I Wish My Ferrets Were That Nice To Me

Yet another opportunity to enjoy mockumentary "April," this time through online film festival OneCloudFest.

Pleasant Relief

A recent excavation trip in a friend's family garage uncovered this vintage bottle of "Pleasant Relief," a medicine designed to casually lighten the internal mood with its fictional pinkhood and gracious font. Here's to the manufacturer composing a version for the twenty-first century, in which the malaise brought on by the altered tempo of lifestyle is easily washed away with one spoonful, or perhaps two. I call it "Lovely Reintegration," or "Enough with the Facebook."

Paid Kiss

Earlier this week I worked on location in a Hollywood hot spot. I spent the morning hanging around Eva Longoria's Beso, soaked with beer and liquor from every night it'd seen before, and full of flashy but mop-able surfaces. How else can you explain dark red snakeprint couch cushions, seemingly leather from far away but as safe from stains as a kindergartner's plastic seat? In the light of day the clear vat of vodka and pineapple, the splashes of light fixtures, the dark floors all seemed like a cheap setup for getting laid; more viable as a television set than a real-life activity: and there I was in the middle of it. Proving my point that in order to get me to go to a nightclub, you have to pay me.

Mermaid vs. Dog Voice

Tomorrow I will be in a production office performing all of the female dog voices in "Beverly Hills Chihuahua 3" instead of auditioning to be a mermaid in an advertisement to sell pirate alcohol, because they need a stand-in for the dog voices and I am not a "professional mermaid" (actual quote from casting). Am I am a professional female dog? No, I am not a bitch, but I will stand in for several small furry ones tomorrow. That's just the life of an unprofessional mermaid.

Dirt Girls in a Grout...in Italian

The stateside wait for my Swiffer ad continues, but a friend unearthed this version currently playing in Italy. As my agent pointed out, one commenter wondered "Qual è il senso intrinseco di questo spot??" which translates roughly to wondering what the deeper meaning of it all is. I'm just guessing here, but: how awesome dirt-covered high heels are? How funny it is to personify dirt as a pack of girls-on-the-town? That you should clean stuff with a great product such as this one?

God In Our Own Image

They say man is made in God's image, but the modeling works both ways. Donut shop? Donut God.

Take My Hand, I'm A Stranger in Parad-Ice

Western set, circa the early 1800s, filmed on a ranch in 99 degree weather: I'm garbed in layers of skirts and blouses, saddled with boots, basket, and hat. To my rescue: the set medic. His equipment: a latex glove filled with ice. Take my hand...

For the Foreground

Just think how lovely it will be when I spend more time working as a principal actor than my side hustle in the background. As in this episode of "Friends With Benefits," rather than being an ogling bystander ("Stop laughing at me," Ryan Hansen pleaded with me), I too could be a naked man hailing a taxi.

Happy Anniversary, Los Angeles!

Today marks four years since I moved to Los Angeles. Here's to hoping this year, as my Hollywood life heads towards kindergarten, that I land a glorious alphabet of great roles. (And that nap time ends soon, so I can go run around the yard and play.)

Wheat Do You Want From Me?

Through all portals of the internet, I am being stalked by a Spanish-speaking piece of frosted wheat. He enjoys doing a balancing act with a pencil and furrowing his brows for emphasis. Not merely a static picture, he moves through his frame, enticing me with his breakfast concept...himself. I close the browser and sneak off to have a banana, which has neither face nor foreign tongue, proposition, or circus act.

Fuzzy Face

In case you ever get tired of growing your own, the machine at my laundromat will provide. Note: extreme chin cleft may or may not be included. Fuzzy eyebrows sold separately. Machine wash warm, dry flat.

Found My Wolf

Thanks to this graffiti in Echo Park, I now know where wolves hide. It turns out: under mattresses. Princess and a little more than just a pea.

Chipmunk Watching

Faith in gods or angels leaves us wondering how we can be sure they're watching over us. As for faith in science, where's the face that watches? Faith in the chipmunk lurking in a casting studio window? I trust he will keep an eye on that parking meter for me.

Things I Wear to an Audition Where I Am Supposed To Look Like I’m Lounging At Home That I Would Never Wear Lounging At Home

A push-up bra
Mascara
Hairspray
Sunscreen
Shoes
Clothes

Too Many Marshmallows

My besty recently received the equivalent of an F+ (failed, but with a gold star?) in her graduate art course. The instructor cited that a primary reason was her excessive use of marshmallows in her work. My guess is that he's like a witch that would melt when wet, but only with hot chocolate.

