Don’t Act, Reason #26: You will sell your soul for a lousy thirty seconds of screen time.

Back when I was in college, I remember a lot of fellow actor classmates saying such nonsense as, “I would never do a commercial.  I won’t ever sell out like that.”  I myself never made such brazen statements, but I would be lying if I told you that I ever thought I would shill for Home Depot and Keystone Light on national television.  The thinking back then was that only “lesser” actors would do commercials (and to be honest, I don’t know if that perception has really changed all that much.)  I suppose I felt the same way, although I didn’t give it too much thought.  I certainly don’t remember being wowed by any performance I saw during the commercial breaks for Cheers while I was growing up in small town, USA.  I never said to myself, “Wow, that was an amazing thirty seconds of acting.  I can’t wait to get my shot at that kind of screen time!”  (Well, that guy who played Joe Isuzu was pretty funny.  At least he was the first time.  Oh!  And Ernest—that guy was genius.  Remember?  “Hey, Vern!  Hey, Vern!”  I am currently doubled over in laughter just remembering those spots.[1])

I suppose, like my peers at the time, I just took it as a given that actors who did commercials did commercials because real jobs weren’t made available to them.  Of course, I was right to think that; I was just slightly off in my logic.  I mistakenly believed “legitimate” jobs weren’t made available to them because they weren’t talented, not because there just simply aren’t enough of those jobs in Hollywood for all the good actors (keep in mind, of course, that good actors are still the minority, and in an extreme proportion.)  I’ve since been forced to change my perspective, not only because I genuinely believe I don’t suck, but also because I know a number of other commercial actors who don’t suck.  And we’ve all been in bad commercials, and looked like bad actors doing them.  Sometimes there is just no way to twist commercial copy into a good performance.  If you have to talk to a dog about how good the specific ingredients of a certain brand of puppy chow are, then you’re going to look like an idiot no matter how masterful you are. Don’t forget, by the way, that commercial actors aren’t the only ones who wind up in shit and look awful as a result.  I would say that I’ve done far fewer bad commercials than Robert Deniro has bad movies.  And commercials are only thirty seconds long.  And they’re free.

It is revoltingly odd how time and experience changes human perspective.  Where I didn’t even consider commercials when I was a kid, by the time I hit my mid-twenties, I became obsessed with booking one.  I auditioned for a full year before I did finally get one, juggling day job schedules and getting in trouble with managers all for the sake of doing a commercial.  My reasons were pretty simple: I didn’t have a union card, and getting cast in a commercial was the quickest way to get one, I would get on-camera experience in a professional environment which would lead to exposure, and most of all, I would get paid to act.  The commercial door was the only one open to me: I saw a chance, and just like Steve Winwood told me I should in the form of song, I took it.  (Of course, Winwood was also the guy who sang that song about being wasted and unable to find his way home.)  I struggled, blood, sweat, and tears and all that nonsense, just to get into a commercial in the remote hope that it could springboard me closer to the career in motion pictures about which I dreamed.  (Of course, I’m cutting out a few steps in my game plan.  In today’s marketplace, actors don’t get movie gigs unless they’ve proven themselves on television first.  So I hoped that the commercials would lead me to guest starring roles on T.V. series which would lead me to series regular roles which would lead me to starring on a hit series which then would lead me to a lead in a major motion picture.  Mathematically speaking, that’s a “plan” contingent on…let’s see…one, two, three…well, a whole fuck-load of lucky breaks.)  After all that was said and done, however, I was fighting to get into a commercial.  I was fighting for the chance to sell things.

            If only life were as simple as the Bible wants you to believe it is.  I screamed and cried for the damn devil to buy my soul in exchange for a movie career, but he just wasn’t interested.  So instead I started doing commercials.  Which some would call “selling out” I suppose.  But if I am selling my soul to Corporate America for occasional residual checks, then at least I’m just selling little bits at a time and not handing the thing in its entirety to horrible, horrible Satan.  I’ve got half of it left, at least.  Who knows, maybe Beelzebub will come around, and take what’s left and give me a movie career.

            In the meantime, I did get to dress up as a giant butterfly.

            (You know the drill.)