RE-VAMPED with Juliet Landau
RE-VAMPED with Juliet Landau is the First BUFFY Podcast with a cast member as your guide!
Buffy’s posse was called the Scooby Gang. Juliet’s character Drusilla was also known as Dru. RE-VAMPED co-hosts include “Scooby Dru” with her extremely, singular POV and hijinks, “Sire Rebecca” and “Watcher Dev.”
RE-VAMPED is rife with never-heard-before behind-the-scenes tales, the definitive in-depth interviews with cast & crew, sequential rewatches, what’s new in the BUFFY-verse, the ultimate fan interactions and showcasing NEW content with the beloved characters.
Filled with belly laughs and poignant emotion, listeners rollick, probe and reflect. RE-VAMPED With Juliet Landau takes the idea of the traditional podcast and evolves it! It’s not only like hanging out with your best friends, but Juliet’s producing what people think of for a weekly TV show or radio show. The team are doing this within the podcast genre.
RE-VAMPED with Juliet Landau
Interview with the Teacher – Miss French /Teacher's Pet
Juliet and Scoobie Frank sit down with Musetta Vander (the teacher, Natalie French, in Teacher’s Pet) for her most in-depth Buffy interview to date. Musetta also shares highlights from her impressive life and career. You can also watch the on-camera interview at: http://www.youtube.com/@slayinitpodcast
Thumbnail art by Slayin It listener, Harmony Davidson
____________________________
YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/@slayinitpodcast
Twitter/X - @julietlandau
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/juliet_landau
Facebook - Juliet Landau Official (Page)
https://www.facebook.com/julietlandauofficial
Facebook - Fans of Juliet Landau (Group) https://www.facebook.com/groups/julietlandau/
Email: revampedpod@gmail.com
Juliet Landau’s directorial feature debut, A Place Among The Dead Trailer: https://vimeo.com/791299045/5b5d98726a
A Place Among The Dead Blu-Ray with nearly 5 hours of bonus extras: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0CJJY4MB9/ref=ox_sc_saved_image_4?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1
Here are some exciting coming attractions.
Speaker 2:I have something exciting to share. On September 7th and 8th Saturday and Sunday I will be at Fanboy Expo in Orlando, florida, with so many Buffy and Angel alum. We will be signing autographs, doing photo ops, panels, and I will also be recording a live episode of my just-launched podcast, slaying it, with Juliet Landau, and I will be on stage with you, you on stage with me well, if you're in Orlando and we will be recording, and then we will broadcast worldwide. So come, come, come to Fanboy Expo. It's going to be such a blast. You can get tickets at fanboyexpocom.
Speaker 1:Woo.
Speaker 3:And now on with the show.
Speaker 2:Hello, hello, I'm Juliet Psst. We're going to slay, want to come, and we're back, we're back.
Speaker 1:Yay, hip hip, hooray, hooray Finally.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, I am so excited for everyone to hear. Interview with the Teacher Teacher's Pet, part Two. We sat down with Musetta Vander, who played Natalie French, the teacher in Teacher's Pet, for her most in-depth Buffy interview to date, and we also got to talk to her about some highlights from her incredible life and impressive career. So should we go without further ado into the interview?
Speaker 3:Yes, I would like to yes.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'd love to hear it.
Speaker 3:For the first time For the first time.
Speaker 2:Well, we are so excited, Musetta, to get to talk with you today. Thank you so much for doing this.
Speaker 4:Oh my gosh thank you for having me. It's wonderful to be here.
Speaker 2:Yay, All together. We love your work and very excited, obviously, to talk about all of it, but particularly with a lens on Buffy. So where were you born and can you talk about your early life and the fact that you grew up without a TV?
Speaker 4:Well, I was born in Durban, south Africa. Yeah, we didn't have television, so I grew up very much connected to nature. My mother was a ballet teacher and an opera singer, so from a very early age I was on stage. I was always doing theatrical shows, pantomimes and stuff like that. Growing up with TV was actually wonderful because it really allowed you to use your imagination, because we had nothing to look at. You know, there was nothing that I was like oh, I want to be like this or like that. I didn't. There was nothing like that for me. So and I didn't really read a lot of books. I love nature.
Speaker 4:So we had a lot of property, well, like two acres of land in the middle of like nowhere. So we had two streams across the property and we had monkeys, a lot of monkeys, monkeys, and there's a lot of legwands and like a lot of all kinds of animals coming out of the bush. It was a more of a newer development. So I myself and my best friend who lived on the mountain opposite from our house, we would call each other, like yodeling across the mountainsides, to come over and play and then we'd go and do, we would build forts and we would go for adventures and and the ballet studio was at the house, so all my friends, of course, were the people in the class and stuff like that. And yeah, that's part of how I grew up, you know, just really very close to nature, and I still love it to this day.
Speaker 2:Do you still get back, because I did a movie in Durban probably about 10 years ago. Is it very much the same? Do you still get back, or is it really different now?
Speaker 4:Oh wow, from when I grew up to what Durban looks like today. It's unrecognizable, I mean really completely different. I go back every year. I'm actually heading to South Africa now for my mom's birthday. So I travel a lot, and consistently. I believe that traveling is essential. For me at least it's essential. I can't imagine life without traveling, and because my family lives so far away, I used to travel every two years to go back for a couple of weeks. Now I travel every year and I am considering maybe moving back I'm not sure yet at some point, just because you know, my mom's older, all my brothers and sisters, my brother and sister, are there and it's nice to kind of reconnect with family, you know. So I don't know, I I living in both places simultaneously. That would be ideal.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, if you could teleport right.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, but maybe by the time I do that I'll be teleporting.
Speaker 2:And did you study dance? Cause I was a professional ballerina prior to becoming an actress. I know you have first to go study because my dad was like you have to study.
Speaker 4:You can't, just you know, go do this and that you have to go get a degree. So I went and I did that, but I always danced. But I was taller and not petite, but I was more inclined to the commercial side of dancing. So I started going into all the commercial world of dance. You know a lot of the shows like television broadcasts or commercials or for conventions, where there's car shows and stuff. I loved it. So I traveled all over the world and paid much more than being a ballet dancer. You don't have to starve yourself and you just travel to all these amazing places and all work is hard. I love ballet. It was the foundation of everything that I do, even to this day. I think it's a very good grounding that everybody should have at some point.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and also the work ethic. Right Like it seems, because when I was preparing for this, I watched a lot of interviews with you and just listening to you talk, it seems like you have definitely that work ethic is a big part of who you are.
Speaker 4:It's a very disciplined art form and you have to be dedicated to it to be even think of being remotely competitive.
Speaker 2:When I first was on a set as an actress. I remember because you just reminded me when you were saying that some of the actors were complaining and I was thinking to myself your feet aren't bleeding, you're being paid well, you're being fed Like.
Speaker 4:This is not hard work, you know exactly right, that is exactly right, because I think that that was the biggest realization for me. When it came here, it was like wow, I'm used to working so much harder than this, you know, so for me it was like nothing.
Speaker 2:So did you always know that you wanted to be a performer? Was there ever a time where you thought, oh, maybe that's not my thing, or did you just? Was it like a duck to water?
