<< Me on TV?

By Hassan Nicholas, 18
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4:50 a.m.
My mom picks me up at school for an audition in the Valley—a national commercial for Pepsi. That could mean two days of work at $550 a day, plus royalties based on how often the commercial airs.

5ish After a short nap in the car and a few moments finding the address we arrive at the casting office. I sign in with "Name … Agent … Social Security Number … Initials … time in … time out." Now I instinctively begin looking for a size card where I fill in the same information as on the sign-in but this time I have to include addresses, home phone numbers, fax phone numbers, a floorplan of my house (no, I’m joking), waist size and other useless measurements and data.

5:something Later on I see others with Polaroids, so I look around for the Polaroid guy. I stand patiently as he fumbles with the simplest camera known to man. I’m confident this will be one of the worst pictures in my natural life. (Polaroids suck, which is why they also ask for head shots!) I staple my Polaroid to the size card and wait to be called to audition. Tip: Don’t fan your Polaroid after you get it taken, they hate that.

6 a.m. I notice a paper taped above the sign-in sheet stating "Read this." I go over to study a storyboard drawing of the commercial. I discover some "sides"—dialogue lines I’ll be asked to recite. Quickly dissecting its stupid one-liners and sad attempts at mimicking the teenager slanguage, I read over them, deciding how I will say them once I’m inside. I continue to read over the lines, drilling them into my head until I can say at least the first three lines by memory.

Now I really wait. I watch people signing in. I see a recognizable face, "Wasn’t that guy in that Cheerios commercial?" I ask myself. The room fills with people; more laughing, more chatter, more competition. It used to throw me, but now I take it in stride. Then I hear my name mispronounced, "Hah … Huhsahn Nicholas." I go in.

6:25 The door slams shut behind me cutting off the noise of the waiting area. The empty office is like a deserted plain with only me, the guy behind the camera, and a whiteboard with the lines written on it.

I hand him my head shot with resume stapled on the back and 3/4-filled size card. I fall in place behind the two worn-out strips of duct tape that show me where to stand. The camera guy briefs me on what I’m supposed to do. I nod, "uh-huh" and "hm-hmm."

6:27 The camera guy goes behind the camera and says "Alright, are ya ready?" He flashes me the signal (a two-fingered gun sign) followed by a silent "Go" and I say my name and turn to show my profile. He then gives me a second "All right, go" and then I proceed to act out the lines with as much energy and flavor as possible. But, wait … something’s wrong. The energy’s there, the flavor is reading off the meters and I’m relaxed, but the words are coming out like a 25-car pileup on a congested freeway. "Okay, Hassan, breathe, breathe!" I scream to myself. The guy stops me and tells me to take it from the top.

This time, I promise myself I will slow down and pronounce every syllable with crisp precision. I contort my mouth and move my jawbone around to make sure my mouth doesn’t cause another "accident." I feel like I need to be twice as good to redeem myself and not look like an idiot. "All right, now," he commands. I start out smoothly and then it happens again! But this time I ramble on, catching the pained expression of the camera guy who’s probably thinking, "Wow, that guy failed English class." He just says, "All right, thank you" and I walk out the door—I can’t wait to get out of there!

6:35 I buckle my seatbelt, bracing for mom’s interrogation. I tell her how badly it went.

On the way home I laugh at myself. I had a better chance of becoming president than getting that Pepsi commercial. It’s just one of those of things. No matter how long you’ve been doing something, how successful you’re at it, and how comfortable you feel doing it, some days you won’t be "on." And this day I wasn’t on, but there’s always that commercial, movie, or voice-over I’d get next time. And when I did, all those bad auditions wouldn’t even come into play.