Turning 30 actually means you're starting your 31st year...
I turned 30 just shy of a month ago, and while I was sidling up to this particular birthday with palpable dread, it really hasn't been so bad. The idea of my 30s doesn't bother me; it was just 30 itself that was freaking me out. But again, so far, so good. I think back to when I was 20, and how I am now, and how much I've changed in that ten-year span. I'm no battle-scarred veteran of life travails or anything like that, but I feel like I've got it way more together now than I did back then. Seriously, how did I not drown in a bucket of water at 20? I wonder if I'll shake my head in ten years and wonder with a wry smile how I survived 30? I'm all for progress, so I hope so...
The voiceover work, it continues apace. Nothing I can talk about yet, of course. Story of my life, eh? :p
No theater productions in the near future--as of right now, at least. I've been keeping my eyes peeled and watching the audition notices, but everything either doesn't spark my interest, or the geography doesn't work out, or I'm 20 too young to play the character in question.
As mentioned in the sidebar of my main page, my episode of Merv Griffith's Crosswords will be airing for the second time later this month, on Monday, April 28th. It will either be the only episode shown that day, or the first of two, depending on whether the show is scheduled for a half-hour or full hour block in your area. Give it a look if you have the gumption and get a chance. I look goofy as all hell, but my last-minute victory is just as valid as that of some beefcake print-model-type--and it more than makes up for my last-minute defeat on Win Ben Stein's Money back when I was 21. I won a weekend trip to Las Vegas and Cirque de Soleil tickets, a nicer watch than my usual circumstances justify the wearing of, and a little cash (which went straight into my back-taxes), for anybody who wants to cut to the proverbial chase. Not bad for an afternoon's work.
Also, refer to the front page for a picture of my character in Tekken 6>--Bob, one of the fattest hombres to grace a fighting game since the iconic E. Honda of Street Fighter fame. A store in Houston, TX is one of the only locations (or perhaps the only location) in the United States with the console version of this game thus far, and as luck would have it, they were aligned with Anime Matsuri, an anime convention I attended as a guest last month. I got to meet the best Bob player in the nation--and watch as he got schooled in what proved a massive, unexpected upset. It was an honor, nonetheless, and when I got the chance to play against him the next day (with both of us using Bob, natch), he was gracious enough to let me flail about a bit before finishing me off.
If you're into manga and/or implied yuri (and, really, who's not a fan of at least one of the two?), be sure to give Voiceful a look the next time you find yourself in your local uber-bookstore. I took a stab at adapting it, which was tougher than I'd expected given the number of anime scripts I've done, but I think the final product was pretty good. Better, say, than when Shaq took a stab at being an actor/rapper...
And, truly apropos of nothing, here's Free Rice, an online game I stumbled upon that tests one's vocabulary and donates rice to the UN World Food Program for correct answers. No download is required and you can play at your own pace (no timer), so if you're a wordy bastard with a philanthropic streak, get clicking!
So, I got to voice Dracula in Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles for the PSP, which was a real thrill for me as I was a big fan of the original Castlevania back in the day (and would be of the continuing franchise now, I'm sure, if only I hadn't fallen a few titles behind in the playing of them).
I didn't realize it at the time, but the original Symphony of the Night dub has become (in)famous among gamers and internet snarks for its...um...well, here:
Here's the same moment in the revamped (har har) version:
But it would seem that nostalgia trumps all; a lot of folks are chiming in in preference of the old one for its overwrought feel. :p
I had new headshots taken--toss in your two cents' worth!
So...I just had a new batch of headshots taken by my friend Liz, and I'm in the process of picking a dozen or so to have her "sweeten," so to speak. I usually don't like how I photograph, but Liz has put me in an uncommon position of having too many good shots from which to choose.
Hence this bulletin. I'd like to invite you guys to go through the two dozen "finalists" I've posted on my MySpace page and leave whatever comments you may have. You'll notice that many of them are pretty similar, and that the differences are in some cases very minor. Hey, nobody said it would be easy!