Speaker 4:It was like a duck to water. I didn't know I was going to be an actor. I knew it was going to be an entertainment business, but because I didn't have TV, I mean we would go to the drive-ins, right. So we would go to the drive-in and, you know, I would always be in the back of the car, like, and I would pop up at them when I'm not supposed to pop up, because I was a kid and I wasn't allowed to see this movie which had an age restriction on it. It's in my tummy and I'd be like I really want to watch this, you know.
Speaker 4:And so, uh, I had a children's book, one of the very few books I actually liked looking at, and one day I was just paging through it and I was like oh, that's it all girls things girls can do when they grow up. And I was just oh, no, no, no, no. And then I saw an actress standing on a soundstage with the microphone, the crew around her, and I go oh, that's what I'm going to be.
Speaker 2:And it was just like that, and then you went about and did it. Yeah.
Speaker 4:You know, I didn't do it originally in South Africa because we didn't at that time have really a film industry. I just knew, since I was very young, I would not live in South Africa. I just knew it in my core.
Speaker 2:Talk a little bit about how you came to the States and started working in film and TV. And then I also want to ask you after that about because I know you did a lot of music videos, but just first your transition, sort of when you did make that move that you always knew was going to happen.
Speaker 4:What prompted it and when was it and what was it like? Well, I think what led into it is I. I started with the dancing as somebody saw me and said, oh, you should come and, you know, be an extra on set for this commercial. And then somebody spotted me there and said, oh, you should come to this movie. And then I. Then I got into the movie side of dancing and then someone over there said you should go see this agent, this modeling agent. So I went there and they sent me on the audition for a host of an MTV-like show and I booked it. I didn't even know who the heck I was introducing half of the time.
Speaker 4:But I was at the MTV VJ, I was like, ok, great, you know, because I never saw it Because it was so different. Television had just come into South Africa. I remember when, when it started and now I had my own show and the way they did it, it was so different to what they do here. Like you weren't allowed to do anything. I wasn't allowed to endorse any other projects. I couldn't do modeling jobs, I couldn't do any acting. They paid me very little money but everybody's like, oh, it's a great opportunity, you have to do this.
Speaker 4:And so I committed to it and I focused on the dancing because at this point I was just getting into the film business. Somebody offered me a movie. I did a movie but then with the show, I wasn't allowed to have any commercial endorsements from anybody else. I did the show and I would host all these artists on there. Sometimes I wouldn't even see the videos and they put me in a in an event place like a nightclub and I would host from there and there's no feedback of the actual music video. I would introduce these artists. I hadn't even seen most of these videos. One day an American actor was visiting in South Africa. At the time he was doing a movie down there, saw me on TV and we bumped into each other the same night and that's how I ended up in America. I ended up marrying him and moving to the States, which was really fated to come here.
Speaker 2:It was meant to be it really was.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it really was.
Speaker 2:And so can you tell us about the music videos you did with Rod Stewart, elton John, tina Turner, chris Isaac and the Traveling Wilburys? Can you tell us about that?
Speaker 4:Yes, it was like surreal to get here and then end up in these music videos of the same artists I used to introduce, because I didn't know who Rod Stewart was, obviously, and stuff like that. The Traveling Wilburys not so much, but I knew who Rod Stewart was. So when I came here I started in what I knew, which was dance. I thought myself a dance agent and that automatically led to music video auditions. And then I booked the Ron Isley Rod Stewart music video. It was fantastic. I mean, it was like surreal. All of these with the Chris Isaac.
Speaker 4:I was sitting at one point he had my foot up on his lap and he was tattooing something on my ankle for the music video and it was like surreal. I was like if I could send this, just take a picture and send it to my friends back in South Africa, they wouldn't even believe this. And then when I did the traveling Wilburys, I just naturally progressed from one music video to the other and I think the reason that happened for me is because it was the time of MTV VH1. It was just the right timing. I was a dancer, which maybe put me in a little bit more of an advantageous position than most other girls who couldn't. So I just booked a lot back to back. And then when I got Tina Turner, they were like, oh, you're going to be shaving this really hot guy's head in a bathtub. I'm like, oh, ok, his name's Jaiman Ansu. I go, ok, all right, you know. And looking back on it now and then I remember the traveling Wilburys. We were shooting on Wilshire Boulevard and one of those big churches down there.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I bet it was the Wilshire E-bill, because. I did music videos and they shot in that space.
Speaker 4:Yes, yes, yes yes, and you know, and shooting music videos became like, okay, I'm going to shooting another music video. And so one day I'm calling my husband and we're talking and he said where are you? I'm like, oh, I'm here at the Royal Shitty Bell Theater and I'm shooting this music video with Traveling Wilburys. And he goes Traveling Wilburys. I'm like, yeah, he's a guy, tom Petty. And you know, he said where are you? Wait, stay there, I'm coming. It was an amazing experience all around.
Speaker 2:They were also all of those music videos at that time, and the ones that you were in particularly are such. They're just beautifully shot, they're really, you know, it's real filmmaking.
Speaker 4:Yes.
Speaker 2:There were budgets, there was, you know it was a very different time. For music videos, it was the heyday.
Speaker 4:Yes, and so artistic and so well-pl planned, and the wardrobing and the costuming. I remember doing one. It wasn't a music video, it was for Philips DCC, it was for the launch of their new like kind of sound system. The hairdressers were flown out from Italy to do my hair. It was just amazing and the footage is beautiful, just gorgeous.
Speaker 2:So you have done a lot of genre, and what is it that you love about genre?
Speaker 4:For me, you know, with the sci-fi genre and how I ended up there. It was interesting because when you asked me to do this interview, I thought, well, let me look at Buffy again. I haven't looked at that for a long time and when I look at it today, when I sat down and I watched it, I was looking at it like who is that? I don't even recognize myself anymore because I don't even sound the same to me at least I don't sound the same. It's so surreal to look back on that. It's almost like a dream. You have all these different facets to your life. I think I ended up in the sci-fi genre because when I listened to that episode I could hear my accent quite strongly and I think that's how I ended up there, because they didn't know what to make with me because I had that accent.
Speaker 4:And you were exotic right, Exotic, yeah, yeah. So of course I fit the sci-fi genre perfectly.
Speaker 3:And that's, you get super force right. Yes, as.
Speaker 1:I thought you first super force, Season two.
Speaker 3:You're coming on season two, right.
Speaker 4:Yeah, coming on season two. Right, yeah, I believe I come in on season two. I didn't even know how hard it was to to get it like a series recurring role. I was like they phoned me to book the job and I was like, oh no, I have a trip to hawaii, I can't work. I called my husband I go. You know I booked this job. You know it's going to florida, orlando, it's a series, he's like. Did you say yes? I thought, well, we're going to Hawaii, he goes, cancel, call them back, tell her you want the job I'm available now.
Speaker 2:I'm like I'm available.
Speaker 4:It was really funny, you know when I arrivedivety, so how were you?
Speaker 2:cast as Natalie French. What was that process like for you?
Speaker 4:I went for an audition and I went just to sit down and I read the part and I remember the director being lovely, very nice. I had seen the movie, I'd seen the movie, so I was a big fan of Buffy already. I thought it was a great movie. I just loved that concept. It was very empowering for women different animals and creatures and vampire hunting and stuff. And then when I got the job I was just super thrilled. I was super excited. I mean, I had no idea I was going to get the job. I just was super, super happy.
Speaker 2:What was the shooting process like? It was very easy.
