Acting climax for your viewing pleasure

Oh dear! I seem to have gone a month without blogging.
These days, the stress of internet life is too much. Myspace, Facebook, Mixi, Youtube, blog.... why are we doing all this?! How long can it last?
For a month I guess this blog has been playing second fiddle to others, despite it being the most "me" of them all. Looking at my Myspace page tells you nothing - except that perhaps I am slightly weird.

So, anyway, I finally got this DVD in the post the other day. I've been looking forward to this one! This was my last big acting job (4 days work for about 1200 pounds), so a pretty good way to go out. It's definately in my top 5. I laughed lots, and so will you (if you have ever met me anyway).

Sorry for the creepy American accent by the way!

Enough claptrap! Let's check it out!!



I know that you won't write a comment, but if you did, it would probably be "rofl", right?

Good acting is for actors

As you have no doubt noticed, a lot of my acting work consists of cheesy dramatic reconstructions. There is big demand for them on Japanese TV, so there is consequently constant demand for actors.

In the acting industry here, the process goes as follows;

1. The agency calls you with a possible job. If you are available on those days, you give them "First Keep". If you might be available (i.e. you already have a first keep), then you give them "Second Keep" etc.
2. The agency sends your profile to the production company - "Picture Selection"
3. If the production company like you, you'll be invited to the audtion for the part.
4. Some time later, you get a call telling you if you got the part or not.

When it comes to reconstruction jobs, step 3 gets cut, and the production company chooses actors purely from the supplied photographs - basically taking a chance on acting ability. The voices get dubbed, so accents aren't an issue. In fact, you don't even need to speak English. Once, I had a role as a father. I spoke to my wife in English. She replied in Russian. My kids cheered on in Japanese. Wild times! Truly, an international family.
For the record, the pay rate for reconstructions (called Saigen here) is appropriately poor.

Anyway, seems this week that a Saigen director got a bit too big for her boots, and thought it might be a good idea to actually do some auditions this time. Man, I'm pretty sure that I don't want them to pick me for this one! I'm sure the pay is crap anyway.

Anyway, this is what I had to do "off the cuff" in the audition. This should shut up any of you guys who think that this job is a cakewalk. If it doesn't - well - you are welcome to try for yourselves. I guess some people prefer hugging Eastern European models.

Basically, I turned up at the audition along with two blonde females - a Slovakian and a Russian (you would probably have fancied both of them). As the only guy, I had to pair up for the both of them (arf).

First scene. Slovakian girl tells me that she is pregnant. But. She has two wombs**. There are two babies in one of them, and one in the other. The emotions swirl in my head - dazzled by elation, struck by shock, smitten with anxiety... then I do it all over again with the Russian girl.
My emotions frazzled, we move straight onto the next scene. Back with the Slovakian. The doctor looks us in the eye: "I'm afraid there has been a miscarriage...". Cue scenes of disbelief, anger, shock; yeh, we're talking about the whole spectrum here! This is pure gold, so we do it all over again with the Russian girl. She doesn't take the news very well, and crumbles into my masculine arms.
No time to waste, so we plunge straight into the next scene - my Slovakian wife is giving birth - and - just as I had always expected, it didn't look that painful (just looked like they had serious piles to me). The baby is out in no time, and we share our elation with the world. Should I kiss her? Probably not. The doctor shows us our new addition - a beautiful Panasonic remote control has emerged from her designer jeans. Classic prop that - I do hope they find something more realistic for the actual filming though.

Congratulations

No sooner are we celebrating all this than my Russian wife is shoved in the chair. Her feeble hands gently squeeze mine as I command her to must her utmost power to evict the alien mass from her spasming body. As I am whisked once more to the highest of human emotions, the doctor shows us our child - another Panasonic remote. I'm starting to realise why those TV repairs took so long now.

It's all over. The three of us leave the audition - elated, depressed and unsure whether we should feel a common bond or simple humility. As professional actors, we luckily have no emotions of our own save vanity, so we leave it at that.

This post started out serious, but seems to have degenerated into flip-flap based on real events. One can only apologise.

I wonder if I'll get this part. If I do, I will try to cry for you all. That would be a befitting climax, wouldn't it.

