Can you hear me now...oh wait, wrong company

I'm on fire right now. I just shot another national commercial for SPRINT! That's right, Sprint Baby! And I'm a principle. I hit the jack pot there. I shot it this past Saturday. I even had to go to SF for a wardrobe fitting earlier this week for the first time ever. A wardrobe fitting is where I basically tell them I need a bigger size cuz I'm a fat bastard who got carried away at the Desert Bar at the Circus Circus Casino Buffet in Reno the weekend before.

So for those counting, that's 4 commercials in a row that I've gotten. Three national commercials and one industrial, and that's just for this summer. So I'll have some nice change in my pocket for when I move to LA. I'll be able to afford the real women hookers on Sunset, not the fake ones named Jerome.

Yesterday was a great day of shooting. Our call time was at 6:30 AM! So I had to wake up at 4:30 after getting a nice 5 hours of sleep. The shoot was at 3Com Park, which is where the 49ers attempt to play football at. The stadium is easy to get to and I even shot a Pepsi Print Ad there before, so it should be no problem to get there. I, on the other hand, have to make things more difficult so I exit before the right exit in order to look for a place to get some food because I was early. Well that took me on a long voyage into the mountains where I finally found a 7-11. As I tried to make my way back, I got caught up in road construction, detours, and Frogger and barely made it there in time. But I made it.

As I arrived I was directed to the talent trailer. The talent trailer! Finally I have a trailer, as opposed to the Pepsi Print Ad where I was an extra and you sat in your car for comfort. So The talent trailer has 5 individual rooms, one for each principle. Somehow I got stuck with the bitch room. All the other principles had nice rooms with their own bathroom and a couch. I on the other hand got a room with a chair and no bathroom. I think it was a converted make-up room. Great, I get the retarded room when I have to seriously unload the tuna sandwich I had just gobbled down. So I make my way to the bathroom trailer and handle my business hoping nobody walks in and dies. Not having a bathroom may sound like no big deal, but when your an actor, you want exactly if not more, than what the other actors get. I was pissed that I didn't have a bathroom or couch and acted like I was going to call my agent, but I didn't want to look like a diva. Maybe it was because I was the youngest principle that I got stuck with the retarded room, or at least that's what I'm telling myself.

So the first few hours I have to get into my wardrobe which consists of some shorts, a grey undershirt, a yellow t-shirt and a grey/black vest, spiffy I know. Then we had to go get hair and make-up. This was a big production because they had their own wardrobe people, a hair person, AND a make-up person, as opposed to one person who did it all. So that was nice. The crew were all really cool. They also had a breakfast bar for the crew and cast but I didn't want to risk it. After hair and make up, we went to the sound guy who put microphones on us.

Now I want to talk about the extras. I remember being an extra and I HATE being an extra. You feel like a scrub and envy the principles who get all the special treatment. So I made sure everyone saw me walk into my trailer, they didn't have to know it was a bitch room. These extras were different though. They knew that if they got on camera then they would get upgraded to principle. Therefore they crowded the principles and kept trying to stick their heads in front of us. It was very annoying. There were these two old asian ladies who kept crowding behind me trying to get in the shot, which would be impossible because me and the other guy were twice as big as them and covered them completely. I farted on them to try and get some space, but it didn't work, they were dedicated. Something that was funny was during lunch. If you are in the the union, then you got fed the catered meal which consisted of steak, shrimp, vegetable, avocado salad, lemon cake and some other stuff. The non-union extras got a sack lunch. HAHAHAHAHA. I would have felt sorry for them, but oh well, I went through the same thing, you have to work your way up. Plus they kept crowding me during the filming, so it's payback.

So the commercial is a football themed Sprint commercial. The Sprint Guy drives up and starts talking about how Sprint doesn't charge for overages anymore, etc. I should be in the commercial because I'm standing next to the Sprint Guy in the final shot which is suppose to be the funny line. We're standing around the grill and the Sprint guy tells the guy at the grill that he went over is bar b que minutes and the grill guy is holding this really burnt hot dog. We all look at the hot dog and start laughing. HAHAHAHHAHAHAHA, brilliant comedy... (sigh)
Well I'm standing between the Sprint Guy and the grill guy. So I should be in the commercial even if I don't say anything. The Sprint Guy was a pretty cool guy. He gets treated like a god, he had his own trailer and everything. And if I was a god, then that's what I would want, my own trailer. He has a good sense of humor. His real name is Brian, but lets face it, he's the Sprint Guy. I think he should fight the Verizon Guy at some point on pay per view, that would be exciting.

One last note about the director. Her name is Barbara Kopple and she's a big time Documentary filmmaker who has done such films such as "Harlan County, USA", "American Dream", and "Wild Man Blues". It was cool because I studied her in my documentary film class at Stanford. So before I left I went up to her and asked if she did documentaries and she said yes. I told her I studied her in my class and she asked which films. I began to awkwardly mumble while I acted like I was trying to remember the names. Luckily she volunteers the names of her biggest films, American Dream and Harlan County. I said yes, we watched American Dream in class and had to watch Harlan County on our own. Ooops. She says, "Oh you HAD to huh?" I say no, I don't mean it like that, please don't cut me out of the commercial, I love you." Well I don't know if she was pissed seriously or not, but I guess I'll see when the commercial comes out if I get cut out or not. Be on the look out for it.

The Star Wars Battlefront commercial is now playing. I don't know if I got cut out of it or not. I saw it once so far and it was a short commercial that only used clips from the videogame and none of the actors. So hopefully they play the other versions with the actors too so I can get paid.

Sorry this blog is so long, but I want to remember everything that happened for my own memories and I don't want to have to tell the story over and over to everyone who asks about it. I can just say read my blog. Oh, before I forget, the other principles were really cool. We got along really well and played football together and joked around. It made the day a lot easier to get through. One guy I had done a commercial with before for the Oakland A's and another guy named RJ, was a comedian magician who I had performed with before. He's very funny and very big and very bald, a sexy combination I must say.

Overall I had a great time, despite not having my own bathroom and couch...yes it bothers me that much. I have the bladder of a two year old, so it would have been nice.