by Wil Wheaton
I read the scene and he asks me if I wouldn’t mind doing a third scene. This is a good sign, because he wouldn’t ask for it if he wasn’t happy with what I’d already done.
But I’ve had all of 30 minutes with the material and I really haven’t prepared this scene at all . . . I mean, I read it once, looked at it again when I was waiting, but I am not nearly as confident with it as I am with the others . . . but I do it anyway and it feels really good.
I have really good instincts as an actor. I know when I totally suck and I know when I’ve done a good job. To use a baseball metaphor: I know when I’ve hit it out, when I bounce back to the mound and when I go down swinging. With the first scene, I hit it deep to center. With the second scene, I hit it out. I really need to get a stand-up double on this third scene, now. So I read it, and that’s exactly what I do. If I’d had some more time with it, I would have gotten a triple, for sure, but I’ll take the double, and hope that Sammy drives me in.
I finish, and put down my script. Jonathan says to the producers, “He is such a great actor.”
He turns to me and says, “You are such a wonderful actor. You still have it, W.”
Of course, it would be great to get this job, because I’d like to work with him and I think the marketing opportunity for the studio is huge: launch the new Twilight Zone with two guys from Star Trek!
But even if I don’t book the job, I will have Jonathan’s kindness and warmth to hold on to. It will be good balance for all the times I read for people who treat me like shit, and, as longtime readers know, it’s all about The Balance.
I had a very good audition, had fun seeing my friend, and left feeling like someone I’d looked up to for several years was proud of me. The truth was, I knew that I wasn’t going to get the job when I walked into the hallway, because all of the other actors (including Casey Siemaszeko, who played Vern’s older brother Billy in Stand By Me) were at least 10 years older than me. I honestly didn’t care, though. I was just happy to have done a good job.
* * *
[7] If I hadn’t been moved to that table, I would have been entirely cut out of the movie. As it is, you can still see me in the wide-screen version if you have a DVD player with a really good freeze-frame.
[8] I learned from a costumer when I was very young that professional actors always hung up their costumes at the end of the day. To this day, when someone is a pain in the ass on the set, I will say to a costumer, “He doesn’t hang up his costume, does he?” So far, I haven’t been wrong.
[9] A restaurant that used to be on Melrose, with a back door that opened right onto the Paramount lot. It was bulldozed for “progress” in the 1990s.
Chapter 8. April’s Fool
“CREATIVITY IS THE ABSENCE OF FEAR,” a friend of mine liked to say. After Vegas, Weakest Link, The Galaxy Ball, and my return “home” on the set of Nemesis, a lot of the fear that Prove To Everyone That Quitting Star Trek Wasn’t A Mistake and The Voice of Self Doubt relied upon to survive was gone. My creativity blossomed as a result. When I wrote in my weblog, I produced entries that were genuinely funny and entertaining . . . to me at least.
10 MARCH 2002
Make it burn!
As I write this, Anne is behind me, doing some workout video tape, and I can only hear the breathless voice of the girl who is leading the workout saying, “Oh yeah, oh yeah, doesn’t that feel good? Don’t stop, you’re almost there. *pant* *pant*”
If I didn’t know any better, I’d think she was watching “Debbie Does 7-Minute Abs.”
But seriously folks, try the fish, and be sure to stick around for the comedy and magic stylings of Johnny Funnypants! I hear the late show gets a little naughty.
I was overflowing with creative energy, and on April 1st, I pulled a notorious April Fool’s joke.
01 APRIL 2002
Good News, Bad News
Good morning, everyone and happy April! I hope everyone had a nice weekend. Okay, let’s get straight to business. Here’s the bad news: the entire site has crashed and we can’t figure out why. I don’t know when the crash happened, or why, because I was offline all weekend, but I’m working on it. I suppose that if you can read this, it means things are working again, which will bring us to our second bad news: I tried to upgrade to Movable Type 2.0 on Friday and it broke. Goddammit! I swear, I am fucking cursed. I know what went wrong and I’m going to start pleading with the authors for some help. They seem like cool people, so hopefully they will be willing to give me a hand. *sigh*
On to the good news! Oh, this is such amazingly good news and it’s been so hard to keep this to myself, but there have been contract talks and all sorts of negotiations and all that . . . but I can finally make the big big announcement.
The official announcement will be made on Thursday, but I’ve been given permission by Paramount’s hired goons to make the announcement today.
In four weeks, I will be joining the cast of Enterprise in a recurring role!
The details are still being worked out, but basically what they plan to do is have Wesley use his Time Traveler abilities to move through space and time to the NX-01. He’ll be more like the dark, troubled Wesley of “The First Duty” and “Final Mission” and less like the gee-whiz Wesley of days gone by.
Here’s a little history: Nemesis is testing very well and Paramount is extremely excited that this lame little website has generated such a huge following. I guess some people started a letter-writing campaign without my knowledge and Paramount listened. I spent most of last week on conference calls with Rick and Brannon, as well as some of the brass at Paramount, working out the details, making sure that Wesley will not be saving the NX-01 all the time.
