Things you already know and 2016 plans

Well, time to do my end of the year blog update. I’ve noticed I’ve only blogged 3 times this year, and all really mainly having to do with work, so I’ll try not to bore you with repeat info. 2015 was kind of a record breaking year for me. The day after I landed back in town after New Years last year I was already booked and back to work day playing on shows, working almost every day until my South America trip. Wowee, what a great trip that was. Aaron and I explored Brazil, Argentina, and Chile. One of the prettiest I have ever been. I got back in town just in time to staff my first tv series….now, I had been staff on shows before, but all mainly indie features, not tv. I’d been working in TV for a little while at that point, but only day playing, so I was pretty excited for this. The show was called Casual (Golden Globe nomiated ;) and it was a great experience. A few days after we wrapped I flew to Florida for a quick trip home before heading off on my European adventure. It went: Ireland, Scotland, London, Germany, Switzerland, Austria. And boy was that an adventure as well. Traveling is the best. So I flew back from Germany to LA and the very next day boarded a flight to Louisiana. Now, Aaron had originally planned on taking the Europe trip with me but wasn’t able to end up coming because he got booked to work on this movie in Louisiana. I told him that I would come out and visit and he said he could probably get me booked on the movie for at least a couple days…..well, 3.5 weeks later of working in the blazing Louisiana dust bowl I get a text to run base camp again on another new tv series so it was back to LA I went. I got back and the next day had my prep day for Superstore, which we all by now know about. (Fingers crossed for season 2!) I went straight from Superstore to working on an HBO pilot and that was a pretty good one as well! If I didn’t like Lena Dunham before, I surely loved her now!! One of the best directors I have worked with. So gracious. The pilot ended just in time for Thanksgiving and for me to just hang out and chill, day playing on shows between then and when I had one more pilot to round out the year the week before I flew home for Christmas. The majority of the crew was from Superstore and we even filmed in the Superstore stage one day, so it was a nice little reunion! Not that you needed it because everyone that reads this obviously keeps up with me on Facebook, but there’s a little (or maybe not so little?) summary of my year! If I can keep this same pattern for 2016 (the rest of my life) it is sure to be another good one! Work>travel>work>travel>work>relax>repeat. 

As I mentioned above, I’ve noticed most of my blogs have to do with work….but I’ve traveled so much this year that I feel like those stories deserve screen time in the wringing out of my memories as well, so something that I’ll be starting in 2016 is a travel website/blog! I’m kinda excited about it! I think it’ll be fun not only going back and writing about my past trips and going through those pictures, but to better document my future trips as well. Coming up in 2016 I already have a pretty solid schedule for the first half of the year (which is kinda surprising for me for this industry to already know my plans/job 5 months in advance! Haha) Starting in January I will be working on a DirectTV show with a couple ADs I’ve never worked with before...as a matter of fact, I don’t know any of the other PAs as well, just 1 of the ADs, so I’m sure it’ll be an experience! That is a very quick show that I’ll only be on for a month and then a few days after I wrap that we start season 2 of Casual! This season we will be filming 13 episodes instead of 10 that we filmed last year for season 1. I haven’t gotten my schedule yet, but that’ll take me until mid-May, just in time to do some traveling!! I believe my options at this point are either a Europe trip with my BFF and roommate Kelly, or a trip to Africa with my other BFF and life partner Aaron. Either way, I can’t go wrong! I’m hoping maybe I can AD an indie after that and maaaybe start up Superstore season 2 after that to close out the year?? (A girl can dream) Wow guys, my life has really started to fall together! This year I’ll have enough days to turn my book in to the DGA for the third area days (near the end of the year) so these next couple of years will definitely be interesting! 

Thanks so much for keeping up with me this year, it was a wild one! I laughed, I cried, I blew a tire in the middle of nowhere in Chile, I spent my birthday with a half drunk man in a cemetery in Edinburgh, I trekked on a glacier, I worked on a Golden Globe nominated show, I took a 46 hour train ride from Chicago to Portland, I had my name scroll through on the credits on national television, I started liking someone again and learned I am not good with rejection, I binge watched so many tv series in 1 weekend, I woke up at 315am for work, I slept in till 1130 because I didn’t have to work, I introduced someone new to Mosaic, I got evacuated from Mosaic because of a bomb scare, I laughed, I cried. 

Thanks 2015. 

Superstore

(Obviously I am posting this late...but here is what I documented while flying home during our last hiatus)

