From the Midwest to Hollywood

My faithful readers will have noticed a prolonged absence of new posts to this blog. Such an absence may seem to indicate overwhelming discouragement or even that I have packed it in and moved home.

On the contrary, I continue in LA, heartily pursuing a successful acting career. I am auditioning, taking acting classes and acting with the Greenhouse (www.GreenhouseProductions.com) with more vigor than ever.

Whenever, Lord willing, particularly good news takes place, I am likely to shout it to you from the rooftops—and probably on this blog, too. For the moment, though, let me wish you all very well and register my hope to share good news sooner rather than later.

The very best to each of you,

Hans

PS If any of you back home could introduce me to Midwesterner filmmakers, located in the Midwest or in LA, I would be really pleased for the help. While talent is extremely important out here, so is the synergy of connecting with people in common pursuits.

I am nearly finished with my first semester of acting class at Los Angeles Valley College. For several reasons, I consider the class to be an excellent choice for many actors.

It is perhaps peculiarly important to me that a teacher not be pretentious. For a person to speak into my life in a way I can hear it, I have to really respect him or her. Perhaps paradoxically, it is anathema to me when a person spends time convincing the class (and it seems to me, convincing herself) that she is a good acting teacher. When  Bob and Betty Ballew (http://www.lavc.edu/mediaarts/faculty/BallewRobert.html , http://www.lavc.edu/mediaarts/faculty/BallewBetty.html) introduced themselves, without any airs, they each told us briefly of their forty-year careers in the entertainment industry. Bob is primarily an actor (last month he showed us a Tony Curtis film in which he acted.). He is also an experienced cameraman (early in the semester, he was busy shooting the Oscars), so he has plenty of valuable advice about how to act on camera. Betty is also an experienced actress and teaches broadcasting.

Of the many workshop instructors I have met in LA, perhaps 25% of them are honest without being hurtful. In contrast, half of acting teachers seem to think the majority of their job consists of speaking loudly about their students’ faults. I am sure that making a student aware of his faults has its place. However, I question the need to have a teacher whose general posture is to speak negative things to his students. My experience is that there are plenty of negative voices in the entertainment industry without hiring a teacher to join the chorus.

Bob’s general posture with us is to let us know the things we can do better–this seems patently more helpful than just saying what we did poorly. Much of his advice is technical, such as “I need you to back farther away from your scene partner so we can get a better close up,” and “rather than look way off to the right, look a bit to the right of straight ahead–it will have the same effect without being too extreme.” I am always eager to receive such immediately applicable advice.

The price tag provides another stark contrast between other acting classes and LAVC. Classes in LA frequently cost between $40 and $60 per night. Because California subsidized its community college classes, the cost for the full semester at LAVC is $60.

My LAVC acting class is not for everyone. Actors wishing to focus on specific acting methods, such as Meisner Technique or Stanislavski, will need to choose a different class. Additionally, some actors might be irritated that a fair part of the class have very little experience acting. However, students get to choose their scenes and acting partners. I have had only positive experiences so far.

My semester goal was to become more comfortable acting on camera; I think the supportive environment in this class will help any actor progress in that direction. To read the course description, go to http://lavc.edu/catalog/courses.pdf and scroll down to Broadcasting 5: Radio and Television Acting.

Please leave a comment if you have any questions about LAVC. It’s great!

Hello, faithful readers! As some of you have noticed, I have not been writing faithfully in recent months. Lest you should fear I have given up the dream, I’ll let you know in brief what I have been up to:

I continue in my involvement with Greenhouse Arts and Media. Check us out at www.GreenHouseProductions.com. We are shooting one short film a month; I updated my reel recently to include one Greenhouse film, and I have about three new ones to include in my next update.

In February, I acted in my first German-language role. It was in a pilot that was just recently completed; I hope to include it here when I get my copy. I saw the project on a private-viewers-only facebook page. If I could, I would now change some of my acting choices, but the project looks great. I will withhold commentary on my German until my Austrian friend gives it a listen. I delight in expert opinions.

