February 16, 1999
Oh yeah. This is the way to audition.
At about 5pm this evening, I was sitting in the Blue Chip Saloon with new L.A. resident Glenn Kessler, drinking a couple of beers, when my pager went off indicating that my agent wanted to talk to me. Hmmmm... Maybe an audition. That would be good. Maybe a pilot audition. That would be real good. So I called in from my barstool deep in the Valley.
I got it! Got what exactly? I wasn't really up for anything that I knew of.
"Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place wants to offer you a guest star role, top of show, starts work tomorrow," came the voice from the other end. An offer. No audition, nothing to prepare, nothing to agonize over, nothing to worry about. Just show up tomorrow at the table read and the part is mine. Sounds like a no-brainer.
It's the first time ever that I've seen the world from one rung higher on the ladder than where I've been. Even the ABC deal still requires me to go on auditions. This, however, was an audition-less job offer. Wild. It's ironic that earlier today, when I auditioned for Wasteland, it wasn't even a pre-read, it was a pre-pre-read, which (besides not auditioning at all) is the lowest possible rung of the ladder. I haven't looked at the world from that rung in a while either. Needless to say, big swing today.
The history behind the offer is that Kevin Abbott, the writer and producer of The Hanleys, the pilot I did last spring, took over as executive producer of this show for the current television season. He and I have talked quite a bit about a possible new pilot for the coming season or some such project, but we hadn't ever discussed my being on Two Guys, a Girl.... It's nice, though, that he thought of me for the show and even nicer that I can just show up and do it. At the end of the day, the executive producer is the guy you want in your corner. So back to work with Kevin. It should be fun.