Currently on my flight back home during our last hiatus from Superstore and I didn’t bring a book or my ipad or anything to read so I’m just being bored on my laptop, going over my calendar when I had to delete the last 2 weeks of Superstore from my calendar. It was so sad. I was even feeling weird coming to Florida because I knew that when I got back and we were back from our hiatus it would mean we only had 1 more week left. Our last episode. Originally we were supposed to have 13 episodes but because of the Olympics and presidential debates and blah blah blah NBC had to cut us down to 11 episodes. It was such a sad day when we all found out. Our crew is so great and I really enjoy everyone. I get along great with the other PAs and ADs and our trainee and the hair and make up and wardrobe department (which is especially good since other than the actors and the ADs, they are the other people I have to interact and work with the most) But the whole crew in general gets along really great. This is seriously the best show I have ever worked on and probably will ever work on. We rarely have shooting days that go over the standard 12 hour day. The show in and of itself is hilarious. The actors have us laughing every single day. The best takes are when the actors improv their lines and come up with a new ridiculous line every time. There are definitely diva actors out there and we are lucky enough on this show that all of our cast are so great. Yesterday one of our actors, Ben Feldman, was teaching me how to use his little segway thing going down the street between our stages and I just thought, this is such a fun show, I don’t think I’ll ever have a show like this again. All our actors were wrapped yesterday probably an hour before the rest of the crew was done and about 15-20 minutes after our last actors were wrapped our second AD got to me over the walkie and was like Amy, why are you still here?? I came up with the excuse that I hadn’t signed the actors out yet (which I hadn’t because they were hanging out and talking with a producer) but even if I had...and when I did, I didn’t want to leave. I went back to stage 1 to hang out and see who won our $5 Friday little game we do every Friday. It was a little group of 3 PAs and 2 ADs standing around talking before we wrapped and even though I know I didn’t have to be there, I wanted to be. I like talking with them and hanging out with them. It doesn’t even seem like work, it’s fun. This is exactly the job where people say ‘I want a job where it doesn’t feel like a job when you go to it’ This is that job. ...I mean, obviously it is work and we have stuff to do, but that’s what makes it good. I feel productive, get to hang out with friends, make a TV show, laugh, eat, ride around in a golf cart, that’s what I do with my day. And I get to do this every day and get paid for it! It really is a dream. This is the perfect show I’ve always wanted and I am so lucky that somehow I was able to end up on it. Man I am going to be so so sad when it ends and just the thought of having to wait till August to work on it again is disappointing, but also the fact that we will get to work on it again and that it is actually a show that I get to work on is enough that will hopefully get me through. I can’t wait till it airs and I especially can’t wait for it to be officially picked up for a season 2 and for us to start filming it, haha. 

What Louisiana Taught Me

Currently writing from my flight back to LA from Louisiana. The past 2 months I have spent approximately 2 days in LA- I’ve gotta say, its been a crazy 2 months but I’ve loved them and it kinda feels weird heading back and knowing I’ll be back there for a while (although who am I kidding, I am already planning another trip out of town in a couple months from now, haha) 

I was in Louisiana for 3 and a half weeks and even though in the grand scheme of things that doesn’t seem too long, it really made me realize some things and it was such a nice entry back into the states and work after my month off traveling around from Florida to/throughout Europe. I guess I can start off why I went there in the first place...as we all know Aaron is one of my best friends and he had been there working for a couple months on a movie...I had wrapped my show before going to Europe and didn’t have anything lined up for when I got back, and he had always said that I should come and visit him and maybe even work on his show since they could always use more help. So when I was on my train to Dublin when I was in Ireland I booked my one way flight to Baton Rouge and I guess the rest was history. I got there right as they were staffing up a second unit so the timing ended up working out very well! Although it was great that I was able to go there and just end up basically working staff on this movie until something else came up, it was the people and Louisiana that really have made it sad for me to go. I was able to meet and work with a lot of really great people who I will miss working with. This AD staff made me laugh every.single.day. They were so great. Yea, at the end of it I was dying to get out of there cause it was hot and dusty and frustrating and they had too many PAs sometimes so I felt useless, but at the end of the day, it was a job I will always remember and be grateful for, for it let me experience Louisiana and the people in it. My favorite part of the 3.5 weeks there were the times we weren’t working (obviously) and why I would’ve stayed there longer if I could. Where I was staying was a log cabin-like house on a lake in the woods. If this doesn’t say Amy I don’t know what does. That alone made me like it there. I spent most of my time sharing a room with Aaron and since he basically lives in every state/country other than LA, it was so nice to be able to spend this time with him. You know when you have a best friend but don’t get to see them that much and then you get to spend some time with them and the whole time you’re thinking...I have really missed this person, I’m glad I’m here and I’m glad they are here and you remember how good it is to have them in your life? This whole trip was like that. I am now making a clause in our friendship we can’t go however many months without being in the same city (...Aaron I’m working up a draft now, I’ll mail it to you for review) My first full day there we decided spur of the moment to take a quick (2.5 hour?) drive to New Orleans to get dinner as a good welcoming to Louisiana even though we had a 430am call time the next day. We had nights in Baton Rouge with the other PAs going to dinners and seeing a movie and another New Orleans weekend where we ate our way through town and gosh darn it I wish I would’ve had at least 1 more weekend for 1 more adventure. One day we had a later call time for work so we took a quick canoe trip around the lake before going in. We took late night walks around the neighborhood and sweated walking around at midnight because it just never seems to get cool there. We went over to the other PA house to hang out and had a bridge party on their cool bridge in the woods draped in outdoor lights while we sat around and listened to music and tried home made apple pie moonshine. It was just always a good time. I learned Arabic every day driving home from work! People would text me and ask me….are you still in Louisiana?? When are you coming back? What are you doing there? Is there anything there other than NOLA?? Are you excited to go back to LA? And to answer all of those questions- well, read the above paragraph. Why would I not be loving it here and want to get back to LA? Everyday I would drive on small town roads with green trees covering my drive and I would pass open fields and see beautiful sunsets and come home to a view of a lake from the kitchen sink and I could sit on a swing we had on our porch (we had porch swing!). Basically this is what I have learned- I do not have to live in Los Angeles. Yea, I missed some of the people and some of my friends and I missed mosaic, but for the most part, I wasn’t really looking forward to leaving and going back to LA. I had missed the woods and open spaces and dark nights where you can actually see the stars and no traffic. It was all very comforting. As much as I can’t really fathom right now moving from LA, because honestly that is where all my contacts and jobs are currently, I could totally see myself spending less and less time there. It’s always a struggle because I would like to be based out of LA still...which is I guess an expensive thing to do cause like, rent….but the closer I get to getting my days for the DGA, I’ll have to start growing my contacts out of town to get 3rd area days and being outside of southern california is just that. 

