Becoming Juliette Lewis!

The first time I had a chance to perform was when I first tasted fear. I was six years old and had been chosen among other Sunday school kids to be a part of a theatrical and singing production on the stage in my large church during the evening service.

As the Sunday approached, I could feel myself getting antsy but it wasn’t until the actual day that my mind began to race, trying to figure out a way to get out of performing. I knew I couldn’t feign sickness because all had seen me that morning at church. As the evening approached, the fear took hold and by that evening, I decided to take drastic measures and minutes before the evening service and production were to take place, I hid in one of the church restroom stalls in the basement where all the Sunday school classes were held. From 7pm to 8pm, I stayed in that stall and the fear slowly faded away. At 8pm, I came out of the stall, went upstairs and as my family and others came up to me to ask where I’d been, it was then that I told them I had gotten sick and was throwing up in the bathroom. At that point, I “acted” sick and could have won an award for best actor, I was so convincing. I was six years old and to this day I remember it like it was yesterday. What a way to let fear take hold.

What was I so afraid of? If I could pinpoint it to any ONE thing, it’d have to be the fact that I just wasn’t in a place where I felt comfortable with a church full of a couple hundred people staring at me on the stage. I was deathly afraid of it? It didn’t help that I lived in a household where both parents or my older siblings didn’t spend enough time with me to nurture, teach and instill in me a level of confidence and fearlessness. Then again, I was SIX. It also didn’t help that both my parents were on the brink of divorce, with negative energy swirling all around me. (They ended up divorcing when I was six).

When it came to being the center of attention, I knew how to do it in all the wrong ways and had complete confidence doing so. When it came time to do something positive with my energy and growing talents by being a part of that church production, I fell apart due to fear. It’s interesting though, because just a couple years later, when I was in 3^rd grade, I used to give puppet and ventriloquist shows to the 1^st graders at my school, sitting in the front of a full classroom, with no fear or nervousness whatsoever.

Fast forward to late 2010. Here I am in Hollywood, having graduated from Southern Illinois University in Theater where I had lead roles on the main stage (in front of hundreds), playing a corrupt Civil War officer, Big Daddy in ‘Cat On A Hot Tin Roof’, and other productions as well as in the intimate lab theater: the duel role of Pip and Theo in “Three Days of Rain” and multiple roles in an original production on the life of Lizzie Borden as well as more roles in other plays, and now in the middle of a Commercial Agent Showcase, fear was grabbing hold of me again. WTF?

That night in late 2010 as I arrived at the showcase, my heart was the first indication fear was creeping into my psyche by starting to beat faster. As I waited in the hallway with a handful of actors (as well as twenty-five other actors filling the chairs in the audition room), the fear grew but I was able to stay calm, cool and collected on the outside. Once my name was called, I went into the room to find the 25 other wannabe commercial actors sitting and looking at me. I went to the front of the room where three successful commercial agents sat in Director style chairs, again looking at me. I handed each of them a headshot and stood in front of the camera where the teacher, Mike Pointer was looking at me and asked, “Tell us your name!” as he pointed the camera at me, sending my image onto a huge flat screen TV which faced the entire room. It was then that the fear I felt at six years old, returned.

As I picked up the sides and read a mock commercial into the lens for the agents to watch, the fear took my comfort level to an all new low and I wasn’t able to relax and read the dog food commercial naturally and as if I were talking to a good friend. In plain English, I sucked.

After I read the 30 second spot, teacher Mike asked a question that came out of nowhere (each actor got a different question to answer), “If drinking beer can give you a beer belly, can smoking pot give you a pot belly?” I did much better here, using my nervous, fear drenched energy to be spontaneous, funny and as “myself” as I can be given the unnatural surroundings and inane question, “Absolutely! Just like beer, pot can give you a belly as well. I know a couple of people that smoke all the time and they’ve got belly action going on. The more you smoke, the more it fills up your lungs and then goes into your belly expanding it. If you keep smoking, it’ll expand it and expand it and eventually, your belly won’t go back down and presto, you’ve got a pot belly. So, yes, smoking pot CAN give you a pot belly, just like beer can give you a beer belly.” After I finished my explanation, the teacher said, “Tell us your name again!” to which I replied to lens, “My name’s Myles Leighton.” and walked away so the next student could come up. When I left the room, I could feel my entire body trembling slightly, all from the four-letter word, FEAR. Why?

