My Pumpkin Died
And other tales from the month of July
Hello readers! Long time no see! I’d like to say that these past few weeks have been a planned break from this newsletter. Frankly, I just found myself for the first time in my life with nothing to say. July was hot. I mostly stayed inside. The summer slow-down in actual news corresponded with a slow-down in personal news meaning I often opened my laptop to write this newsletter only to find that I had nothing to report. Nothing, except for this:
My beautiful pumpkin fell victim to the heat. Or maybe it was the squash bugs. Either way, my goal of growing a pumpkin this summer quite literally withered on the vine about a week ago. Turns out ten straight days of 90+ degree heat was too much for the old girl. RIP.
I’ll be honest, the whole thing felt like quite a blow. I ordered new pumpkin seedlings off of Etsy in hopes that maybe I can squeak a few little Jack baby pumpkins out by Thanksgiving, but my goal of carving a jack-o-lantern grown by my own hand for Halloween will not become a reality this year. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t very bummed. I had placed a lot of hopes on this pumpkin - probably too many. Come to think of it, maybe it wasn’t the heat that did her in. Maybe she* was smothered to death by the pressure of hearing me tell too many people she was my “big personal project in lieu of the strike.” That’s a lot to put on a gourd.
The fact of the matter is, being on strike has really sucked. For the past four years, I’ve been very lucky to enjoy a feeling of constant forward motion in my career. Even when I was between jobs, the steady stream of new auditions and opportunities always had me looking ahead. Didn’t get a job? That’s fine. There are three new opportunities waiting in my inbox that could be the gig that changes everything. (Or, at least, secures my health insurance for another year.) But starting with the WGA strike a full 90 days ago, all of those opportunities faded away. I went from more auditions than I’d ever had in my life thanks to the buzz from the CBS Showcase to one - maybe two - commercial auditions in a month. And commercials have never been my strong suit. Just a week ago I was on hold for my first “legit” acting job in over two months - a prank show that is still in production because it falls under the Network TV/Reality contract. I had actually been dreading the prospect of getting the job, almost as much as I’ve been dreading my life without one. I can’t even watch prank shows because the second-hand embarrassment overwhelms me**. It was the type of job that, at a different time, I may have even passed on auditioning for altogether.***
But literal beggars cannot be choosers, and I’ve been getting too perilously close to $0 in checking to pass on a job just because the idea of making other people uncomfortable on purpose makes me want to cringe so hard onlookers would call an ambulance. Perhaps my apprehension ultimately came across to the producers, because they ended up going with someone else.
And reader, I cried. I cried over a job I didn’t even want because I didn’t know when I’d be offered a job again. I cried because all the promise I felt like I’d had in my career this January had withered on the vine like a rooftop pumpkin by July. I cried because I don’t know when - or if - I’ll ever get that momentum back. I cried because if I’d only booked something before May, I could at least felt like this year had been a success.
I don’t know when the strike is going to end, and I have no idea how long it’ll take for me to book again when it does. I know everyone else in my industry is in the same boat, but the shitty thing about acting is that it is ultimately a very lonely pursuit. You only book a job because somebody else didn’t. You only don’t book a job because somebody else did. Even in solidarity, it’s a pretty solitary gig.
That said, you can catch me on the picket line for the foreseeable future.
And as always, fuck Bob Iger.
xoxox
besitos,
Alise
**important notes**
*At the time of death, my pumpkin had actually only produced male flowers but gender is a construct and I feel confident she would have grown to be a beautiful woman if climate change had not had other plans.
**As a kid I could never watch “Doug” for this exact same reason. Either talk to Patty normally or leave her alone!!!!
***The premise was I would be at a bar with another actor pretending to be a bartender. Our marks would overhear me telling said bartender that I was a teacher who did OnlyFans during the summer. Then a child would walk in (?) and recognize me as their teacher, with a father who recognized me as his favorite OnlyFans girl. When the child walked away, the father would threaten to expose me publicly and I would beg him not to do so and then…they’d see if anyone at the bar intervened? Personally, I am unclear as to why anyone listening would voluntarily insert themselves into that situation. Even typing it out now I feel like no amount of money would have been worth it, but a strike will make you do strange, strange things.
**promos and plugs**
I actually have shows this month THANK GOD.
This City’s Changed 8/10 9:30pm at Caveat.
Drew Carey’s Improv-a-Ganza 8/13 at 8:30 at Brooklyn Comedy Collective
Written in Brooklyn 8/17 at 8pm at the Williamsburg Hotel
See every single one of you there!