*grin*
I’ll be in 8 of 22 episodes for the two seasons, with an option to renegotiate at the end of the second season. I’m only recurring to allow me the freedom to participate in other shows, and pursue other projects.
I’m so freakin’ excited, I don’t even know what else to say. I can’t believe that I’m going to be working on Star Trek again and I can’t believe that I’m going to be working on Stages 8 and 9 again.
I have to go to a fitting right now. I’ll write more when I have more details. I hope everyone has a great day!!
The Internet bought it completely. My announcement was posted on the mega sites Slashdot and Fark (who were in on the joke), and the “news” was carried by many sci-fi newswires (who were not). I had very carefully crafted the news, working it out over the course of several of days, adding in difficult-to-verify yet plausible details, like the testing status of Nemesis (they didn’t even have a rough cut at the time) and talking with the producers about the nature of Wesley’s character upon his return.
Minutes after I’d posted the prank, the e-mails began to pour in. Hundreds of Trekkies joined the regular readers of my website in expressing the excitement I would have felt had it been real. The genuine happiness and kindness, pouring in from people all over the world, was the opposite of the reaction I expected. As the happy e-mails piled up, I began to feel like I was misleading these people and taking advantage of their good will. By the afternoon, I felt awful and decided to set the record straight.
April Fool’s!
Well, most of you have figured it out by now, but the truth is . . .
. . . I’m not gonna be on Enterprise. Even as a computer voice, or within the secret, dirty, late-night thoughts of Capt. Archer.
I hope everyone takes this in good humor. Lots of people sent really kind and sweet congratulatory messages and I actually feel pretty badly for fooling such nice people. All the idiots who thought it was a really good idea to fill my inbox with “Wesley is gonna ruin Enterprise" crap should get a life and direct any further comments to /dev/null.
To be honest I was surprised at how many people were wishing me well; I was expecting the Kill Wesley Crowd to come out instead.
I think the greatest highlight of the day came when my mom called Anne while I was out.<
br />
The conversation went something like this:
Mom: Do you have something to tell me?
Anne: Uh, no.
Mom: Do you have some big news about Wil?
Anne: Oh, that. Uh, what day is today?
Mom: It’s Monday!
Anne: Right. And the date is . . .?
Mom: It’s April Fir- OH! Damn you!
Heh. I guess my dad was all pissed off, stomping around my parent’s house because I didn’t tell them myself and he “had to read it on Wil’s fucking website!”
Thanks go to the Frodo Crew? who helped me take this scheme from stupid idea to stupid fruition: Spudnuts, jbay, JSc, Roughy, Bobby The Mat and Greeny. Also to /. and FARK, for getting on board.
All those people really did want me to succeed, and they really were happy for me. The joy that I thought I would have felt, had I been given a chance to do Star Trek again, became real and undeniable when I realized that I had redefined myself with my weblog. Some people would still see me as That Washed Up Guy Who Used To Be An Actor When He Was A Kid, but many more people, including myself, saw me as That Guy With The Cool Weblog Who Is Just A Geek Like The Rest Of Us.
It was a good time to have this realization, because my acting career, which hadn’t really gone anywhere for years, was about to crash right into a brick wall.
Chapter 9. Alone Again, Or . . .
ON APRIL 5TH, 2002, as Anne and I were packing for a Spring Break trip to Lake Tahoe with Ryan and Nolan for a much-needed change of scenery, I received a phone call from my manager. It was the end of pilot season—a period at the beginning of each year when studios cast for their new fall television shows. Most actors, myself included, hope to get a job on a pilot each year, because it means financial security and a chance to be on the next Friends or West Wing. During pilot season, most actors have several auditions each week, and it’s a hectic but exciting time. The pilot season that had just ended was the fourth in a row where I’d had fewer than 10 auditions, all of them failures.
“Is your fax machine on?” my manager said.
“Yeah.”
“Good. I’m sending you two appointment sheets for next week.”
“Oh crap,” I said. “I can’t go. It’s Spring break for the kids, and Anne and I are taking them up to Lake Tahoe.”
“When do you leave?”
“In about 20 minutes. When are the auditions?”
“You’ve got an independent film on Tuesday, and at least one, possibly two pilots on Wednesday. Callbacks will be Thursday or Friday.”
“What do you think I should do?”
“I can’t make that decision for you. Talk it over with Anne and call me right back.”
I hung up the phone.
“I know how you feel about your family, but this is our last shot at pilot season,” said a familiar voice.
“This is stupid, Prove To Everyone,” I replied. “You and I both know I’m not going to book these jobs, and we’re all looking forward to this vacation. We’re packing up the car, for fuck’s sake.”
“What the fuck is wrong with you?! You’ve had ONE audition in months, and you’re going to pass on THREE OF THEM in one week? Do you want to be an actor or not?!”
“I’m not so sure I do.”
“Oh, you think you’re going to be a big writer because you write a stupid weblog?”we were joined by The Voice of Self Doubt.
“I thought you guys were gone,” I said.
