A lesson I learned several times last week was to simply smile and say, “Thank you.” My voice instructor was assigning new pieces for us to learn and I got Edgar Allen Poe’s The Valley of Unrest. I thought nothing of the length of the poem until I looked at the piece my classmate sitting next to me had. She had only a paragraph. So, instead of smiling and saying thank you, I complained. Only because in this class we are graded not only on memorization (dead letter perfect) but also, pronunciation. And if you have ever worked with Standard American Pronunciation (SAP), you know that there a lot of words you regularly mispronounce. My instructor ever so politely snatched the poem and reminded me that it was a privilege and honor to have a lot of material to learn and work on. Why? Because lead roles always have the most lines!That smile and “Thank You” came back to haunt me in another form a few days later. I went for an audition for a role in a feature film that I found on Model Mayhem. I was the first girl to show up. I had my headshot and resume crisp and ready to go. After reading for the part, the producer and photographer looked at my headshot and begin to heavily criticize it. Yes, my headshot! The same free ones I just got done telling you about. They mentioned that there were a lot of technical things wrong with it and it was not retouched at all. They said agencies would LAUGH when they saw it. They told me that a smiling picture was not good to send to theatrical agents. Smiles are more commercial. Well, of course this embarrassed me and made me feel horrible, but what did I do? I smiled, and said “Thank You” for the advice and the time they took to help me. While they were waiting for the other girls to show up and audition, the photographer decided to shoot me. He happened to be AMAZING. After 2 costume changes, provided by his studio, he showed me the difference retouching really makes in a picture. We worked from 9:30am until 5:00pm. Only 2 other girls showed up to the audition ad I read with them both, giving me more opportunities to show my talent. Those 2 girls were the only interruption. I walked out of that audition with a brand new headshot and he even offered me another shoot for a comp card the next day. Now this is quite amazing, and is a sheer example of God’s favor, but he even got a makeup artist to come in and do my make-up. Within the 2 days, I had 5 looks, a theatrical headshot, a commercial headshot, a comp card/zed card with 4 looks, plus retouching. I asked him how much it would’ve cost me if I were paying he said anywhere from $750-$1,000. I got it for the grand total of $0! And I am sure it had a lot to do with my positive attitude and ability to smile and say “Thank You.” As for the part, I couldn’t shoot the lead role because of time scheduling conflicts, but they worked it out so I can shoot on the weekends in a smaller part. The moral of the story is, things you don’t like are going to come your way, but when someone is trying to help you, even if you don’t see it at first, just smile and say, “Thank You.” Thank you Rick Reynolds and Digital One Stop Photography. Love Tiffany!
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