Speaker 4:It was a very smooth, easygoing. I was very impressed by all the actors in it because I thought they were very talented, so on point, with everything they did. They were so comfortable, they were so good in their abilities as actors. I was very impressed with that. It was so well written. You know, when the material is well written, it's easy. It's when you have bad material to make that look good. There should be awards for movies that are badly written, that look good.
Speaker 2:I always find, just in terms of even dialogue, when something's well written it just goes in, and when something's not well written, you can drill it and drill it, and the bumps in it make it so much harder, even just on the level of learning it, whereas I kind of feel like when something's if you're working on Shakespeare, when you're working on a really well-written script of any kind it kind of just goes For me, the dialogue just kind of starts to live in me without that Herculean effort of trying to make something that isn't working work.
Speaker 4:You're absolutely right, and I don't think people realize how hard that is, because I've seen actors who are Academy Award winners do material that's really badly written and they just don't come off the same. So, yeah, it makes a very big difference. The writing is very, very important.
Speaker 2:Well, it's also interesting because it was the fourth episode of season one and it's already. The show is in such a groove and I didn't come in until season two. Such a strong episode and we were talking about it the other day and all of the relatable themes and that using the praying mantis and that whole metaphor, really to have this teacher that's praying on a young student and how powerful and really profound that is as well.
Speaker 4:When I read the script and I obviously before I went in for the audition and I saw the character, I just immediately I loved it because it was predatory. I think that's kind of part of our nature too. You know, we have this kind of of as human beings. We have a predatory side to us. But bringing in this whole like insectoid element to it was very different. And it's very easy to play the villain the whole time and bringing in this, this kind of praying mantis feeling as the character that was.
Speaker 2:I loved that idea and did you end up using a lot of your dance background in terms of that physicality? Did you access that part of yourself in playing the role? Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 4:You know, I think it's also because since I was a child, when I was growing up, with pantomimes, I mean, I was poodles and I was a bear and I was all these different animals, I was a lion. And then, when it came to the praying mantis, definitely just very subtly, you bring that in and also having the ballet training behind you just gives you that kind of praying mantis kind of body stature you know?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and otherworldly element as well, yeah, I actually really like praying mantises.
Speaker 4:So you know, because I was always in the forest, I like the praying mantises.
Speaker 1:I'd look at them and I'd hold my hand.
Speaker 2:I was like oh, Although when they get to be the size that you're, you know that wasn't. That's a little frightening.
Speaker 4:Yes, definitely a little frightening Definitely a little frightening.
Speaker 2:You wouldn't want to wake up with a giant praying mantis, having you for dinner, because you know, when I was playing a vampire, I didn't really approach it from the aspect of playing a vampire. I approached it as trying to make as well-rounded a character as possible and as human as possible and delve into those elements. Did you work with the idea that it's human, not human, or what was?
Speaker 4:your process, like you know. For me, obviously, because I think emotions underlie everything, whether it's an animal or an insect or whatever, there's an emotional component to everything. You cannot separate them unless you're playing, you know a rock, you know anything, anything that has movement, okay, and it has an emotional component to it. And so, for me, I wanted her to be feminine, I wanted her to be alluring and I wanted her to be deadly. So, yeah, those were things. I tried to keep her very subtle, you know, as much as I could, so it wasn't like I was trying so hard to do one thing or the other.
Speaker 2:Well, also, you don't want to tip it, you don't want to see the end, what's coming, you't be like, oh well, she's definitely going to be bad guy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly exactly right, yeah as opposed to your performance as lash in the oblivion movies which I those. I was the perfect age for those movies when they came out. So oblivion, oblivion 2, is where I first saw you and you're iconic in those movies oh, thank you that.
Speaker 4:That was one of my. That was one of my favorite characters to play. It was just so much freaking fun I was hoping to hear that.
Speaker 3:It looked like fun and you're surrounded by an amazing cast. You have George Takei, Julie Newmar, Carol Stryken. It's just an amazing cast and it's like this fun space Western.
Speaker 4:It was absolutely amazing. I remember when I went to the audition originally I had brown hair and then when I got the job and I read the character and I looked at Betty Page and I thought she should be like Betty Page and so I didn't really ask. So I dyed my hair jet black, because he was already in Romania, you know, and I got to this and he goes your hair's jet black, I go do you like it. He loved it though.
Speaker 2:Oh good, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's so interesting when a role like speaks to you and so like no, no, she has to look like this. Like it's very clear when that happens and it almost feels like it's irrefutable, there's no other. Like no, she can't be blonde, she has to look like this, right, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 4:You know, I just felt her. I felt her she had to be this like sassy, sexy, deadly, like wicked character, and that was just screaming black, long hair with bangs to me Now, you shot them back to back, right?
Speaker 4:Yeah, we did. We shot for three months in Romania. Was it cold? Well, we shot for three months. So when we went in, it was right after the fall of Ceausescu and it was warm. It was like end of summer. Okay, because we shot for so long, it ended up going into winter and they were literally days when we would shoot and we were on the set. And you know romania, in those days they have dogs everywhere. You know that set was built, you know the whole set, that whole the whole town, yeah that whole town was built for Backlash and they've made several movies there since.
Speaker 4:Oh wow, yeah, many, many, many different movies have shot there, so it'll be like bitterly cold, okay. And then you hear like, and literally like a rat is trying to chew through the wood to come inside from out of the cold or like a dog running into the shot.
Speaker 4:It was really funny, like they had those saloon doors that swing open like that and the dog would just randomly run in. So there were all kinds of very unusual things that happened on that production. It was I should write a book about all the things that happened on that, but I fell in love with it. I fell in love with the Romanian people. It was a very interesting time to be there, because they had, at that point, nothing. You couldn't get food. It was very hard to get to. You know, we stayed in a hotel called the Levada. Our food was brought in for us and some nights there was just nothing to eat. You go, what do you want to eat? I say, I don't know. Chicken, no, no, chicken, no, no, beef, okay, vegetables, potatoes. I said, okay, potatoes. That's why I look so good. I couldn't eat anything.
Speaker 2:Perfect place to go shoot. What was it like working with Julie Newmar I actually she used to take dance class, so sometimes we were in dance class together. There was a place called Stanley Holden back in the day. Yes, oh my God, on Pico, on Pico. On Pico, yeah, and that's why, well, when you know Baryshnikov was in town, he would be there. Patrick Swayze would come to class. We were probably in class together, you and I. Yeah, so julie was there, and how did you find working with her on this project?
Speaker 4:she was lovely, you know. She was very, very professional, you know. She looked amazing, of course, and she was so right for the character, you know miss kitty, I mean she's cat woman and she just loved it.
Speaker 4:I mean, I think that you form such a bond with people, especially on that film, because we spent such a long time together, because we traveled to so many different locations and because we went through so many different things. Like one of the actors found a place where we could get some kind of meal, food things, so we would be looking.
Speaker 2:Because you needed some sustenance besides potatoes.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I mean there was food. At one point a big soccer team came in from italy who came to stay there, and they brought their own chefs and we were all cozying up with them because they had pasta because they had actual food yeah, I mean, I mean, look, you could get food, but it was hard to get it.
Speaker 4:yeah, it was the buildings that all had bullet holes in them. You know, people, some of the buildings, because the buildings, because it looked like the Champs-Élysées they were trying to build, the Etchagesco tried to build and then it was just abandoned. When the whole revolution happened, some people would be living up on the floor, high floors with nothing, with fires, because they were told to move out of their homes, like within like 24 hours, you know, as they came and demolished all the buildings that were there.
