Cattle Call

Or, Why I See Myself the Way I Do.

Let's say you are casting a television commercial for, let's call it, Major Japanese Car Producer (MJCP). You need three women: blonde, brunette, redhead. One man. All beautiful, that goes without saying.

The casting agent does the first cull, but they don't want to leave out The One, so they still bring you about 300 heads.

Yes they're called 'heads', because I guess they aren't actually, you know, 'people'.

You're presented with six binders, 50 heads each.

Page after page of stunning women, each more beautiful than the other. And its not just head shots - aspiring actresses have shots of themselves in various poses and wardrobe to illustrate, "Look, I'm beautiful no matter the situation or clothing! I can be sophisticated, housewifey, girl next door, club slut! Put me in a burlap sack and I will still be so stunning I can sell your product!"

And they are right.

Let's start with the brunettes. What shall be our first eliminating factor? Eye color. Easy. Green and blue shoot better than brown. Sorry, those belonging to 90% of the world's population, you're out! All brown-eyed brunette heads are pulled from the binders and hit the floor. No really, they end up on the floor. Some assistant gathers up the rejects and drops them in a box. Labeled 'Rejects'.

Well that helped narrow things quite a bit.

Is there any other semi-legitimate criterion we can use? Sure - we do have a brand we are working under, so - who is too cute, too young, too old? This is really the most involved part, you have to look at each actress in terms of the profile of MJCP's target audience - Male, 30-50, income level, the cars we will be shooting and what the market is for those particular models, and of course the concepts of the spots.

More hit the floor.

Of course everyone has an opinion. When I say everyone, I mean Me, the art director (final say); the producer ("How much will she cost? Is she scale?") the director ("I can't shoot her, she doesn't Speak to me, you know?") the casting agent ("Oh you'll love her!", regarding pretty much everyone).

And as an aside - I'm not going to get into dealing with my boss the CD, and the client approval process, a post for another day...

So now it is around six, everyone is getting a little punchy and secretly anxious to make it to a happy hour, somewhere, anywhere.

The final eliminations, judgment on the most gorgeous women you have ever laid eyes on, go something like this:

"Her cheekbones are too high."
"I don't like her ears. I can see them."
"Is that a gray hair?"
"Her nose freaks me out a little."
"She reminds me of my mother."

Seven-thirty. Women who, under any other circumstance would inspire unapologetic awe, are reduced to Freaks of Nature.

"That's not a beauty mark - it's some alien thing taking over her cheek."
"Did she put her lips in a vacuum cleaner hose?"
"Yeah but look at her NECK - I didn't see a GIRAFFE in the storyboard."
"She has iguana eyes - seriously, tell me I'm wrong!" (true quote, I kid you not).

The selects for callback are made, the producer drops you at the hotel, and you lurch to your room.

At the bathroom sink, you try to scrub the shallowness and hypocrisy off.

Then you look in the mirror.
The unforgiving, indifferent mirror that shows your own face VERY, VERY CLEARLY.

Tomorrow, the blondes.