**I think both of the girls got confused. Or had never heard the English word "womb" before. They kept on telling me that they had "..two rooms - two babies in one, and one in the other". Luckily, I knew what they were really trying to say. I have a deep understanding of women like that, see.

Deus Ex Machina tops off Ultimate Week!!

Operating Theatre or train? You decide

I'm writing this now at 5:30am Tokyo time, denied my basic human sleep-needs and nursing a hot Tesco-branded Lemsip. I've come down with a heavy phlegm-cold that I used to get once a year, but which now strikes me about 4 times each winter since moving to Tokyo. It's a consequence of 20 million people converging on a limited number of trains day in, day out. When you first arrive here, you think that the mask-wearing train sufferers are just eccentric or hypochondriacs - but soon, you come to respect them. Indeed, you start to loathe the salarymen who don't wear them, as they make barely any effort to keep their nasal audio level down (or control their death-rot breath, for that matter).

It's a cruel way to end what has otherwise been a fantastic week. So, let's un-digress.


Well, I guess that I should start with the big news - that is to say - that - yes, - I have got a new job! My original purpose when I came to Japan was to gather up steam and get a video-game job in Japan. With my visa expiring this month, I was pretty much set to go back to the UK, slightly defeated, to search a job out there. Heck, I've tried hard enough to get a game job here over the past year. Time after time I was rejected.
Well, after reading every - single - job mail-list email that I've received over the past 18 months, yeh, I've finally bagged one! It has been almost uncanny. It just so happens that the president of this company is also the only Japanese developer that I have ever met before - he gave a keynote at the Game Developers Conference in London when I was still a student - and the company is small enough in size that the interview was directly with him. I'm not going to give away who the company is just yet - you never know who might be reading! Heh.
The company is getting lots of demand from Europe and North America, so they really need someone who can handle the bilingual communications. It's a little bit daunting to be the only foreigner in the company, and at times my Japanese ability will be pushed to it's limits. Having said that, this is what I've always wanted - total immersion is the best way to improve after all.
The actual job title is "Assistant Planner", so I should get the chance to learn some production and management techniques - especially considering the size of the company. It's almost too perfect.

Wow, the Lemsip is kicking in already. If there's one thing worth importing to this country, that's it.

So yeh, I start this job in less than two weeks, and so another page (a big page) turns over in my book. Sadly, it looks like I will have to pack in the acting. To begin with I will be outsourced to the company by a recruiter, and they don't allow any days off in the three month "trial period".

It's strange really because lately the acting has been going great. This week I was filming my highest-paid job yet. It was a promotional video for a health products company (*cough* quasi-pyramid program *cough cough*) that they will use to open a conference they are holding for their customers in the Makuhari Messe (where Tokyo Game Show and Comicon is held) in April. The whole thing went very smoothly, the hours were reasonable, and at the end of it they even let me keep the tailor-made suit and shoes that I wore during the shoot! They're pretty nice!
In addition, I have a job with NHK (The Japanese BBC) next week. About two hours of work for 250 pounds. Paid on the spot. All I have to do is smile and make British animal noises for a kids TV show. Usually I'm the one paying other people to make animal noises. **
I've also been offered a part in a video game cut-scene, and have another possible credited movie role - but it looks like I will sadly have to turn these down now. Looks like a cake that I won't be eating.

** Lie told for the purpose of a joke. Honestly.

In other, unrelated news, I got a new laptop this week. My previous PC was a nice little unit, but the lack of an internal optical drive was really annoying. It also had an annoying, incurable virus. So, I imported an 14" Widescreen HP unit from the States. Man, the States is just so much cheaper than anywhere else for PC's. Even after an $80 shipping fee, and after my UK bank had their fun charging ridiculous foreign transaction fees, it still came out as much cheaper than anything I could find in the UK. It's a special edition unit. Very nice.

It even has a mini remote control that stores itself in the PC card slot.
Very nice. But never gonna use it. Never gonna use it.

Well, yeh, that's about it really. Looks like I'll be in Japan for awhile yet. To those of you who were looking forward to my return - well - my apologies. I recently came to realise that I really do like it here. And for now, the future teems with optimism.