Speaker 2:It sounds like it was intense to be there right at that particular time.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it was after the Etruscisco was overthrown, but yeah, it was like a country starting to rebuild itself, right.
Speaker 3:Well, if you are going to write a book about the making of Oblivion, so you already know I'm going to buy a copy of it because I would love to hear about it. How did you feel? Like now that movie comes out and you're on the poster for that movie, Was that like a surreal thing? It's like I'm on a movie poster.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I had no idea that I was going to be on the poster for this movie. I didn't know. I just, you know, I just went in there to have a good time. I love the character it was right up my alley. I was just standing in the park here in West Hollywood with the whips cracking whips and I remember people driving by going. What in the world.
Speaker 2:What's happening there? What is going on? Going back to Buffy a little bit, when you talked about the director of your episode, and that was Bruce Seth Green, who I also worked with Do you remember any specifics about working with Bruce, about what the shoot particularly was like, any fun stories, you know? I?
Speaker 4:just remember him being very kind and very nice. I remember him being very specific. I remember it being a fun set, you know, because it was just nice. I remember the detail. I remember them deciding to have my nails be green with a hint of green because of the praying mantis. I remember the eyeshadow had a hint of green in it.
Speaker 2:That would be Todd McIntosh, and he was very detailed. I loved working with Todd because he was very detailed about everything and he really loved it, and so that collaboration takes things to that next level. That's true.
Speaker 4:And Susanna who did the wardrobe, susanna Poisto. You know I had known Susanna because I did a movie with Susanna before. So I mean everything, just it was just a seamlessly everything was thought of every single detail, which is what I liked about it, you know it wasn't like oh you come in and well, I think most shows who are very successful pay attention to all the details.
Speaker 2:And did you feel? Because I know you know having guests start on a lot of different stuff and it's always, you know, you're the new kid coming into somewhat, even though this was a new show, it's still a well-oiled machine that you're kind of coming in on, and some sets you have to do your job no matter what, but some sets it's an easier thing to come in as the new kid than others.
Speaker 4:Have you found that in your career? Absolutely. There are some shows where, especially if they've gone for many seasons and you come in, it's very intimidating in the sense of you know you come in for like one guest star and they've been working together forever. For them it's like nothing.
Speaker 1:They'll be like okay, ready, okay, we're rehearsing. Okay, here we go, action. You're going to go from here to here. You ready, okay. And they'll be like, okay, ready, okay, we're rehearsing. Okay, here we go, action. You're gonna go from here to here you ready.
Speaker 4:Okay, everybody get going, quiet action, go. And I'm like, oh, my god, I'm just heading in the direction where they're going. You know, and especially if it's getting to the dialogue, this kind of technical jargon or comedy, when you do comedy, getting the timing and the timing I remember with fraser, the timing, the comedy, that it's like, oh, okay, I guess we had me, yeah, that's where, you know, in those situations where it's sort of you're thrown into it, for me it's like that's the technique comes in, that's where there's other times you don't need to access it or whatever.
Speaker 2:But it's like, okay, concentrate and do. I need to take this moment and do what I really, you know, find what I need to find in this moment, because this is the moment absolutely right, and often you don't have a lot of time to rehearse either.
Speaker 4:You know, because they they've got so much dialogue, the serious regulars, that when you come in you've got the dialogue that flows in in between here. You know there's no time to rehearse with them, they're so busy and the last thing I want to do is still focus on this.
Speaker 2:So you just have like two, two chances that's it, yeah, and a lot of times it's funny with, depending on the nature of the show, the guests can actually have a lot of the exposition or like you're seeing the mumbo jumbo, so you've got a lot of stuff that services the whole. As the guest, you know, whether you're sometimes you're the victim of the whatever the thing is that you're playing, you can be carrying a lot of the emotion. You can be carrying a lot of the emotion. You can be carrying a lot of the dialogue. It's like quicksilver that you have to show up and you know, do so much work that you can, because usually sometimes you're hired a week in advance, sometimes less, you know, and so it's all that stuff that people don't know that goes into it before you even step on set.
Speaker 4:You are so right, because that's exactly how it is. I remember being on Star Trek and I was sitting in my makeup room with everybody and you know, they come in, they hand out the sides in the morning and they say oh, by the way that scene. We changed all the dialogue. It's now this and I'm shooting like, oh my God, really, and I have an accent. I was trying to do it without my accent and now I have all this dialogue and I'm like, oh, oh, you can't say anything Right.
Speaker 2:I always find it funny that thing, that because somehow we managed to pull it out, but it's so stressful in that kind of situation and it's so also like I always think the producers don't really. They're like, oh, that worked really well, and you're, but you're like, well, it would have worked even better. Like think of all the levels I could have gotten if I wasn't given the dialogue at the last minute and only thinking about what do I say next?
Speaker 2:Oh, exactly, yeah exactly Because your mind is so focused on what these words are that you have to say that you can't really relax and just perform, because once you're having your back pocket and you've got your dialogue down, it's a breeze, you go to set, you have fun, yeah, and you discover stuff, yeah, and you rehearse it and you play around, but when you just you have one or two takes and they change your dialogue, it's like oh wow all right, oh yeah, and don't you find it crazy when they change it just enough where it's not totally different, but enough to make your brain go like, as you're approaching it, you're thinking, oh, it's just this little bit tweak, different, these different, these parts of it that make it actually almost harder than if it was completely different?
Speaker 4:Yeah, you just could be able to roll the punches. Yeah, no, I think it makes it a lot easier if you don't have an accent.
Speaker 2:Yeah, or, but you know, often I've played so many characters with dialects, so it's the same similar thing, sure, and I always like to get to a place where I'm so comfortable with the dialect that I can speak with it, and it's not just the dialogue, but still it. That's all more daunting if you're handed it right before you're needing to shoot, and then again that's where your brain is, instead of in what all of the other things that should be going on or could be going on in the scene.
Speaker 4:Totally right. You don't want to be in your head, you want to be in your gut when you act. And if you can't try to remember your lines, you know, then you like, you can't, you can't perform like you should because you need to be in the belly. You're gonna have right, that emotional freedom, you know. Yep so.
Speaker 2:So what was it like eating? I mean just, watch.
Speaker 3:I know, obviously I know what you're asking.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you obviously didn't eat Like the cut is so good that it looks like you are, but obviously you didn't eat the bugs. But that whole sequence it just what was that like that?
Speaker 4:actually was one of the scenes that I was like, wow, I don't know, because they came to me and they had these crickets that they use for fishing in the box and I was like listen, I'm a huge like animal person. I don't want to hurt anything, I don't care if it's a cricket or I don't know what it is, just just they're like no, all you have to do, you're not going to hurt, it's going to. You're going to spread your bread and you're going to sprinkle the crickets on here and then you're just going to fold the bread and I'm like but then the butter is going to be on their wings, right, and they'll get smushed, yeah, yeah. And they're like well, they're going to be fish food either way. So it's like, well, all right. So I put really light layer of butter and buttered my bread really lightly, and you can see them actually, when I was watching this you can see them jumping off, but they cut before I closed.
Speaker 4:I didn't close all the way. The editing on that was beautifully done. Yes, because it looks like I do compress.
Speaker 1:It does it really does?
