "milestone" in terms of getting money, though that is nice - Other than acting, this is the first time I've actually tried to make money doing something I enjoy.

So thank you all for your support - and your clicks - and I hope you'll keep the love coming in the future.

By the way, I've had some people contact me with particular questions/concerns about the ads.

Unfortunately, my answer to any and all ad-related questions at this point is "I don't know". I actually can't click on the ads myself, lest I get kicked out of the Google AdSense program, so I haven't seen where the links link to, or anything like that; I'm basically just putting my faith in the fact that Google is a reputable concern, and wouldn't damage their own reputation, and ability to make money down the road, by taking ads from fly-by-night concerns.

All I really know is that when you come here and click on an ad, Google puts a couple pennies in my account. And that makes me happy.

But one way or the other, I will educate myself a little better on the AdSense program, so if you have questions/concerns, I can actually answer them (I think there's a program I can download to check if the links are working properly, so I may do that, just so I can click through ads, and see where I'm asking you to go).

And speaking of "educating myself", I finished Born Standing Up yesterday (It's a very quick read), and the next book up is The Eight Characters Of Comedy, a book on sitcom acting and writing by Scott Sedita.

I bought the book months ago at Samuel French, but have never gotten around to reading it (I don't know - Maybe I was waiting for sit-coms to make a comeback).

(After Tuesday's less-than-stellar commercial callback, maybe I need to dig out my books on commercial acting! But anyway...)

I looked at my SAG ballot earlier today, leaning towards the "Membership First" candidates, but not being very happy about it, when it occurred to me to just split my vote - amongst "Membership First", "Unite for Strength", and "Independent" candidates.

I'm not completely comfortable with "Membership First" - the faction running things right now - because I don't think they've handled the current AMPTP negotiations very well, and I think it was a mistake to wage a public campaign against AFTRA's deal with the AMPTP (It just wasn't very good p.r.).

But on the other hand, I think they're closest to where I'm at on the issues (The main "issue", for me, being residuals).

"Unite for Strength"'s main thing is a SAG/AFTRA merger, which they say will never happen under "Membership First" leadership.

And on the surface of things, a SAG/AFTRA merger couldn't make more sense - when actors are going up against the producers, who represent giant multinational corporations that have all the money and power in the world, they need to be united.

You'd think.

But AFTRA, far as I can see, has a history of concessions and appeasement of their corporate overlords, undercutting SAG with pretty much every contract they bargain. And how does SAG, in good faith, merge with that? What's the point of being "united", if the new union's "philosophy" will mean bending over and taking whatever unfair terms the producers offer?

The people who are now "Unite For Strength" have also tried, in the past, to push through a motion for "qualified voting", which basically means you have to work X amount of time, or on X number of jobs, under a specific contract - the commercials contract, for example - in order to vote on it.

I don't agree with that at all. The way I see it, if I'm in the union, and I'm paying dues, I get a vote. And just because I haven't worked in some aspect of the business yet , or I didn't in the past year, or whatever, that doesn't mean I won't in the future.

My main worry with "Unite for Strength" is that it's basically the party of the acting elite who don't need the union anyway (The performer's unions establish basic contracts, but if you're a big name, like Tom Hanks, say, you negotiate your own contract terms), so they'd be content to say yes to anything the producers offer, knowing it doesn't effect them anyway, just so they can keep working and getting their giant paydays.

(Hmmmm...I seem to have a stronger feeling about the "Unite for Strength" people than I realized...)

Crap - Maybe I'll just vote "Independent".