I began a new acting class a couple of months back under Bob and Betty Ballew. The class is all on-camera and extremely economical. I find I naturally respect both the teachers, which makes all the difference in the world. Currently, I am working on scenes in which I play a Frenchman and a Russian.

I broke my hand about three weeks ago. I was playing, of all things, a dancing boxer. In this short film, I got knocked out by another boxer, but to settle the score, I challenged him to a dance off. I know it sounds like a crazy concept, but the hand aside, it was an enjoyable experience. I am hopeful to get some good dancing footage out of the deal. Many of you do not know that I learned some Latin dancing down in Colombia; I then took Latin and ballroom lessons in the States for a while, and even took part in a competition.

To make a crazy story even crazier, I went to the doctor yesterday so she could take off my cast, check out my hand, and so I thought, put on a new cast. However, upon looking at my arm, the doctor said ”I don’t need you in a cast anymore.” She even said I could use my hand as I normally would, and in a week or so, I could even try doing pull ups. She is the medical professional, not me, so I will be pleased to do as she says.

In any case, I hope you are all very well.

May your days be good ones!

Over the summer, I shared how people inside and outside the entertainment industry frequently mention a resemblance to Viggo Mortensen (see http://hansroberts.wordpress.com/?s=Viggo&submit=GO). Incidentally, thank you, Viggo fans, for your kind comments in this regard.

I ended the post by saying while I thought such a comparison was a compliment, it remained to be seen whether it would help my acting career.

On a small scale, it did help me get a recent audition. Before I even met a director, he was sure I was “perfect for the part! I saw your picture and knew you were the one!” The part was for a Russian mobster, very similar to the part Viggo Mortensen played in Eastern Promises. As you can see below, the style of my head shot in no way suggested a mobster personality.

My head shot

Through amateur studies in counseling, I have learned about a dynamic called transference. Each of us, every day of our lives, applies to current pursuits what we have learned from previous experiences. This includes impressions from people in our past. My theory is that when people experience Viggo Mortensen in a certain way (by watching him in a film), they expect the same of those who resemble him, be it in appearance or manner.

Consequently, I was excited about possible applications of this theory when I learned Viggo had a new role in a Western film, Appaloosa. However, his beard and mustache in the role certainly detract from any purported resemblance, so I do not expect any increase in calls for Westerns.

Cowboy Hans

Feel free to comment about Viggo rather than me–no fleas on me, but he is great.

In September, I auditioned for a short film based on a novel, directed by USC student Kat Lo. I did not get the role, but when I met Kat, I found her creative, thoughtful and interested in literature, just the sort of director I would like to work with. Not long afterward, she released a breakdown for another short film based on the novel London Fields. I prepared for the role of a snobby aristocrat, but Kat had me read for the part of a lower class, womanizing dart player named Keith Talent.

When Kat called to offer me the role, I was excited to get footage with my Northern British accent. It did not immediately strike me as a particularly difficult role; after all, I am an actor, and provided I look the part, I can play any role if I choose to act a certain way, right?

However, at the first rehearsal I was rigid when I needed to be loose. I was nervous when I needed to be forward.

Kat and I conferred about how different the character and I were. Keith Talent’s description included the following: “Dresses like a 1970’s porn star. Professional darts player. Often uses vulgarity. Smooth talking. Womanizing and cheating on his wife. Doesn’t care about other people’s feelings provided he gets what he wants.”

Kat suggested I invent an appropriate history for the character and practice in front of a mirror while focusing on how I ought to move. She also had me watch Trainspotting, saying Keith Talent was like a combination of Sick Boy (the pretty boy character) and Begbie (the rough one who is always beating others up). These activities were probably helpful, but certainly useful were her suggestions of what my character really wanted. Where I had focused on his desire for a certain woman, he also wanted to outshine the upper class patrons of the bar in conquering her.

After a work-filled weekend that included polishing up my North Country British accent, we performed our scene for Kat’s professor (Jeremy Kagen) and class. Most illuminating was Professor Kagen’s admonition that we discuss our relationships with all the characters in the scene rather than just those with whom we interact most.

When we shot the film a week later at a pub in Pasadena, the moment arrived when I blessedly forgot about my accent and preparation. This is not to say I ceased to employ the accent and preparation, but rather that I did so less consciously, thus allowing me to devote myself to the scene.