Speaker 4:Yes, because it looks like I do compress it. Does it really does? I would not do that. So as I fold it over, it just went, let's say, three-quarter way over and from the angle that the camera was, it definitely looked like. I closed the thing and then picked it up and ate it and the sound effects it put in there also, you're like, you're a trooper for that.
Speaker 4:That's when I would say I have a trip to hawaii. Well, you know, I think, I think originally, when I uh read that I didn't think it was gonna be like really live crickets, right, I thought it'd be like a little like fake. You know, I know animatronic things, not not. Yeah, live crickets jumping in and out. I was like, and also you gotta remember, now they're jumping.
Speaker 2:And then like jumping here, jumping here, they're jumping, oh, no, no, no no because I, I did a film, uh, about a year ago, and in it there was a snake. And then there was a thing where I sort of had to chop the snake's head off and all this stuff, and obviously we didn't do that in the film, but I had the same thought, I okay. And then when we went to set my sequences, they're like oh, have you met your, your co-star, the snake?
Speaker 2:I, I was like really, and I've always been, I'm squeamish about certain things, so I had to, like my husband, of course, being a photographer has the first moment that I have the snake coiling on my arm and all of that where I'm looking like and I actually made friends with the snake and everything was good and I ended up doing it, but and of course we didn't do any of the violent stuff that way, but it was it is that thing where you think like, oh, this is going to be, it is, I'm not going to be working with the real thing. And then you're on set and what do you mean? Yeah, no, you're working with a snake, you're working with the crickets. It was interesting for me because I had never touched a snake. I had never. But and once I I actually I said, well, what's the snake's name? And they said, oh, actually, it's snake number one. And I thought, well, that's not going to work. I need to personalize this.
Speaker 2:So, I named the snake Todd, and apparently Todd was a famous snake, had been in snakes on a plane like all these movies. So snake had worked a lot, but for me he's managed by Gersh.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but for me he's banned by Gersh. But I didn't mind, actually felt so much smoother than I anticipated and I didn't mind anything about it, except for a few times when the coiling would get tight and when the little tongue would start to come up near my face. That was the only time where I was like, ok, I got to get through this take now, because it's kind of coming up in there Any other time. I was actually ended up being totally fine with it.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's amazing how cold they are. You know, yes, they're really cold. I mean, you always hear it, they're cold-blooded, but they really are cold when you touch them.
Speaker 2:And silky.
Speaker 4:I mean that was what was surprising to me, like that silky texture and silky. I mean that was what was surprising to pictures from different shows. And then I have Buffy. But then they come by and then they see it's Buffy, and they see Miss French and they go oh my gosh, you're Miss French, You're Buffy, and it's like they can't believe it. They can't believe it, you know. So it's really, it's really nice. It's always been a very positive experience for me.
Speaker 2:I've never met anybody who didn't like the show. Can you talk about working with the Coen brothers, and again, you play a mythical character in that film? Can you chat a little bit about what that was like we?
Speaker 4:filmed in a town called Jackson Mississippi. I remember the audition. We went in as dancers it was a dance audition, yeah, and I went in on the audition and I just remember doing something unusual because there was a seduction scene. So they told us it was a seduction scene. So I knew the two choreographers, bill and Jackie Landrum. Oh, I knew them, my gosh.
Speaker 2:Yes, wow, yeah so.
Speaker 4:I'd worked with them before and several other jobs, and I guess that's how I got called in. That's, I believe that's how the whole thing happened with O Brother. And so I did the whole seduction scene towards Bill, you know, and I just went over and I sat on his lap, which got everybody laughing because they didn't know I knew him.
Speaker 4:It was kind of a bold move to do. You know, Jackie just laughed. That's great, yeah. And so then I got the job, which is great. I was a huge fan of the Coen brothers, so when this audition and opportunity came in, I wanted to be in a Coen brothers movie you weren't in Hawaii's your dream to be part of, like films, like like the Coen brothers or, you know, Spielberg or whoever. So when this opportunity came, I was like I want this, you know, and. But there were a lot of people, a lot of people, a lot of dancers, I mean, and I guess it just came down to who they decided to pick and put together as what they wanted for their different characters. And then we all flew out to Jackson Mississippi to go work there and we rehearsed that scene for like a week.
Speaker 2:Oh, wonderful yeah, every day how luxurious.
Speaker 4:Yeah, we worked on the timing. Specifically, it had to be absolutely perfect the lip syncing, everything. The first outfit they put me in with, because it was all antique, real antique dresses, because once we got into the water, the water, because it was silk, was so heavy. I just took the dresses and just the dress just like, oh my gosh.
Speaker 4:Yeah, and so I had to go and change and get into a different wardrobe. But small things like look in that movie I was a huge fan of John Turturro already because I think he's a brilliant actor. It was so interesting because when you work with people who are well-established and who really know the craft, just to be around them and work with them and watch how they work, he would be just doing like nothing, talking, and the minute they start yelling action and he gets ready, he would look at me like I was the only woman he's ever seen in his entire life and it was so magnetically charged and powerful that it I was like you, I was just like felt like I was drawn to him, like I was the only woman on the planet you know, and I was like wait a minute, I'm supposed to be seducing him. He's not supposed to be seducing me just because his reaction is so intense. The minute they yell cut, it's like, you know, back to normal.
Speaker 4:So I think the what I learned a lot from that movie is plugging in and and connecting in in such a way, especially the way he does, he just plugs into you where then nothing else exists. You don't see anybody else anymore. You know, and I loved that movie. I, I was very happy to be part of that and I, um, I remember one day I was somewhere and somebody said oh but your elbows were dark.
Speaker 4:You had dark elbows, like my elbows were dark and I'm actually talking about, and I guess, from when we were lying on the rocks, because it was man-made rock, the paint some of the darkness from the oh, I never noticed that I go like that, oh, and I do like that. They saw my elbows were dark. Oh, oh, so it was the funniest. What a strange thing to pick up.
Speaker 2:What a thing to notice out of that beautiful sequence. Well, I wasn't looking at the elbows. I mean, it's such a, it's so beautifully done. Were you ever paired with your other sirens prior, or did you meet when you were flown out there? Okay, when you were rehearsing, how much of the rehearsal period were you submerged in water like? Were you actually in water, coming in and out of water, or was that saved for certain moments?
Speaker 4:no, I, we rehearsed in the studio for a couple of days, right, and then we went out to the location where we would rehearse my dress rip during the rehearsal, I believe, because we had to be able to figure out how we're going to do all the stuff we're doing, where the tree limb was going to be for the dress to be thrown or the cloth or whatever we were doing, and how we would walk the path through, because it was a real river. It's a path that's clear. That's what's happened, half what's happened. But once we started filming, it was just. It was just. They were just genius, just genius directors, you know, they finish each other's sentences. It's like two peas in the pod. They look at it like one brain but two people.
Speaker 2:Can you tell us about shooting Barry Sonnenfeld's Wild Wild West with Will Smith and Kenneth Brownow?
Speaker 3:Now are you just typecast in sci-fi Westerns at this point?