Casting by Keratin

Sometimes it seems so important to have just the right hair for auditions that perhaps one's hair should have its own headshot. Check out the growth from these fine dermal follicles! Peep my keratin bundles! The natural tendency when parsing a photograph, however, is to find a visual entry point: in essence, to find eyes to look into. That is why a gluestick and googlies are a helpful add-on to such an 8x10. Way to stand out in a pack.

Nerd Prank

Boy, I sure showed my coworker when I got out the label maker and attached alternate endings to the word "trans" emblazoned on her backpack! How transgressive of me. Snigger, snigger!

Koan for Businessmen

Don't get so distracted by noticing a gorilla playing basketball that you do not see a gorilla ambling across a canvas-covered chair. Who moved your cheese? How do you artfully go to war? How did that gorilla turn green? Meditate, then consult NASDAQ.

Wooly Pockets

Everywhere I went in San Francisco this weekend, there were plants growing out of wooly pockets. Plants hanging in stores, plants on walls, plants hung in the air. Encased in fall clothes on the summer day, I pondered whether I too was staying sufficiently hydrated, and whether any uprooting to go back to Los Angeles would merely be a matter of undoing a simple grommet from a nail.

No Pink Berry Parking

This parking lot sign, halfway between Trader Joe's and Pinkberry, has a bit of a speech impediment. No Pink. Berry Parking. The color pink not welcome, only berries allowed to park. The color pink cannot park here. If you are the musical artist named Pink, you must go to a different grocery store. If you are a solo berry, you may pull your car into this space. Note that this sign is only over one spot, so all fuschias and large fruit may abandon their vehicles all around. But like a tooth with a smile full of teeth, what could a cherry possibly purchase in a produce section?

Deschanel Doppelganger Moment

Look, it's me and the rest of the cast of my new sitcom on FOX!

Just kidding. I passed on that dress at Anthropologie in favor of something at Kate Spade. But can you really be sure those aren't my jazz hands?

Callback of Snowflakes

When we think of competition, usually it's 94% vs. 95%, close vs. closer, strong vs. stronger. Often we judge by putting two or more highly similar possibilities side by side, to see which choice has the edge. At today's callback, each of the men and each of the women were so distinct that we could have been going in for entirely different parts. Rather than select on a "better than" basis, the director and clients are now able to choose boldly; one pick not superior to another on any superficial standard, but rather on the basis of something more subjective, soulful. The kind of casting from the heart, the kind that counts.

Important Notes For Sunday's Hollywood Networking Event

Congratulations! This card printed on a printer that came free with our office computer was made just for you! We want to maximize use of our color ink cartridge so whenever possible, we used a rainbow color scheme! See this 3/4 inch by 1 inch photo? It was taken at an event we held three years ago and from the backs of people and the slightest indication they are standing near a pool, you can tell it was a success!

We need to know right away if you want to be a star, as demonstrated by your presence at our Hollywood networking event. Important people have already sent in their RSVPs, which is to say that if you do not come you will probably miss the chance of a lifetime to stand with them near a pool and try to become famous. Plus there will be soft drinks!

The dress code is conservative Polynesian attire. No exceptions. It is very important that you mingle luau-style, and climb the ladder/break the glass ceiling/get your big break while looking like you could hula-hoop or play the ukulele. There is no charge to attend, but you are expected to give us all your extra money.

You are cordially invited. To attend! This! Special! Event! Designed exclusively for you. Because we are under the impression that "exclusive" can include everyone on our mailing list, and that you will drop everything to wear an oversized shirt with palm trees on it in order to meet your destiny of getting hit on by an out-of-work producer.

Yes

What if everything you most want is on offer to you...right now?

What if you're the one delaying your own good, by refusing to take the risk to claim what's yours?

What if the fear you feel is only a mirage, and under its ghostly form is the ability to experience total and complete happiness?

(Including some really good juice.)

Venice, Vidi, Vici

In lieu of an Italian vacation, I spent yesterday in Venice. Substitute a forty-five minute drive for an eleven hour flight. Substitute grains of sand on the beach for legions of pigeons. Substitute a parade of teen skateboarders for slick commuters on Vespas. Substitute eating salad with yuzu-carrot-ginger dressing and iced green tea next to a surf shop for pasta marinara and wine at a trattoria in a piazza. Substitute a fantastic friend walking about with me for my true love beside me. Substitute all this with all intention for that, too.

