My Acting Debut

Last Saturday, Indhu and I starred in a short film project in which we acted out a scene from American Beauty to help some CMU entertainment technology students with their assignment.

I was cast in the role of "Jane" who is an insecure, angsty, goth teen who is intrigued by "Ricky", her new next door neighbor. In the scene, I'm standing with "Angela" (played by Indhu) at school, smoking a cigarette, and looking moody when I'm approached by the creepy-sexy, enigmatic Ricky. I didn't get a chance to watch the scene before filming (it had been years since I saw the movie), so I had only my own unremarkable high school memories from which to draw inspiration for my character.

When I was told that Jane should appear uncomfortable and awkward, I thought, Wow, I don't even need to act! But dressing for the part was a whole other story. Since I happened to have left my entire goth wardrobe back in the States, I had to make do with what I had here in Australia. The end product was an outfit consisting of jeans, a purple Hillary Clinton t-shirt, and a brown track jacket. Yeah. Needless to say, I was more than a little misguided at understanding goth fashion.

I haven't received the film clip, so unfortunately, I can't share my Oscar worthy performance with you all, but I included the script for the scene we did. I had such a great time that now I'm thinking acting can be a fallback option just in case my career in public policy doesn't work out. (No, not really.)

Script from Asian, er, American Beauty:

ANGELA and JANE talk at school.

ANGELA: Cunt!
[to Jane] I am so sick of people taking their insecurities out on me.

JANE: Oh my god. That's the pervert who filmed me last night.

ANGELA: Him? Jane, no way! He's a total lunatic.

JANE: You know him?

ANGELA: Yeah. We were on the same lunch shift when I was in the ninth grade and he would always say the most random weird things. And then one day, he was just like gone. And then, Connie Corduello told me that his parents had to put him in a mental institution.

JANE: Why? What did he do?

ANGELA: What do you mean?

JANE: Well, they can't put you away just for saying weird things.

ANGELA: You total slut. You've got a crush on him!

JANE: What? Please.

ANGELA: You are defending him! You love him! You wanna have like 10,000 of his babies!

JANE: Shut up.

RICKY walks up to them.

RICKY: Hi. My name is Ricky. I just moved next door to you.

JANE: I know. I kinda remember this really creepy incident where you were filming me last night.

RICKY: I didn't mean to scare you. I just think you're interesting.

JANE: Thanks. But I really don't need to have some psycho obsessing about me right now.

RICKY: I'm not obsessing. I'm just curious.

JANE stares at RICKY who maintains eye contact until she uncomfortably looks away. RICKY leaves.

ANGELA: What a freak! And why does he dress like a Bible salesman?

JANE: He's like so confident. It can't be real.

ANGELA: I don't believe him. I mean, he didn't even like look at me once!