Speaker 4:typecast in sci-fi westerns. At this point I didn't know about the original wow, wow west. I wanted to audition for selma's part but they said, no, no, no, it's gonna be somebody else you can come in for these parts. So okay, so I went and I auditioned for the movie and I was very fortunate, I got it. Barry is a real jokester, prankster, and so both berries, it was a blast. So once we got to set and I met will and kevin and kenneth, they were amazingly nice. I mean so, so nice, so gentlemanly, so much fun. We traveled to two different places, went to santa fe, a lot of it was shot at warner brothers and, uh, some of it was shot just on a different part of the studio, and then the last part was shot in Santa Fe where we do the thing on the train and all that stuff. But I had a magnificent time because I also ended up doing the rehearsals prior to shooting.
Speaker 4:Salma couldn't come in. I did her part, I did my part. We rehearsed for two weeks. The casting director called me and said Musetta, salma can't make it to the table read tomorrow. Can you read her part at the table read? So I hang up the phone and I'm like, oh my gosh, she's Spanish and I'm going to have a Spanish accent and I'm going to be more of a. Anyway, so I did, I studied the whole night, I rehearsed the lines, I did her lines, my lines, and I remember we had to sing like the anthem from like back in the day and none of us foreign girls, girls, knew what that even was.
Speaker 4:But anyway, so get to the table reading and it's this long table and everybody's there the directors, the producers, camera, all the cast and they put me down in the chair right opposite Will Smith and Kevin Kline and Kenneth Branagh, and there's the directors and producers and they're like you ready, and I was like uh-huh, yeah, and so I did the whole table read and it was amazing and obviously the table read went well yeah, the table read went well and then she couldn't make it to the rehearsal.
Speaker 4:So I did two weeks of where I did all her dialogue. We rehearsed on the train, all the scenes she did on the train, blah, blah, blah. Incredible. It was an incredible experience and I really got to know and work with them like I never would have in my character, because my character was a smaller part.
Speaker 2:So, musetta, you've done a lot of genre shows Babylon 5, xena, Highlander, stargate, sgi. Can you tell us a little bit about working on those shows?
Speaker 4:So Star Trek was an amazing experience for me to do. I originally was supposed to play a different episode, but anyway, and then I couldn't do it and then I did this episode, which I love, beautiful episode and apparently it was the most skin that had been shown on Star Trek at that point, because I'd seen where I was lying on the bed and my spine tingles and all of that. And I love working on Star Trek. It was probably at that stage one of the most difficult shows. I've done it to that point just because of the dialogue it was. So you know it had a completely different way of speaking. We were speaking about intergalactic terminology which you don't normally say there's a lot of jargon.
Speaker 4:There's a lot of jargon. I think my very first scene I shot was a scene where I beam aboard the shuttlecraft. So that was a fun scene which is very light, and it set the tone for me, which was great.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's wonderful that it was. Sometimes that's a good luck of scheduling right.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that was great. So that really gave it a nice light, vibrant, cheery feeling. I really enjoyed it. It was a beautifully done show and I'm very, very happy to have been part of that. Stargate that's also another amazing show. I'd also obviously seen the movies, just like on Star Trek, that was shot up in Canada in Vancouver. There were so many funny moments on that because it was Peter DeLuise was directing the first episode that I did. Oh, wow, yeah, he loved pranking people and playing jokes Him and Teal'c, my love interest in the episode. I would come through the portal there was Stargate portal and we would be rehearsing and then Peter DeLuise- would say.
Speaker 4:And now, with fire in your loins, you look at Teal'c and you say and I was like this is very serious I'm coming through this portal, I'm all like, really like a you know, and then he says, now I'm firing your voice. It's hard to keep a straight face and, you know, I would do a scene where I was dying, christopher Judge, as I was referring to earlier, and I would be dead. I'd be dead. It do a scene where I was dying, christopher Judge, as I was referring to earlier, and I would be dead. I'd be dead. It's a scene where my character has died and they're like okay, we're going to shoot it now, Ready, I'm all dying there in my corpse posture and they're filming. My eyes are closed and Christopher Judge, unbeknownst to me, has a feather and he's around my nose. Oh no, I'm like what the heck is on my face?
Speaker 4:I'm trying not to sneeze and then, of course, having a whale of a time. You know it was really funny. So it was a lot of fun. It was so many good memories over there, oh Zena.
Speaker 3:You went to New.
Speaker 4:Zealand right, yes, that was at the height of you know where the world was going to come to an end. I think it was the year 1999. Oh, y2k that whole the.
Speaker 2:Y2K stuff yes.
Speaker 4:I was in South Africa. We, you know I was. Everybody was like what's going to happen tomorrow? Am I actually going to do Xena? Will I make it? But yeah, so I was dressed in that period and I flew from there out to New Zealand. It was an amazing experience. It was amazing because the thing I love about acting especially when you're doing guest stars on different shows you get to travel to so many different. Yeah, you meet so many people that you would never meet normally, and New Zealand reminded me a lot of South Africa was very much like South Africa.
Speaker 4:Same type of landscaping, same type of feeling of people. Um, they would have instead of like a craft service I remember that very clearly they would have a tea time at four o'clock. A truck would come with like sandwiches and tea.
Speaker 4:So but, uh, on that show I, the very first day I had all this fight sequences. You know, with Lucy Lawless, that I had to do and, being the dancer, of course I really wanted to do a nice roundhouse kick because you know I could do that. I was flexible, this was the time to show what I can do. So it's her close up, it's over my shoulder, it's her close up and we start the scene, you know, and I do my roundhouse kick and I pull my hamstring. Oh, no wait, did you not warm up? Yeah, I did. I don't know what shoot, I don't know. I don't know how that happened, because I wasn't even really trying, because I knew it wasn't my close-up. I knew it was her close, right, I snapped that, I pulled that hamstring. Oh, I hadn't even started shooting my stuff yet. So I was like, oh my gosh, this is a nightmare.
Speaker 4:And so if you actually look at the fight sequences and you look close, like even this is the very first time you see my character and I'm stepping out, I can barely walk. I had to end up going to somebody to like hammer my leg and massage it and chop the karate chop, just try and get my leg to moving and my, my leg is bent the whole time, even when I jump off. I'm like you know, yeah, but still we got through it. I mean, we did it, but not like the way I wanted to do it. But, you know, because I wanted to have my, my flexibility. You know my round I was getting my grunge at days oh, oh, that's so frustrating, yeah, but you know, everything happens for a reason?
Speaker 2:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 4:And now I have amazing stories to tell from it.
Speaker 2:There's a few episodes of Buffy where we were working on Disney Ranch and I was wearing a period costume and they actually gave me a shoe that was a little bit too big and the skirt got caught and my ankle snapped and, of course, being the dancer, I like finished the whole take and they were like how did you keep going? We all heard that snap and I was like I didn't want to ruin the take, you know.
Speaker 3:Is this the Boxer Rebellion or no?
Speaker 2:It ended up being the Boxer Rebellion.
Speaker 3:That's the Boxer.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was before that we shot the Boxer Rebellion and so, yeah, we had to re-block certain scenes where I was supposed to be doing a power walk and all this stuff, because I literally couldn't, I was hobbling so badly. But it's funny because even in some of the scenes like I'm sure you can pick out on Xena where you're like, oh, that's me moving, Because there's a few scenes where I'm just taking a step or two but I'm kind of like Igor in the way that I'm moving and it's very different than I would have moved if I didn't have a foot that was like four times the size that it normally is in blue, you know.
Speaker 4:Oh my gosh, that's amazing. Yeah, you know, I think that's exactly right. That's a testament to the dance background, because what are you going to do if you're on stage and you pull something? You got to keep going. You just have to keep going, and that's pretty much what I did. I just went through and kept going. Yeah, it was like fire. Somebody stabbed like a red poking iron in the back of my thigh.