Thanks in advance for the feedback--and if any of my fellow Angelenos are in the market for headshots, you can check out more of Liz's work and contact her via the following:
It's much leaner and meaner than the old one, clocking in just shy of 90 seconds where the old demo was over two-and-a-half minutes long, and featuring 14 voices to the old demo's nine.
Give it a listen, if you have the gumption, and let me know what you think!
I recorded a game-show appearance early last week! I don't know if I'm cleared to hawk it by name just yet, and I definitely can't report how I fared on the show, but I'll definitely let folks know the air-date when it comes up. If nothing else, it'll give you guys the all-too-rare opportunity to see me wearing a button-down shirt and a tie. This was my second time on a game show, after an appearance on "Win Ben Stein's Money" back when I was 21. I didn't win, but Ben Stein telling you you're smart certainly has a way of soothing one's second-place scrapes.
WRITING WORK
I've been adapting anime scripts for two shows lately. I'm not cleared to mention either one of them yet (what's new, right?), but they're very distinct from one another and we're only a few episodes away from the proverbial finish line in both cases--at least with regards to the scripts.
VOICEOVER WORK
A lot of the most recent stuff I've done is still shrouded in necessary secrecy (story of my life; see previous parenthetical), but I can finally announce my involvement with a few video games, now that they've hit the shelves:
I took a pre-dawn drive into the sandy hills of Idyllwild last Saturday with six other brave souls for the purpose of shooting a short film! Aside from a small handful of student projects I worked on back during my first stint in L.A. in my early 20s, this was my first time doing anything on-camera--and it was an experience!
The script evolved over time, starting as a ten-page, one-act play I wrote as a lark late one evening, evolving into a short film script, and metamorphisizing further when a former professor of mine said, "Hey, let's shoot this thing!" There were three or four subsequent drafts, each with a markedly different ending. It centers on two would-be bank robbers and how quickly the axiom "honor among thieves" goes out the window when their luck goes south. Suffice it to say that shooting it required prop guns, fake blood, fake smoke, shell casings, a last-minute trip to the massive St. Vincent de Paul thrift warehouse in search of gaudy shirts, and every bit of daylight we could squeeze out of last Saturday.
Working on the film was great fun, but it did give me a new appreciation of how streamlined and straightforward a process my voiceover gigs are. I walk into a climate-/sound-controlled room, the copy's all right there, and we knock out dialogue until we're out of time or we're done. Shooting the film on Saturday, there were so many more variables to keep in mind: Was I holding the gun in my right or left hand in that one scene we shot three hours ago (because we're grabbing that scene on the fly right now from another angle and I need to maintain continuity)? It's too windy up on this rock to use the boom mic. Well, damn...it's too windy up on this rock to use the body-mics, either--so we'll wait until the wind dies down and try knocking out a take before it starts up again. Okay, there's gonna be fake blood all over the place after this shot, so we really have to get it on the first take (although, to be fair, we did squeeze a second take out of that moment, thanks to some creative blocking by the cameraman. Wait...I have to walk and talk at the same time? You're kidding, right? Okay, we got the basic two-shot of that ten-second exchange from here...now we have to get it from over here, over here, up there, down below, and way back there. I'm exaggerating, of course, and our cameraman and sound guys were great so I'm certainly not talking smack, but it was a totally new experience for me--and this was a movie with only two characters! If we'd had three or four...!
And, paramount among the variables and our concerns--the sun. We got to our location at 6:30, started shooting shortly thereafter, and chased the light all day long. We got it all shot in a single day, but just by the skin of our teeth. We did have a chance to reshoot some of the film's final moments at the end of the day, which was something of an unexpected luxury, but we were still standing there watching as places the other actor and I could stand for the last scene melted into the shadows. As someone suggested only partly in jest as we trudged back to the cars at the end of the day, we should scrap the film's intended name in favor of "Daylight's Burning"--our mantra throughout the day.