Reasons You Cannot Wear That to Work, As Explained by an Logician

You now have before you the new dress code policy for your workplace. Perhaps management did not fully go over the reasons behind these choices for the staff. I, a highly skilled analyst, will now explain to you why.

* Attire that reveals a midriff. This is clearly because women's belly buttons are where the man sticks his, you know. (Have I ever...? I have spent the last seventeen years at MIT. What do you think?) Not to mention the belly button is where the baby used to be attached to the mother, so it's like being reminded of your pretty coworker hanging out with another woman, when she was young and naked all the time.

* Skirts that are shorter than three inches above the knee when in a standing position. Measurements are taken this way to respect the disabilities of our staff that cannot sit or lie down. Why the knee? It's where the leg stops being the calf, and becomes sexy. Three inches above the knee puts us at approximately seventeen inches away from the belly button.

* Attire that is designated as sleepwear, underwear, or swimwear. This is so that clients and coworkers alike will not get confused, thinking you are about to take a nap, get undressed, or do the breaststroke. In fact, although their perceptual apparatuses may provide them with data points suggesting you are not participating in these activities, you may in fact already be doing these things. Management does not have time to tell you to wake up or stay out of the deep end.

* Attire that has offensive and/or derogatory terminology or graphics. With the use of and/or, you can no longer get away with something offensive but not derogatory, or derogatory but not offensive. For instance, whereas you once could wear a t-shirt worshipping Satan (offensive, but not derogatory, since Satan seems to have an open-door policy), or a t-shirt proclaiming your hatred of marshmallows (derogatory, but not particularly offensive since marshmallows are not actually that delicious), you cannot don slurs to any gender, national, or ethnic group. Note that non-offensive and non-derogatory graphics and terminology are not mentioned, ergo you are free to wear a dress printed with cheerful dancing unicorns playing in vats of butter.

* Heels should be no higher than three and a half inches. This is because anyone who wears four inch heels will be able to reach stuff on the top shelves better. What did we buy a ladder for, then? We spent our hard-earned money on that ladder. Wear flats.

* Any attire that is provocative, inappropriately revealing, or see-through. Look: if you're going to choose an outfit with mysteriously good French seams that allows us to witness your clavicle through a peep-hole in the garment, just go work somewhere else. It is not worth the damage that will be done by our staff falling over in shock at the sight of you, disturbed that underneath those clothes you are naked and over that nakedness are those...those clothes.

Mature Alternatives to Wearing a Self-Esteem T-Shirt

In the spirit of the Roaring 20s, step out in a hat worn at a rakish angle, paired with spats and a shiny cane.

Dress up as God’s creation, which you so ever much are, as demonstrated by wearing lilies of the valley pinned to every surface of your white pantsuit.

Have self-esteem.

Things I Have Imagined About My Friend Tim

That he will, along with our friend Hart, be one of my bridesmaids when I get married. Even if that means he wears his Teddy Ruxpin post-doctoral interviewing outfit.

That he will successfully mount the play he wrote involving a character named Audrey, based on me, based on my love of pink and a certain expletive, and that I will in fact have my Broadway debut as a version of myself, which is to say that casting will not prefer Alison Pill.

That he will 1) Purchase an ostrich egg at Whole Foods for $40; 2) Locate an ostrich; 3) Have the ostrich sit on, and then hatch, the egg; 4) Sew tweed suits for the two ostriches; 5) Dress the ostriches, then himself, and go out on the town as a trio of gentlemen.

Acquire a needlefelt brain.

Half-Birthday

Today is my half-birthday! Although it is very June gloomy outside, that cannot stop me from any of the possible half-birthday celebration techniques available. Keep this list handy for when yours rolls around:

* Purchase a half cake. Make sure it is awkwardly cut straight down the middle, and then insist that the bakery save the other half for when it is your real birthday.

* Take an inventory of the last six months of your life while wearing a tiara and a t-shirt that reads, ever so articulately, "ME."

* Take back the reign of Lewis Carroll's "unbirthday" concept by graffiti-ing ALICE HAD IT ALL WRONG on a wall somewhere. Get caught and resist arrest so you have a charming story about jail to tell on your actual birthday.

Photograph by Leslie Weinberg.