This moment was possible partly because I had done the work I needed to do. Also, I had the opportunity to forget about myself for awhile.  I hope to be able to do this more and more–to simply be a person and to be conscious of the other actors.

Filmmakers, if any of you are working on period pieces or projects with accents, please comment hear! British accents aside, I specialize in roles with Russian, German and French accents. I also speak French and Spanish fluently.

NOTE: I wrote this a month or so ago, but am only now posting it. Enjoy.

My schedule last week was something like this:

Monday: I shot a pilot in which I played a Nazi ensign on an aircraft carrier. I enjoyed working with the director, and I hope to follow up with an actor I met.  Maybe we could work together in future, or maybe I just made a friend.

Tuesday: I interned from 10 am to 6 pm. It is a continual field trip for me to drive over the mountains to West Hollywood each day. It is a swanky neighborhood I rarely have occasion to visit. Paris Hilton used to live up the street from us; we are just above Sunset Boulevard. Don’t remember what I did exactly…might have read a script, worked on compiling some lists from my boss Julia or both.

After interning, I filled in for another worker at Act Now (where I help out in the office and take classes–www.actnownetwork.com); I interacted a bit with casting directors Fern Champion and Jason James. I also got to interact with the other actors who work at Act Now–this has been a great highlight for me because I have constant contact with the same people. This is in contrast to meeting people on set and rarely seeing them again, a matter of course in moving from one acting project to another.

Wednesday: At my internship, my other boss Bill and I put together a list of Australian actors to audition for a project we may cast. Once or twice in the past, we have posted requests for actors on LA Casting and Breakdowns Express. When we request foreign actors, many American actors pretend they are foreign in their submission. A couple of times we have received submissions from actors I know.

After work, I went to a Jamie Cullum concert at the Hollywood Bowl with my roommate and his girlfriend. The concert was excellent, though he did not play my favorite “I’m All at Sea.”

Thursday: I interned from 10 to 6. Afterward, I went to Act Now for a class with Don Phillip Smith of “The Young and the Restless.” If any readers could introduce me to people who work in soaps, please leave a comment. I have a particular interest in soap opera acting.

Friday: I interned from 10 am to 6pm.

Saturday: I had two auditions; one was in Beverly Hills for a short film, and the other was in Hollywood for a political advertisement.

Michelle Kunz took most of the head shots you’ll find on my blog. I recommend her unabashedly.  She has a good eye and is perfectly pleasant to work with.

You can get in contact with her via her web site: http://www.mishinaphotography.com/

JK Rowling’s talk about the fringe benefits of failure directly apply to pursuits of acting, virtually all of which involve a period of failure. Watch it at the link below. Alternatively, text follows.

 http://harvardmagazine.com/go/jkrowling.html 

Copyright of JK Rowling, June 2008

President Faust, members of the Harvard Corporation and the Board of Overseers, members of the faculty, proud parents, and, above all, graduates.

The first thing I would like to say is ‘thank you.’ Not only has Harvard given me an extraordinary honour, but the weeks of fear and nausea I’ve experienced at the thought of giving this commencement address have made me lose weight. A win-win situation! Now all I have to do is take deep breaths, squint at the red banners and fool myself into believing I am at the world’s best-educated Harry Potter convention.

Delivering a commencement address is a great responsibility; or so I thought until I cast my mind back to my own graduation. The commencement speaker that day was the distinguished British philosopher Baroness Mary Warnock. Reflecting on her speech has helped me enormously in writing this one, because it turns out that I can’t remember a single word she said. This liberating discovery enables me to proceed without any fear that I might inadvertently influence you to abandon promising careers in business, law or politics for the giddy delights of becoming a gay wizard.

You see? If all you remember in years to come is the ‘gay wizard’ joke, I’ve still come out ahead of Baroness Mary Warnock. Achievable goals: the first step towards personal improvement.

Actually, I have wracked my mind and heart for what I ought to say to you today. I have asked myself what I wish I had known at my own graduation, and what important lessons I have learned in the 21 years that has expired between that day and this.