Speaker 2:No, pulling your hamstring is not a fun thing to do.
Speaker 4:That was not a fun thing, but you know, we all go through it, we live through it and the body is an amazing thing it repairs itself.
Speaker 2:It does indeed. And have you ever felt, if it wasn't in high school, but any other period in your life? Have you ever felt like an outsider?
Speaker 4:Yes, in the sense that I don't really think more like the traditional way of growing up, how I was supposed to think, to fit into a box of a certain role. I'm a very social person, so I'm not like I don't engage in conversations. I'm not very social person, so I'm not like I don't engage in conversations, I'm not that kind of. But as far as my thinking goes of our place in the universe and what the universe is about and purpose of life, I always thought a little bit differently than most people. You know that I always felt like, well, there's not many people I can talk to about that kind of stuff. Now it's becoming much more open, like healing and meditation and all of that interiorization, all those kinds of concepts which in the beginning wasn't really readily available.
Speaker 3:Which is interesting in today's time. There's that feeling, especially when you're into a very niche thing. It's like I guess I'm the only person, and now that you have so much more access to other people, not only is this not that niche of a thing, but there are whole communities around it.
Speaker 4:Exactly, you know, 20, 30 years ago, when you came up with these things and you'd say, oh, I'm going to go meditate, for example, and we were, like you know, wasn't really like something, like why don't you just come out and have fun? I want to go really spend some quality time, you know.
Speaker 2:Have you ever had a social situation where you felt like you were trying when, whatever age it was trying to fit in somewhere? That, where it was, you either realize that you didn't need to or didn't want to, but have you ever had that sort of feeling?
Speaker 4:Oh yes, oh for sure, you know, I think for sure, when you feel like when you're in a place where suddenly you're trying to make a conversation because you want to be polite and then you end up saying the absolute wrong thing. I've done that many times. I'm trying to engage in conversation and I say something and you put your foot right in the middle of it and you're like, oh, maybe I shouldn't have said. It's like saying, hey, I'm sorry, I'm going to Hawaii, I can't do your show. So, yeah, definitely. I've had many times like that, you know, and I think that's part of figuring it out. It's part of figuring out life and how, how you navigate through all the different things, because we are all different in some ways, you know. So you learn, okay, well, that doesn't work here and that works there, and so you use what you can.
Speaker 4:I had an audition once for a very, very big director and I'd already passed the acting part of it and I went in for the personal interview. It was with Spielberg and I went in for the in-person interview and it was for Minority Report. I remember when I did the audition I thought, oh, I'm never going to hear anything from this and I'm only sharing the story, to kind of bring up how you feel you don't fit in or you did something wrong and I done the whole audition. It was fine. I got the callback. Callback was at Amblin Entertainment and I didn't tell anybody I didn't want to jinx it.
Speaker 4:I didn't tell anybody. I was too terrified, you know. I believed I wouldn't want to jinx it. I didn't tell anybody. I was too terrified, you know, I believed I wouldn't want to jinx it. So I researched every single thing I could about every movie he did all of so excited to get there. And I'm sitting there and it took me forever to figure out. What should I wear? What you look? I don't really know what I'm playing because the script's very secretive.
Speaker 2:I had to audition for the role of right I don't know how to sort of give a hint of what I look like.
Speaker 4:So I mean, I had to read as a male cop, and so now I don't even really know what I'm playing. So I decided, okay, I'm going to dress this way. That took me forever, and then finally I'm sitting there, I'm all ready, I'm prepared, I am overly prepared for this.
Speaker 2:Right yeah.
Speaker 4:Every actor's dream meeting. And I get called up and the door opens and they spiel her and he goes hi, misaela, it's so nice to meet you. He goes, my daughters imitate you all the time and I'm like what Am I being punked? Somebody's punking me. Okay, so now I'm like I don't know who you are, I don't know what's going on, but I feel uncomfortable, and I'm never uncomfortable. So I go into the room and he's sitting there. He's trying to have a conversation with me and around the room for hidden cameras, like I don't think he's Spielberg, because why would he know who I am? All right now.
Speaker 4:I have never lost confidence, ever in my life. But in that moment every single bit of confidence has just left my body and vanished into like space and I'm like I don't even know who I am. I'm like a, a sail in the wind, going like this. All right, and it turned out that as the conversation progressed, after he tried to have conversations with me and I just kind of answered in like one sentence at a time, I was like not sure, Painful, very painful, polite, but very controlled.
Speaker 4:Not who I am, okay, and that he has all these kids. I never really researched his personal life. He has all these kids and they would play the music from A Brother when art thou and it was his favorite music and their kids would be in the pool pretending to wash the laundry and squeeze out the laundry, and that's what they did for fun. But I didn't know any of that. I just thought I'm being punked. I just thought this was an imposter, and it was. You know when those shows, the punk shows, were on, and you know yeah, I was being set up for punk.
Speaker 4:So I became completely just like I don't know who you are. You look like him, but it could be somebody else. I remember that meeting so well because all I had to do is just be myself, be in the interview. But in that moment I became a space cadet. I couldn't speak normally, I didn't trust anybody and I didn't know what was going on. I didn't get the job but, but I remember in that moment I it was just between me and one other person and I remember crying about that for six months every day. Because that's every actor's dream is to be in a movie like the Spielberg. You know, to get there, to even get that opportunity. And then when you have a meeting, the personal interview, you become an idiot. That is hard. That was my hardest lesson all the years of being an actor to come to terms with that. Now I don't let anything throw me at all. I don't care if an explosion goes off next to me, I'll be like okay, I'll be right there. What did you say?
Speaker 2:First of all, thank you for sharing that and it. You know, it sounds like that one of those situations where, also, instead of you being you as you are always, that you got inside your head and you were thinking about yourself and what's going on, instead of really just being present and being able to be with the flow. It's funny because Guillermo del Toro mentored my husband and I on our film that was released last year and he told us a story and I thought it was a great story. And he told us a story and I thought it was a great story which is sort of like the opposite of what ended up happening to you is he?
Speaker 2:This fellow came in to pitch and I forget what project it is. He told us, and I'll need to look it up after you know and go. Oh, it was that project. But apparently this young director came in for to pitch him about something that he wanted him to present or be involved in, whatever, and he said he got so nervous that he started just profusely sweating, to the point that it was like the scene in broadcast news where he was like dripping and it was the worst pitch he's ever heard in his entire life.
Speaker 2:Like it got and it started out bad and then it just got like paramountly worse and worse and worse and he was just sweating and sweating and Guillermo said that was the worst pitch I've ever heard in my entire life. So like, let we've gotten that out of the way Now let's hear what like your passion about that. And he totally actually understood that he was had this moment. It was the moment that this young filmmaker was like, oh my God, I'm blowing it and it's Guillermo del Toro. And he diffused the situation and he ended up like doing it. And he said part of the reason he ended up doing it was not only was once they relaxed, they had a great conversation, but really more. He was like he cared so much that he was sweating so badly, he was so upset, he was so everything.
Speaker 2:I felt like this person wants to be a filmmaker and cares and has that kind of burning desire. But it was funny because I was like, oh, that's a great story. Like you didn't have to be perfect all the time. You know you could give the worst pitch ever and maybe end up getting the gig, you know You're absolutely right.