Dirty, dirty boy

Man, I'm glad that's over. Spent over an hour in make up just to look like this:

Oops, left the camera in macro-mode

Yeh, back to my mining heritage. I even wore a hard-hat.

Wearing a thick coat of make-up isn't much fun, I can tell you.
What made it worse was that they asked us to come in at 1pm, and we didn't start filming until 10pm! In the meantime, Kimutaku came and did his bit and left without any of us noticing... the rest will be down to the magic of post-production. I'm looking forward to seeing this one - should be pretty hilarious.

Still, it gave me plenty of time to practice my kanji. As you shall see.

Another brush with fame

Whilst we're on the twin subjects of bad-hair and Japan, I guess I should mention my current job that I'll be undertaking in a few hours. It's a TV commercial for Gatsby, a Japanese male beauty product manufacturer.

I'll be working with mega-famous Japanese talent and SMAP member Takuya Kimura (Kimutaku).

I won't ruin the contents of the ad, but for those of you who are curious, here is the previous ad;



Phew, it's gonna be tough to live up to that one!

Nyago on TV, Nov-Jan

I've been gradually stocking up my TV performances on the HDD recorder for awhile now, and with no more appearances scheduled for the near future, I thought it high time for this compilation.
I've been on Beat Takeshi's Unbelievable 4 times now... I must say, it is fun. I always laugh when I see myself on it. The ridiculousness of it all still isn't lost on me.



My acting career has been on a brief hiatus for the past month (Hence the large amount of free-time enabled posts recently). Indeed, I'll be teaching English to Tax Officers again for 4 days from tomorrow.

Until greater things appear, please enjoy the video.

Capturing the essence of motion

I just got back from an audition for a motion-capture part in a video game. I can't give too much away of course, but I can say that it's for an RPG by one of the major Japanese software companies.
I was very impressed by the professionalism - the staff and studio were much more organised than anything I've seen so far in TV, commercials and films.

This is what motion capture work looks like -
not so different to a Saturday night out for me, then.

The audition was really fun - there were several different parts to try out, as well as some ad-lib sword fighting with a wooden kendo sword. Yeh, I kicked arse, of course. Need you even ask?
It would be real sweet if I could land this job - not only would the experience be ideal, but the money is also really good too. It will be hard though, as all the other actors there were pretty good, and much more experienced... let's hope that I have some raw talent hidden in there somewhere. I thought that I did particularly well doing my lizard-man walk.

The studio had a huge collection of fake weapons - guns, swords, bows - the lot. For one scene, we were going to use this huuuuge bad-ass sword, but it was too long for the poor girl... so we gave her a baton instead. For some reason, all the girls there were all really hot - isn't it irrelevant for motion capture anyway?!? Give the mingers a chance, for pity's sake.

I really need to penetrate through the scummy layer of TV acting that I've been doing - this kind of stuff is much more beneficial. I haven't heard from my voice-artist agency for a couple of months now, so it's been shitty job after shitty job.

It's time for some more 'Oomf'. It's time that they all realised that I AM A GOD!! Only then will I wear my Motion-Capture suit before the masses.

Films, new jobs, nonetheless blasé

I guess that this week should have been a big week.
I acted in my first ever movie.

It's called 'Nippon no Aozora' (Blue skies over Japan), and is basically about the McArthur treaty - the post WWII negotiations between Japan and America over future military capabilities.
I was just an extra. But a good extra, you know. Not just walking in the background - I have a 10 second scene which features me giving Hershey bars to Japanese kids. I'm a member of the Military police. They even gave me a 40's hairdo, and brickloads of make-up, as if I'd been in Okinawa for a month.