I have come up with two answers. On this wonderful day when we are gathered together to celebrate your academic success, I have decided to talk to you about the benefits of failure. And as you stand on the threshold of what is sometimes called ‘real life’, I want to extol the crucial importance of imagination.

These might seem quixotic or paradoxical choices, but please bear with me.

Looking back at the 21-year-old that I was at graduation, is a slightly uncomfortable experience for the 42-year-old that she has become. Half my lifetime ago, I was striking an uneasy balance between the ambition I had for myself, and what those closest to me expected of me.

I was convinced that the only thing I wanted to do, ever, was to write novels. However, my parents, both of whom came from impoverished backgrounds and neither of whom had been to college, took the view that my overactive imagination was an amusing personal quirk that could never pay a mortgage, or secure a pension.

They had hoped that I would take a vocational degree; I wanted to study English Literature. A compromise was reached that in retrospect satisfied nobody, and I went up to study Modern Languages. Hardly had my parents’ car rounded the corner at the end of the road than I ditched German and scuttled off down the Classics corridor.

I cannot remember telling my parents that I was studying Classics; they might well have found out for the first time on graduation day. Of all subjects on this planet, I think they would have been hard put to name one less useful than Greek mythology when it came to securing the keys to an executive bathroom.

I would like to make it clear, in parenthesis, that I do not blame my parents for their point of view. There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction; the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you. What is more, I cannot criticise my parents for hoping that I would never experience poverty. They had been poor themselves, and I have since been poor, and I quite agree with them that it is not an ennobling experience. Poverty entails fear, and stress, and sometimes depression; it means a thousand petty humiliations and hardships. Climbing out of poverty by your own efforts, that is indeed something on which to pride yourself, but poverty itself is romanticised only by fools.

What I feared most for myself at your age was not poverty, but failure.

At your age, in spite of a distinct lack of motivation at university, where I had spent far too long in the coffee bar writing stories, and far too little time at lectures, I had a knack for passing examinations, and that, for years, had been the measure of success in my life and that of my peers.

I am not dull enough to suppose that because you are young, gifted and well-educated, you have never known hardship or heartbreak. Talent and intelligence never yet inoculated anyone against the caprice of the Fates, and I do not for a moment suppose that everyone here has enjoyed an existence of unruffled privilege and contentment.

However, the fact that you are graduating from Harvard suggests that you are not very well-acquainted with failure. You might be driven by a fear of failure quite as much as a desire for success. Indeed, your conception of failure might not be too far from the average person’s idea of success, so high have you already flown academically.

Ultimately, we all have to decide for ourselves what constitutes failure, but the world is quite eager to give you a set of criteria if you let it. So I think it fair to say that by any conventional measure, a mere seven years after my graduation day, I had failed on an epic scale. An exceptionally short-lived marriage had imploded, and I was jobless, a lone parent, and as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain, without being homeless. The fears my parents had had for me, and that I had had for myself, had both come to pass, and by every usual standard, I was the biggest failure I knew.

Now, I am not going to stand here and tell you that failure is fun. That period of my life was a dark one, and I had no idea that there was going to be what the press has since represented as a kind of fairy tale resolution. I had no idea how far the tunnel extended, and for a long time, any light at the end of it was a hope rather than a reality.

So why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me. Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one arena I believed I truly belonged. I was set free, because my greatest fear had already been realised, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.

You might never fail on the scale I did, but some failure in life is inevitable. It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all – in which case, you fail by default.

Failure gave me an inner security that I had never attained by passing examinations. Failure taught me things about myself that I could have learned no other way. I discovered that I had a strong will, and more discipline than I had suspected; I also found out that I had friends whose value was truly above rubies.

The knowledge that you have emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive. You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity. Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more to me than any qualification I ever earned.

Given a time machine or a Time Turner, I would tell my 21-year-old self that personal happiness lies in knowing that life is not a check-list of acquisition or achievement. Your qualifications, your CV, are not your life, though you will meet many people of my age and older who confuse the two. Life is difficult, and complicated, and beyond anyone’s total control, and the humility to know that will enable you to survive its vicissitudes.