“We were just waiting for you to call on us again. You know that fear you feel right now? That fear that you may be letting a golden opportunity slip through your fingers, and you’ll regret it for the rest of your life? We felt it too.” Prove To Everyone was right. The Fear hadn’t completely gone away. I’d just managed to keep it hidden for a few months.
“If you blow off this opportunity, you will live the rest of your life as That Washed Up Has Been Who Used To Be An Actor When He Was A Kid,” he said.
I stammered something about April Fool’s and how I’d redefined myself.
“That’s bullshit. Anyone can write a bunch of drivel on the Internet,” said The Voice of Self Doubt.
“No, Wil’s right. If he passes on these auditions, he can always sign autographs at a Star Trek convention for a few more years until he digs himself out of debt,” Prove To Everyone said. “And there’s always Celebrity Boxing to get that career going again.”
I walked out to the car and told Anne that I had to stay home.
A few minutes later, we called the kids over to the dining room table.
“You guys, I just got a call from Chris,” I said, “and I have two auditions next week.”
“Did you tell him that we’re going on vacation?” Nolan said.
I couldn’t look him in the eye. “I told him that we had that planned, but I have to stay here and go on these auditions.”
“Why?! We’re getting ready to leave!” Ryan said.
I looked to Anne. Her eyes were welling up, but she said nothing.
“I’m really sorry, you guys. I haven’t had any good opportunities for work in months, and I have to take these chances when they come along.”
It was silent in our house. A car drove by outside. Nolan said, “Well, can you drive up and meet us?”
I shook my head. “It’s eight hours there and back, Nolan. If I get a callback, I’d just have to turn right around and come home.”
“This sucks,” he said.
I looked at Anne again. She looked away.
“I know how much we’re all looking forward to this trip,” I said, “but I just can’t go. Once you’re there, you won’t miss me at all.”
We all knew that wasn’t true. We were having enormous problems with Anne’s ex-husband, and our family desperately needed to get away from him. I really didn’t want to stay home. I wanted to go with them, and play Auto Bingo and I Spy on the drive up. I wanted to play with the kids in the melting snow and roast marshmallows over the cabin’s wood-burning stove.
Silence hung over the four of us, until Anne quietly said, “Why don’t you two go and get your backpacks, and take them to the car.”
The boys went into the back of the house, and I looked at my wife.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“I know.” She wiped tears out of her eyes and left me alone at the table.
“You did the right thing,” Prove To Everyone said.
“Fuck you,” I said.
I sadly bid them farewell and watched them drive up our street. I stood at the end of our driveway long after they’d passed out of sight. When I walked into our silent and empty house, I sat at our dining room table, and wondered if I’d made the right decision.
05 APRIL 2002
Alone Again, Or . . .
The Big Plan for this weekend was to go up north with Anne and the kids, because it’s their Spring Break, starting today.
We get the rental minivan (ugh) loaded up and ready to go, and I get a call from my manager: I have two auditions on Monday, both pilots, and I have an audition on Tuesday, for an indie. I’m also supposed to test for at least one, possibly two pilots on Wednesday.
So all of my stuff comes out of the rental beast and I go from spending the weekend with my family to spending it alone, preparing for these three auditions.
Holy crap, how things can change in an instant.
It’s not a bad thing, missing the vacation, because I continue to make it down to the last handful of actors on all my auditions, (except for the call I had last week, where I got to spend all of 25 minutes with the material and the producers were taking calls on their cell phones and leaving the effing room while I was doing my audition) and the more I have the better my odds are . . . but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t going to miss them.
It’s weird to be in my empty house, alone, without even Ferris to keep me company.
It’s just me and the cats, just like the old bachelor days . . . except I am under pain of death to “keep the fuck
ing house clean” from my old lady.
It should be interesting to see how I do on these three auditions, since I’ll have three whole days to prepare a character and memorize the scenes, without any distractions.
What a huge, steaming pile of bullshit! “It’s not a bad thing?” Who did I think I was fooling? Though I was desperately trying to believe that I had made the right decision, I wasn’t even fooling myself. The only saving grace was the minute possibility that I could book one of these jobs. If I did, I would be able to convince myself that I’d made an acceptable sacrifice.
When we actors fight for roles (and unless you’re a Big Hot Superstar, it’s always a fight), we only control about 10% of the factors that will ultimately get us the job: our preparation and how we look. The rest of the process is completely out of our hands and includes elements such as:
Casting Director prejudices—how excited about me is this casting director? This is about 60% of the fight.
Studio pressure—do they want a big name for this part? This is about 20% of the fight.
Nepotism—is one of Jimmy Kimmel’s cousins available? Surprisingly, this is only about 5%.
Chemistry—how do I fit in with the rest of the cast? This, too, is about 5%, but isn’t even a factor until the very end of the process.
Since I had so much at stake, I did everything to ensure that I gave the best auditions possible. I spent lonely and silent hours in my house, creating unnecessarily complex character histories. When I finished, I memorized my lines. When my lines were memorized, I memorized the other character’s lines. When that was finished, I tried different hairstyles and costumes. When I went into those auditions, I wanted to leave as little to chance as possible.
The first audition was a complete disaster.