Anyway, I know this has been a super long update and I don’t expect anyone to read it or have made it this far, I am really just keeping myself occupied on this flight and using this word document as a way to process and vocalize some of my recent thoughts. As I mentioned before I am heading back to LA to start another job, which starts prep on Friday and then we start filming Monday the 10th. It’s for a new tv show that will be a half hour comedy and we will be filming until November 20th and supposedly there will be 3 hiatus weeks spread throughout, which is really cool!! (*see previous comment about me already planning another trip in a couple months, haha) I’ll be running base camp again which is what I was actually just talking with Aaron about when I was in Louisiana how I would like to run base camp again for a show and then low and behold a couple days later I got a text to run base for this show, haha. I really like the second AD that texted me and turns out I know the 2nd 2nd as well and I really like him too so, it should be a good show. Anyway, so that’s what I’ll be up to the next few months. Thanks for taking the time to keep up with me and see what’s going on in my world. Hope everyone else has a great rest of their week. 

And Before You Know It, It'll All Be Over

Wow. I can't believe I haven't made a post since last November. I've wanted to multiple times but I just didn't know what to write about....but here I am all these months later, a new continent traveled to, and almost finished a whole season of working on a new show.

I've been working on this show since I got back from South America in mid-March. I know this may seem odd to all you folks who work normal jobs, but this will have been the longest job I have had since moving to LA and working in the film industry. If you weren't positive, what i'm doing on this show is running base camp, which basically means i'm the direction giver of cast before they get to set and then do some paperwork and other behind the scenes logistics when they are on set. I was a little curious/nervous at first at how it would go since I hadn't run base before for a series, but as it turns out, I think it may be my favorite PA position....but I guess it all really depends on who you're working with and the cast of our show is a dream to work with, and our hair, make up and wardrobe gals are just great as well. (as is our AD staff and other PAs)

The show I am on is 10 episodes, filming 2 episodes at a time, and Friday was our last day on episodes 107 and 108. Before we wrapped for the day i was dropping off paperwork to the hair and makeup trailer and our makeup head remarked 'Amy, we are almost done! Are you sad??' ...of course my first thought was, 'for the night or for the season??' haha (Friday ended up being a 16 hour day for me, so I was happy to hopefully be wrapping soon, ha) But then it hit me, we only have 10 more shoot days left on this series. It seems like we have been going at it for a while, but at the same time it seems like just yesterday we were doing our hair and makeup and camera tests during my prep week. Before I know it we will be on our last day and wrapped for the season! Which is kinda crazy because when you work the hours we do, you just spend so much time with all the crew and cast and get into your routines and get to know everyone and it's weird to think it being over...and then potentially never working with these guys again! (I mean, fingers crossed for a season 2! haha)

Anyway, I just say all this to write I can't believe how fast time flies the older you get. One day your gonna look up and a year has gone by, and then 10 years or 20. Adults can spend so much time thinking about and worrying about their jobs that time can slip by without them even noticing years have gone by, and I hope they never look back on those years and wonder what they did with them. In my travels I have learned that Americans work a whole heck of a lot more than a lot of other countries and I just hope not all of us turn into the one's that spend our lives working without acknowledging what the rest of the world has to offer. Friday I got texted to run base camp for another show starting June 1st running through the whole month. At first I was a little sad I had to turn it down because that is right when I will be flying to Florida then Europe...but then I thought how stupid of a thought that was. Traveling is something I really love to do. I work to travel. And what good is working if I don't use the money i've been saving to travel? Hopefully new jobs will always come up, but i'm not gonna let my years slip by without me making them great. Traveling the world and doing fun things with my friends. Don't get me wrong, I have been making great and awesome memories and connections I hope to have forever on these jobs i've been working on, but there are also so many stories and memories to be had outside of Los Angeles and America and i'm really looking forward to those as well!

Don't be afraid to do something that makes you happy. Go on an adventure. Take a few days off work. Travel to a new country. Make a new friend. Go to the roller derby. Remember that this life is what you make it, but it's movin pretty fast!