I didn't even shave properly. I didn't bother to look at my scene in the script. What was I thinking? There's no doubt that I had one eye on my PS3 video. It may be sad, but that made me think more than a movie debut did. Will I be in the IMDB now? It comes out in March. I think I'll wait for the DVD. It would be too embarrassing to burst out into laughter when I appear in the cinema. I always gaffaw when I see myself on TV (apart from when I've been edited out, of course).
My distracted performance was even more compounded by the rather strange direction. The Director didn't speak directly to me. One of the AD's told me a basic outline, but the actual cut was different. Very confusing. Add to this the random factor of kids, who did something different in every practice shot. Also, I had no specific lines, but I was free to say anything that came to mind, as long as I told them exactly what I said later for the Japanese in-movie translation. My mind was so preoccupied with all these variables, that I'm not sure if I even remembered to do an American accent! We only did one cut. No second chance. I was so disorientated that I forgot my coat. And then we drove to the station, and I realised that I was still wearing the military trousers...
I guess that acting in movies is kind of hard. I'm also convinced that good directors make bad actors look good, and vice versa. Let's hope that I get better directors in the future!

I've had a number of interesting costume roles lately. As a special Christmas gift to my fans around the world, next week I will compile a video of all my cameos that have been screened in the past month, but weren't big enough to warrant it's own video. It'll be a bit like those disappointing Christmas comedy specials on BBC; AbFab or whatever.

As an appetizer, here I am, taking names and kicking some quite serious butt-ocks.

"Hey, you - shut up!!"

"Your ass is mine, cowboy!"

But that's not all. Starting today, I started a one-week course teaching English to Japanese Government Tax Workers. Not just general English. Specific, tax English. For 110 minutes each lesson. All day, every day, same 10 students. It is dry. The English is impossible to teach. But the money is very good.
I sincerely hope that this will be my last English teaching job - my soul seems to have had it. Money or no. This doesn't make me happy. Dressing up as a policeman, for 1/3rd the money... bring it on!

It's true, I am a professional model

Still don't believe me?
I recently paid money to have some professional photos taken for my portfolio. I figured that the reason I got turned down for a lot of jobs was due to the amateur nature of my present portfolio photos. When a company is paying like 2k for a model, they'd like to think that said model is at least professional I guess.

Anyways, look and judge for yourself.

More recording troubles o(#_#)o

I certainly haven't had much luck lately when it comes to recording my acting jobs.
Last month I did a promotion Video for media manufacturer Imation, almost exclusively using me. I'm trying to get a DVD copy of the ad, but my agency is notoriously fickle about these things, so I doubt that it will materialise.
The ad was only shown for three days on a big screen outside Shinbashi station in central Tokyo. The ad was only shown once an hour, so we waited, in the rain. Eventually my camera ran out of batteries, so I had to use my mobile phone. When it finally came on, my hands were so cold that I had difficulties pressing the button! having tried in vain for about three hours, this is all I could capture - just pictures of my hands! Oh well. Click on the eSnips buttons for more video disappointment!!

Oops x 2

Well, I was on TV twice in the past week, but I'm afraid that I missed them both...
In this work, you ask your agents to tell you when the shows are going to be on TV, but of course they never do. Why would they? For me, it's like a tangible part of my life failed to tangibilise... maybe they'll be on repeats in the future. Maybe not.
I was particularly looking forward to one of them, where I give wedgies to a pair of rubbish xenophobic comedians, and talk about steak and ale pie. It's the first time that I'd really had a chance to be myself on TV (in a semi-scripted way).
Fear thee not, I will be more vigilant about my appearances in the future! I don't want to disappoint my fans!
Hello?

Monomane Battle 39

Was the result a fix? Maybe not, but it was certainly setup to be this way (maybe that's what a fix is anyway!)
Regardless, please watch this exert of Japanese prime-time comedy, and ask yourself - what if this is as good as it gets?
I spent hours laboriously sub-titling this one, any comments welcome! The least I deserve is one minute of your time for some scathing criticism!

Documentary about rare genetic diseases

Another main role here, playing an ALS victim - turns fit young people into Steven Hawking in less than 5 years!
If you want to see more about this, try and find the Documentary 'So much, so fast', it's quite moving. You can see more real footage - in English - about this guy in it.

This one is about 25 mins long; I've cut it up into 3 parts.

Trivia - the guy below in the white shirt is the guy in Lost in Translation who speaks German in the sauna. So there.

Unbelievable - Boston murder!

My first main acting role, see if you can tell whodunnit! It's all dubbed in Japanese of course - them's the beans.

This is more than twenty minutes long, so make sure that you see all 4 parts!