Sidney Lee, bottles, and the monster inside of me
So, have had a bit of a long day already, but a good one!
It all started when I slammed the door with my keys inside. You know the kind when you realize that your keys are inside before the door is closed but you have no time to send the thought to your arm to stop it closing the door. Luckily my roommate slept at his girlfriends place and it’s not far away. So it just resulted in a bit of stressfull morning. I managed though.
An old college had asked me to help them out with an exams project they’re doing, he’s studying ‘Film and Media’. So I had the day of to do that. The deal was for me to play a danish guy called ‘Sidney Lee’ who’s a kind of phenomenon in little Denmark, he’s famous for being famous… I know, doesn’t make sense, let me just say that I’m glad I don’t own a television. Back on track; the project was a ‘fictional dummy’ for a television show, kind of a make-over show. It was great fun and we just improvised a lot, which went really well.
After that I had a few errands that I had to run. Can’t remember if I mentioned this, but my brother and a friend of ours and me, are making this fight scene this saturday. Not for anything particular, just because we thought it would be funny to try… So the errands included picking up fake blood (the kind you can have internal too) and fetching ‘stunt bottles’ to break on each others heads. And just to invest in these objects made me really thrilled, it feels good to just do what you want and post some money in it to make it look cool. So I’m really psyched to this coming saturday when we’re shooting it!
My brother and I shot a little bit of ‘storyboard’, just to get an idea of what we’re doing and some feeling of where we’re headed!
Tomorrow I’m going to the premiere for a film I did with some of my old colleges. It’s showing in the biggest cinema in Scandinavia. It’s the cinema where I used to work, and the colleges are from that job, so that’s why we can show it there, but it’s gonna be really cool, I think with champagne and all that jazz… I already saw it, and I’m satisfied with the result, looking forward to hear what people think, and I invited over a dozen people, so that’s making me a bit nervous.
I think it’s the first film I did where I really researched the character, and I’m playing a monster, so t was a really interesting research. I went out in the woods in the middle of the night, armed only with a flashlight, looking for this monster. And I must say that even though my logical sense tells me that nothing is going to happen, the worst thing I could run into is a guy walking his Shih Tzu, then I had this really ancient fear in my stomach, quess it originated way back when we lived in the woods and actually could get slaughtered and eaten by a sabertooth tiger. But I tried to really analyze this fear and instead of being afraid, then simply become the fear, and become the creature that the forest should fear.
It was a really interesting process, and some days after that my girlfriend asked me why I did this when it was just a very little production. I thought about this, cause I could see her point, but got to this conclusin: First of all, it’s so much fun when you really work for it, and especially with a role like this. Second, if I didn’t research and really put an effort in this production, how would I know when to do so… You get my drift? If I really want this, I have to be the best at my game, even if people doesn’t see it. Cause if I faked it till I made it, I don’t think I would make it. Cause acting is not acting, it’s about being true in fictional circumstances, and being there mentally and psychically. Like Sanford Meisner said; “Acting is the ability to live truthfully under imaginary circumstances.” (When I get a cat, he’ll be named Meisner…) To recap; I really thank my girlfriend for asking me that question, cause it made me realize all this…!
Wow, I’m so glad to be able to share all this, and thank you for listening!
All the best to you and yours,
Lucas Alexander
Bonus: Another video I made, basically from various clips recorded on my iPhone. I think, if you don’t know me, you’ll get a pretty good image of who ‘me’ is… It’s called ‘Egg on bread with avocado’. Enjoi!
[UPLOAD YOUTUBE VIDEO HERE]