It was after this experience that I realized, quite angrily I might add, that FEAR is a completely useless emotion and one I want to rid my body, mind and soul of. I see absolutely no redeeming value in the negative feeling that took hold of me that night. What’s the point of my heart beating faster, palms getting moist, body starting to perspire, breath growing shallow, adrenaline rising, body trembling, my mind wandering, insecurities surfacing, focus and ability to perform suffering? All because of what? Because people are watching and taking in what I'm doing? Because I'm on stage in front of them and they may be picking apart my physical and performance imperfections? Because I’ve got this idiotic notion that I may mess up, causing them to laugh or ridicule? Who cares? That night, fear made me care. It seems like in that audition situation, fear took over my body whether I liked it or not. There’s gotta be reasons why.

Looking back at the audition itself, it was a combination of things that sapped my normal, relaxed self. First off, the unnatural surroundings didn’t sit well with me. I go into a room with lights and a camera where there’s a roomful of eager, nervous actors watching my every move, three top level commercial agents judging my performance and watching my every move, the teacher training a video camera on my every move and displaying it for all to see, a mock commercial on paper that I’ve never read before and have to read cold, with complete authenticity and only 90 seconds to impress one of the agents enough to where one of them will sign me so that my career in commercials will get the kick start it desperately needs. Whew!

To add to the awkwardness of the audition was the fact that I had read for one of the agents at his agency a few months earlier when trying to get representation. He had loved my look and said my resume was top-notch and after my reading, was in awe that I sucked so bad, prompting him to ask me why I had thrown away all my stellar education by giving such a bad reading. He recommended Mike Pointer’s school, “Hey, I Saw Your Commercial!” to me that day and I knew I had to go check it out:

http://www.heyisawyourcommercial.com/

The reason I gave such a poor reading for that agent that day was because the sides he gave me were confusing and having to stand up in front of him and his assistant and read to an imaginary camera after having only 5 minutes to look at my mock commercial was more than a bit off-putting. Especially since I’d not auditioned in a couple of years. When it comes to the whole audition process, I have to admit, I’ve never been entirely comfortable with such an artificial situation. The idea of going into a room with casting directors, agents, producers, directors and, in the case of a classroom, other actors watching, critiquing and judging as I “pretend” and put on fake enthusiasms and emotions in order to sell the product known as ME is not the most natural and comfortable situation I’ve found myself.

The commercial workshop where fear got the best of me was put on by “Hey, I Saw Your Commercial” where I’d recently graduated their eight-week program. During the time there, I learned the complete ins and outs of the commercial industry from Mike Pointer, who’s been in hundreds of them and seen it all. I learned so much on a variety of levels and when it came to fear, Mike always said, “Just blast through it, man and do the task at hand as well as you can. You can’t worry about fear. When you go in an audition, relax and have fun.” Great and true words. Why then was I letting fear take over enough to sabotage my reading, my audition and my possible representation? I’m certain that if I had not had fear, like a monkey on my back, to bring me down, I’d have nailed the audition and instead of writing these words, I’d have a commercial agent now. The thing to remember is, in an acting audition whether for a film/TV role or a commercial, the agents, casting directors, producers, directors, etc, all want to see an actor nail the audition. They want to find the person they're looking for. They want an actor to have complete confidence and freedom to give it their all. I learned a valuable lesson both in the eight-week class and in that commercial workshop.