You might think that I chose my second theme, the importance of imagination, because of the part it played in rebuilding my life, but that is not wholly so. Though I will defend the value of bedtime stories to my last gasp, I have learned to value imagination in a much broader sense. Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation. In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power that enables us to empathise with humans whose experiences we have never shared.

One of the greatest formative experiences of my life preceded Harry Potter, though it informed much of what I subsequently wrote in those books. This revelation came in the form of one of my earliest day jobs. Though I was sloping off to write stories during my lunch hours, I paid the rent in my early 20s by working in the research department at Amnesty International’s headquarters in London.

There in my little office I read hastily scribbled letters smuggled out of totalitarian regimes by men and women who were risking imprisonment to inform the outside world of what was happening to them. I saw photographs of those who had disappeared without trace, sent to Amnesty by their desperate families and friends. I read the testimony of torture victims and saw pictures of their injuries. I opened handwritten, eye-witness accounts of summary trials and executions, of kidnappings and rapes.

Many of my co-workers were ex-political prisoners, people who had been displaced from their homes, or fled into exile, because they had the temerity to think independently of their government. Visitors to our office included those who had come to give information, or to try and find out what had happened to those they had been forced to leave behind.

I shall never forget the African torture victim, a young man no older than I was at the time, who had become mentally ill after all he had endured in his homeland. He trembled uncontrollably as he spoke into a video camera about the brutality inflicted upon him. He was a foot taller than I was, and seemed as fragile as a child. I was given the job of escorting him to the Underground Station afterwards, and this man whose life had been shattered by cruelty took my hand with exquisite courtesy, and wished me future happiness.

And as long as I live I shall remember walking along an empty corridor and suddenly hearing, from behind a closed door, a scream of pain and horror such as I have never heard since. The door opened, and the researcher poked out her head and told me to run and make a hot drink for the young man sitting with her. She had just given him the news that in retaliation for his own outspokenness against his country’s regime, his mother had been seized and executed.

Every day of my working week in my early 20s I was reminded how incredibly fortunate I was, to live in a country with a democratically elected government, where legal representation and a public trial were the rights of everyone.

Every day, I saw more evidence about the evils humankind will inflict on their fellow humans, to gain or maintain power. I began to have nightmares, literal nightmares, about some of the things I saw, heard and read.

And yet I also learned more about human goodness at Amnesty International than I had ever known before.

Amnesty mobilises thousands of people who have never been tortured or imprisoned for their beliefs to act on behalf of those who have. The power of human empathy, leading to collective action, saves lives, and frees prisoners. Ordinary people, whose personal well-being and security are assured, join together in huge numbers to save people they do not know, and will never meet. My small participation in that process was one of the most humbling and inspiring experiences of my life.

Unlike any other creature on this planet, humans can learn and understand, without having experienced. They can think themselves into other people’s minds, imagine themselves into other people’s places.

Of course, this is a power, like my brand of fictional magic, that is morally neutral. One might use such an ability to manipulate, or control, just as much as to understand or sympathise.

And many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all. They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are. They can refuse to hear screams or to peer inside cages; they can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally; they can refuse to know.

I might be tempted to envy people who can live that way, except that I do not think they have any fewer nightmares than I do. Choosing to live in narrow spaces can lead to a form of mental agoraphobia, and that brings its own terrors. I think the wilfully unimaginative see more monsters. They are often more afraid.

What is more, those who choose not to empathise may enable real monsters. For without ever committing an act of outright evil ourselves, we collude with it, through our own apathy.

One of the many things I learned at the end of that Classics corridor down which I ventured at the age of 18, in search of something I could not then define, was this, written by the Greek author Plutarch: What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality.

That is an astonishing statement and yet proven a thousand times every day of our lives. It expresses, in part, our inescapable connection with the outside world, the fact that we touch other people’s lives simply by existing.

But how much more are you, Harvard graduates of 2008, likely to touch other people’s lives? Your intelligence, your capacity for hard work, the education you have earned and received, give you unique status, and unique responsibilities. Even your nationality sets you apart. The great majority of you belong to the world’s only remaining superpower. The way you vote, the way you live, the way you protest, the pressure you bring to bear on your government, has an impact way beyond your borders. That is your privilege, and your burden.

