Spreading Too Thin

Had a same-day commercial audition for Wendy's on Friday in Santa Monica. My agent called at 1:30 for a 4:30 appt. Unfortunately, I had made plans to help a friend at 2 pm, so I ended up squeezing both things in. Got to the audition a half hour late and was running up the block to the casting office when a guy stopped me and said, "Wendy's?" I nodded. He said, "You might as well walk. Everyone has an hour wait." I thanked him and slowly made my way to the office.

Of course, at such auditions with long waits, you end up seeing a few friends and acquaintances there. Asian actors are a pretty tight-knit group, and the degrees of separation are about 1 or 2, meaning you're 1 or 2 introductions away from anyone. I caught up with my friend, Bruce Locke, who is a veteran actor as well as athlete. He's most recognizable from the RoboCop series where he played the Japanese villain. Musashi, I believe, was the character's name.

Speaking of Musashi, I have my samurai class this afternoon. We've been learning a new kata called the earth kata. We're also doing some light choreographing, pairing off in an attack sequence. Our goal is to do this sequence at the speed two samurai warriors would do it.

Regarding the Wendy's audition, we had to appear to be holograms. The idea is that our real selves are at the game while our holograms are filling in for us with the girlfriend at Wendy's. The gist of the spot is that while we may be spreading ourselves too thin, the Frosty at Wendy's remains nice and thick.

Later, my friend Ken is having his 40th birthday at the brand-new Hokusai Restaurant in Beverly Hills. It has sort of a Sushi Roku- or Matsuhisa-inspired interior and the chefs are supposed to be top notch. The Continental, owned by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, used to be there.

Later still, I hope to be stopping by a club to check out a DJ named Matt Darey. But we'll see how that goes. I still have taxes and a proofreading job to finish on Sunday. Don't want to, you know, wear myself out too much.