Looking back now in the beginning of 2011, I know I don’t suck when it comes to acting, but at that audition, this fear thing really screwed me up and made me appear like I was bad. Having had a great deal of acting experience both on stage and in a classroom setting beginning at a young age, I realized that FEAR and my allowing it to consume me was robbing my potential now and that to me is completely unacceptable. If I could completely and forever eradicate fear from my being, I’d do it in a heartbeat. I view it as a complete waste of time and an emotion that robs the soul. Some people say to use that nervous energy and channel it into your performance and while that may be true to an extent, the danger with allowing fear into your being at all is if you’re not careful, it can overtake you and get the best of your talents, making you look inexperienced, insecure, untalented and foolish.

Looking back at my entire life and why someone like me, who has so many positive qualities on my side now, would let fear damage opportunities and corrupt my performances in auditions, it’s not only my turbulent upbringing where I moved around a great deal and was in private schools away from solid parental figures to nurture my formative years, but other things like: having a mouth full of crooked teeth from the emotionally tender age of 11 all the way to 21…Message to parents: When your child has teeth that come in crooked, instead of having him or her continue through adolescence with their self-esteem (which is already fragile) go to an all-time low, get their teeth fixed ASAP. In my opinion, to not do so is a form of psychological abuse because fellow teenagers can be cruel. I know I was made fun of and in turn, because of my horrific smile, had serious problems with confidence and self-esteem. Ironically, I didn’t have a girlfriend until I got my teeth fixed while in the military.

Other contributing factors to fear based insecurities in my past were times when a couple past relationships either put me down because of what I lacked in material or career wealth or the fact that even AFTER braces, “You could be a model, but you’d have to get your teeth fixed first” or “You’ve got crooked teeth”. Even the fact that a famous casting director I worked for as an assistant a decade ago, while casting a major motion picture, told me she was going to give me a part in the film and my SAG card, only to give the role to an ex-boyfriend in hopes to win him back hurt.

Just the mere fact that in the audition room, when I read for the role, she was nowhere to be found as my floundering audition was captured on video by her associate, who could’ve cared less whether I did well or not read lines with me, was damaging to my self-confidence. I mean, how hard would it have been for her to have been in the audition room, to help guide my performance by coaching me a bit? Trust me, it would have done wonders for me and maybe I would’ve impressed the producers who watched the video later enough to cast me. We’ll never know. What I do know is I never got a role in the film OR my SAG card, leaving me only with her empty promise.

Truth be told though, I need to take those negative experiences of my past and turn them into positives. I can’t let the past hurt me anymore because to do so is to let FEAR based emotions sap my creativity, my abilities, my talent, my being. I’m not about to let that happen. I’ve got too many redeeming qualities to let them all be suffocated by fear. I need take a breath, be strong and focus on…becoming Juliette Lewis.

In December, a few weeks after the commercial workshop disaster, I went to see a rock band called “Camp Freddy” at The Roxy on Sunset. It’s a band with a core group of successful musicians in the world of rock and roll. The entire show is made up of all cover songs and with a who’s who of surprise guests showing up either to join in on instruments or to sing lead. On this night in December, actress/singer Juliette Lewis appeared on-stage to sing a couple of songs with the band, including “Proud Mary”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfAu05EksMI

What I witnessed that night as I watched Juliette sing and perform was a fearless woman in complete control of her body, soul and mind. I was witnessing someone that had banished fear from her body and in doing so was free to completely BE on-stage. She exploded with unbridled, yet controlled strength, spontaneity, focus and energy that took hold of my psyche and impressed me to the point of change. It was then that I realized again that FEAR is a useless and negative emotion and that I need to rise above such limiting emotion and thought and learn to BE. In life I have no problem “being”, it’s in the audition situation that I need to learn to BE. It’s so not about worrying about nonsensical things like other people watching, judging or the like. It’s about…becoming Juliette Lewis and in so doing, conquer and destroy all fear from your being.

And, while Juliette Lewis has her faith in “Scientology” to fuel her positive fire, I’m determined to find my way to self-empowerment from a secular standpoint. On my own two feet. Taking the negatives and positives of my past and morphing them into an all-powerful and fearless me. Just like Juliette Lewis was on that Roxy stage that night. Only this time, I’ll approach my future with the attitude of becoming Juliette Lewis.