If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice; if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless; if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped transform for the better. We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.

I am nearly finished. I have one last hope for you, which is something that I already had at 21. The friends with whom I sat on graduation day have been my friends for life. They are my children’s godparents, the people to whom I’ve been able to turn in times of trouble, friends who have been kind enough not to sue me when I’ve used their names for Death Eaters. At our graduation we were bound by enormous affection, by our shared experience of a time that could never come again, and, of course, by the knowledge that we held certain photographic evidence that would be exceptionally valuable if any of us ran for Prime Minister.

So today, I can wish you nothing better than similar friendships. And tomorrow, I hope that even if you remember not a single word of mine, you remember those of Seneca, another of those old Romans I met when I fled down the Classics corridor, in retreat from career ladders, in search of ancient wisdom:
As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.
I wish you all very good lives.
Thank you very much.

As the school year drew to a close, I knew I wanted to make this summer count for my acting career. Besides submitting myself for roles as usual, I decided to find an internship where I could learn more about the business of acting, to work as much as I could at Act Now (a networking company where casting directors teach classes) and to add to my list of “special skills” that suit me for particular roles.

I acted in at least five projects, two of which were with The Greenhouse (www.greenhouseproductions.com), a film co-op I joined a few months ago. I am excited to see the finished projects when we screen them October 7, and more importantly, I am eager to grow with these fine folks—our already good productions look to become better and better. Early in the summer, I also acted in “Stupid Laws,” to air on cable in Great Britain. Also, my friend Yong asked me to star in a short he wrote; it was unique to me because we shot the film quite out of order, and I will get to see whether my acting is coherent—will I seem too excited early on and then subdued in later scenes? And finally, last week I played a Nazi soldier for a History Channel type pilot. We shot it on a green screen, which was a first for me.

When looking for an internship, I applied at Rough Diamond Management and Productions, where one of my best friends interned last summer. My internship there has been unique because the whole office consists of two executives and two interns (including me). Therefore, my activities have been manifold: I helped organize two casting sessions, from calling in actors to taping the auditions; I helped come up with a list of well known actors for a future film project; I read through several scripts to give my opinion on their value; my boss invited me to several parties, where I have met interesting civilians and industry people. And throughout all this, I have gotten to ask many questions of my two bosses; I have genuinely enjoyed the experience.

At Act Now (www.actnownetwork.com), I met or acted for several casting directors that were new to me. One casts The Young and the Restless, another is on the directing team there, another casts CSI, two cast independent films and another casts Terminator: the Sara Connor Chronicles. In one workshop, we prepared monologues and performed them for prospective theatrical agents. I aim to keep in touch on some level with most of these individuals, whether as a friend, as a business contact or both.

Two special skills new to my repertoire include beginning violin and a Northern British accent. I got a great deal on a violin, and my roommate’s friend offered to teach me lessons for $15 a week. When I picked up the violin, I felt like Harry Potter when he picked up the right wand—electric. I aim to continue in this mostly because I enjoy it, but also because proficient violin skills might qualify me for a part in future.

I superficially studied a Northern British accent early in the summer, but when I got called in for an audition, I kicked preparation into high gear. Over the course of a weekend, I spent about 25 hours learning the part, going over an accent tape, talking with people in the accent and watching a film that featured the Northern British accent. I did not get the role, but I moved toward authenticity in this accent.

Quite importantly for me, I became eligible to join the Screen Actors Guild this summer. Like so many other steps in acting, this does not make one’s career by any means, but SAG-eligibility is essential to be called in for most television programs.

My perspective on my acting career changes constantly. At 8am, I might be hopefully optimistic. At 2pm I might be smiling madly about new contacts. At 7pm my mood might be waning, and at 10pm I might be doubtful about my acting skills.

My overall trend, though, is to be pleased with recent growth as an actor and thankfulness for recent opportunities.

Hi, guys. I won’t be blogging for a little while, as I am on my summer holiday. Pumped to see family and friends, I am hoping to recharge before getting back at it.

Happy first half of July,

  Hans