Highly Effective Uses for Today's Lunar Eclipse

Today there is a lunar eclipse along with the full moon in Sagittarius. What does one do with such a momentous event? Here are some productive ways to maximize the astrological current you're swimming in.

* Draw up a garbage bag and fill that Hefty with all the stuff you no longer want. Items could include unkind coworkers, outdated ideas of looking at yourself, and that old bartending kit that made one round of margaritas and then called it a day.

* Enact the cosmological event in order to feel more close to it. Dress up like a half-man, half-horse, and show off your rear until your Golden Retriever walks by. Act pleased when you notice the humans on Earth read the astrology advice columns and stopped doing unproductive things in response.

* Write the moon a heartfelt letter, explaining that you know it's still there.

Small Dog Presented as Large Dog

Mural glorifies, distorts an animal that could fit in a purse. I may have to sew a giant handbag around this Silverlake block just to regain perspective.

It's either that or fly myself out in a helicopter far enough away to rectify scale.

Recycling Bin Treasures: Botox And

At work I found this lavender slip of paper in the recycling bin, in all its reassuring tone of voice. What, I wonder, was the other product? Here are some possibilities:

A) Botox and a mirror with frown lines drawn in. Inject enough Botox until the frown lines disappear from both your face and the drawing of your face on the mirror.

B) Botox and a puppy. If you smile too much at the puppy, you might get your frown lines back. If you inject too much Botox, the puppy might not know you are smiling at him.

C) Botox and a rubber Gertrude Stein mask. Are you more yourself when you wear one or the other?

D) Botox and a syringe of maple syrup, which you can put in your coffee instead of sugar. Since when are they bottling maple syrup in syringes? Is it more helpful when removing the sap from the tree?

E) Botox and a baby bag filled with diapers, pacifiers, rattles, and a blankey. Figure out what to use to retain your youthfulness.

F) Botox and a book. Decide whether you want to think about your face, or think with what's inside your face.

Gas Matters

There is no clearer sign that our current social media platforms have hit rock bottom than that I got a request in the mail to "like" the company that supplies my apartment with gas. While I appreciate Sempra Energy, do I really want to be friends with them on Facebook? Or say that I "like" gas? This is the point in the intervention where all the businesses now crowding what was once a place to connect with your dormmates need to be sat down and ever so gently but firmly have the cursor pad taken away from them.

Equally Valid Optimism Via Fruit

Cherries notwithstanding, life is just a plate of grapeys!

Talk Isn't Cheap

These days, it's common to get away with substituting conversation with texting, which is another way of saying that full language can be swapped out for brief symbols. Why negotiate the complexity of human relationships when you can send a smoke signal instead? Forget spelling, respect, and talking out loud. LOL! LMAO! OMFG! Maybe "I'll talk to you" is the new "I love you." Or maybe instead of roping steer and gunning down the bad guys, alpha males can show their prowess through a face-to-face conversation. "What's on your mind?" the virile will say. "Let's talk about it." Girls and boys, take the dictionary off the shelf and use it.

No Nude Mimes

Imagine that you are a mime. You have just found a casting notice for a role you can do! Alas, if you are female and acting on camera, you must have to take off your underpants. What's this? A part that lets you tell a story without words or sound while keeping your black unitard on? Ladies of the panto, rejoice. This director must truly be a visionary, to imagine you pulling an invisible rope and dressed at exactly the same time.

"April" Abroad

"April", that winsome mockumentary that I am so happy to be a part of, is now showing online with the UK-based Itzon.TV Film Festival. It's free to watch, and offers a full screen, high definition viewing experience. The finalists in the festival are decided by audience votes. Please create a free profile, watch the film, and vote for us! You can watch at the following scheduled times (Wednesday 5/18/11: 5:28PM, Thursday 5/19/11: 7:41PM, Friday 5/20/11: 6:31AM, Saturday 5/21/11: 12:45PM, Sunday 5/22/11: 4:29AM, Monday 5/23/11: 9:56AM, Tuesday 5/24/11: 7:18AM) or use their on-demand function. Times are either adjusted for various zones as indicated, or someone's a jokester over at Itzon. Check it out!

Phrase of Our Lives

"No way!" I thought in response to Amazon's downstream suggestion. Purchase my books (and favorite French anise-flavored candy) and allow access to my credit card information through the phrase "Audrey's Undisturbed Tensions"? Hopefully between the quality literature and the sweets my tensions would be entirely disturbed; rendered impotent and vanquished entirely. Too astute for its own good, Amazon's rejoinder was the suggestion of another phrase: how about "Audrey's Unbroken Candor"? Yes, Amazon, let's keep it real.

Snack Glove

If you are a doctor who might get hungry later, feel free to make a snack glove. Nothing for you but the most hygienic to finger those pecan bars.

Man Fall In Love

Some women keep reading material such as How To Make A Man Fall In Love With You ironically, like how they don't actually make waffles with their iron; but such books are funnier and do not require maple syrup, even hypothetically.

If you are enamored of someone who looks like a relative of Pac-man, this tome is for you! Perhaps, according to the author, your boyfriend is always listening, which he does by rotating his eyes back and forth:


In that case, perhaps you do not know if he is in love. Because this is what he looks like if he is:


You'll know a man loves you when he wears the pancakes you made on his eyes. That would be a good time to sketch him and turn those drawings into a video game. But hopefully with more smiling.

Toothy Grin

We all accept that dentists have the prerogative to advertise their services through use of a tooth logo. We acknowledge that in order to appear friendly and not too Little Shop of Horrors-y, they may choose to give that tooth a smile, thus rendering it less a glyph and more of a mascot.But what happens when that smile is so full, so radiant, as to reveal teeth? Where does something that started out as a welcoming gesture turn into a carnivalesque need for orthodonture? "Don't worry," says the winsome call of such a molar, "I can handle any meal all on my own."

Bake It Frost It Picture Take It

"Say cupcakes!" my lovely and talented photographer Erin Gibson urged, as we worked the big cartoon eyes and wavy (read: comedy) hair. Sitting in a West Hollywood garage in a tank top, you think to yourself, This is February, and maybe these photographs will launch my career, but right now—"CUPCAKES!"

Sleepless in Silverlake

It's been a good long while since I went nearly sleepless, but last night there was no rest for the wounded. In dreams we get some murky license for whimsy and experimentation, but in waking life it's all reality, reality, reality. Without the respite of my Zzzzs, I had to rely entirely on what was visible to my eyes but nonetheless seemed like apparitions:

*My cell phone displaying a photograph from the first of the year. In it, I simultaneously look deeply unglamorous and incredibly happy, proving there is an inverse relationship between makeup and joy.

*An episode of "Weeds" playing on my laptop, in which I ride a bicycle and the pink blotch of t-shirt with me in it keeps wending its way through various scenes. No one would know it's me; I am secretly haunting another narrative world.

*Vegan mochi ball ice cream. All those years of wishing they would make a non-dairy alternative produced the desired outcome, there in my hand. Don't pinch or dream me, I'm awake.

Infant Formula

What better vending machine to have in the lobby of a casting center that includes a modeling agency than one with a baby wearing lipstick and drinking its body weight in Coke?

An Illicit Word from Noodles

In my spam folder: an email from Official Pasta Boat, regarding TV Pasta Boat. I'm unfamiliar with TV Pasta Boat; is it related to Major Theatrical Release Pasta Boat? What about Unofficial Pasta Boat: when I get mail from that guy, can I take him seriously? "Make dinner fast, quick, and easy"...Pasta Boat, do you have somewhere else to go? I thought we'd spend some quality time together. After all, I'm guessing you are an entire boat full of pasta, and are here because I am hungry. Wait, spam folder...it's time to come clean about what's in your sauce.

Agency My Agency

Here in Hollywood, when we say "signed across the board," we're not referring to an autograph on a Monopoly set, but rather an agency representing an actor both theatrically (film and television) and commercially. I scribbled on one such plank, so to speak, today.

I'm thrilled to be working with RPM Talent Agency, which has recently merged with The Agency, which has recently merged with my resume, which has recently passed "Go" and collected $200*, 10% of which will go to what I can only hope will be called Agency The Agency, so that the next phase of my career is lead by a glorious typo wrapped in an enigma and coated with a delicious chocolately network contract.

We're on the move...

*Monopoly joke, for those foreign children who were busy in the outside-world, rather than chewing on the machinations of tiny plastic dogs and hats.

Socks At Last

Quiet love stories have clout, too. As I moved my delicates into my new chest of drawers, not one but two pairs of socks were reunited with their mates. Really, these socks were left for dead. "The laundromat clearly ate them," the legend went. But they held out, and timing took the reigns. Cozied up together again, dreaming of hikes and jogs, they're right where they're meant to be.