Speaker 4:You're absolutely right. I think maybe I never. Maybe even if the interview went perfectly, I might not have gotten the job. You know what I mean. But what you do to yourself after that, yeah the torture, the shame spiral you feel it was your fault and you did something wrong. Now, if I had gone in there and just been myself and be fine, like, okay, I didn't get the job and wouldn't think about it right, but you're retracing everything, yeah but I'm thinking of how I wasn't even in my body.
Speaker 4:But you know, that was one of the pivotal points in my life because I learned so much from that moment, you know, I mean maybe I never would have gotten the job. So you know, whatever it's what it is.
Speaker 2:It's also like that thing of when you over-prepare, Like there's that sweet spot where you need to prepare enough so that you feel free, but not to the point that you're laden down and it becomes overwhelming and sort of paralyzes you, and so that's an interesting thing too is kind of going oh where's that sweet spot for anything that I'm doing, that I know enough to walk in the room and be educated, but not so much that it's going to actually not serve me well.
Speaker 4:Exactly right, you know, because all the other jobs I got up to that point. I didn't even, I didn't even research it. You know what I mean. I would do the job, I'd go to the interview, I'd speak to the people, like I mean, we figure it out as we go along. Oh, I have to be perfect, I have. I try to be something that I'm not, instead of just being myself. And it was a valuable lesson because, you know, I teach acting as well, and so that's something I share, because, as an actor, it's a valuable lesson. You don't want to be over-prepared for that. It wasn't even an acting audition, it was a personal interview, no-transcript.
Speaker 4:But it has helped me in many ways and it's helped many other people that I teach acting to, so they don't make that mistake that I made. So you learn from your own lessons?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we sure do so. Can you tell us about your passion for Qigong? It felt like you alluded to it a little bit earlier when you were talking about keeping moving and health and all of that stuff, but I would love to hear more about that part of your life.
Speaker 4:Qigong is just a word. That means energy and skills. Qigong is a skillful gathering, circulating and applying life force, energy. Everything in the universe has energy, right, energy is abundant everywhere around us, so, and we are made up of energy. And Qigong focuses on healing the body in a very natural way. The body has a natural ability to repair itself, but we step in the way so we have. You can't just address the physical body, you've got to address the emotional body, the energetic body, the mental body, all of the bodies, to have the body ultimately heal. And how I ended up in Qigong was not. I never in my wildest dreams ever thought I was going to get into healing.
Speaker 2:This has been amazing. Is there anything? First of all, what else is a big part of your life these days that we haven't talked about?
Speaker 4:I just finished an audio book, oh yeah, called Swan Song. It's a young adult, children's novel. It's coming out. I think they just asked me yesterday for photos, so I don't know when it's going to be on Amazon. It's a beautiful story. It's a children's story, but I've got to tell you that's one of the most difficult things I've ever done in my entire life, really before.
Speaker 4:Oh, tiring, oh, you've done one. Yes, I was like I didn't even know. I mean, I just said yes because you know I say yes now to everything. Yes. And then I read it and it was beautiful. But oh my gosh, I was living across the street from construction and then my neighbor decided to redo their house. Oh, and were you recording at home? Yes, and I was at home, okay, and the amount of time it took to record and the obstacles I had to overcome to record this book, and it's such a beautiful story. It took me forever to do it, just because of the massive amount of noise. But anyway, that's what's coming out right now. I've got that book. I've got a short film I did which hopefully will be doing the circuits soon. I've got a film that's out in theaters out in the East Coast at the moment, but who knows what's up next?
Speaker 3:Hopefully the book about oblivion.
Speaker 2:Yes, you never know, maybe one day I'll write that book, what's the movie that's out in theaters in New York so people can go check it out.
Speaker 4:It's called the Uncivil War. America Divided. It's what happened during the pandemic and the separation of families and stuff. It's interesting because, going back and watched it I just watched it like two months ago, a month ago, for the first time. We shot it forever ago and watching it and looking at it as an audience member, it's hard to watch, to think we all went through this crazy time. We were all locked up at homes and all this crazy stuff that went on. It's kind of almost a bittersweet thing to watch. You're like I don't want to be reminded of it. But yeah, it is part of what we went through.
Speaker 2:I was going to ask what the name of the short film is so people can look out for that once it goes to the festivals and stuff.
Speaker 4:It's called Mommy Mommy. It's about a dysfunctional family and a player, a rather disturbed mother, ooh Little twisted. It's a young filmmaker and I think he's going to be really doing well one day. It's meaty, it's different, you know, and I'm always grateful. When somebody offers me a job, I'm like, yes, I'd love to do it Wonderful.
Speaker 2:Well, is there anything that we didn't ask you, that we should have asked you?
Speaker 4:I mean, I travel extensively, so I'm going to be traveling a lot. Nice, I love that.
Speaker 2:Where do you go? Where are you off to next?
Speaker 4:Up to Washington State, then to Denver, then to South Africa. Oh right, I don't really plan anything you never know with the business. I just literally I discovered camping, which I love. I never had the chance to do it earlier, so I love camping. I have a roof tent, oh my gosh. So I will throw that thing on my car and sometimes I'll just drive somewhere and I'll just park it somewhere and open up my roof tent and sleep in the middle of nowhere.
Speaker 2:And do you do it? Do you go on your own?
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 4:Because I can't wait for everybody, because you know my husband works. I do things very impromptu because I just don't know. When I have the time, like I always tell my friend do you want to go? Yeah, yeah. When I don't know I have to do this, I have to do that, I'm like bye, yeah, I don't wait, I'll send you the invitation. You want to go be at my house at this time I'm leaving.
Speaker 4:I had the craziest experience with a bear. One of my first solo trips was to Mount Shasta, wow. So I go to Mount Shasta. I've got this bee in my bonnet. I'm going to go to Mount Shasta and I see this Lake, suskew, beautiful and I travel away. There's a hell of a drive.
Speaker 4:I get them exhausted, I'm so tired. As I get them exhausted, I'm so tired. Uh, as I check in, they go oh, by the way, there's been bear sightings in the area. I'm like, okay, they go leave your food in your car. I'm like that's a bummer, because I was going to sleep on top of the car tent as well. So I figured I'll just pitch my tent. So I'll just pitch it and then I'll sleep in my tent. I was so tired, and I was, I wasn't even going to make dinner and then I decided to make dinner. So I made dinner, got on my tent it's about 10 o'clock or so, 11 o'clock Exhausted, I fell asleep like dead on the floor in my little tent, which I'd never pitched a six-man tent by myself before. That in itself I needed an education. But anyway, I'm sleeping peacefully on my stomach, passed out on my little air mattress, and I hear go on, shoot, get out of here, go, oh. And I'm like what's happening? Get out, go. And I'm like, oh, okay, and I realize it's a bear.
Speaker 4:and I hear the as they're walking around my tent and I'm like, oh my god, wow, and I mean not just one bear, like several bear, and I parked, like the bathrooms were like I don't know, don't know far away, far enough away anyway. But now I'm on the floor and I'm in a blackout tent and I can hear the footsteps and I can hear that around me. I don't want to move, but I tell you I I've never been afraid like that. My whole scalp vibrated, my scalp went like this, my body went like that. I mean my body was physically shaking like, yeah, you shake like I've never.
Speaker 2:I've never shook like a leaf ever no, but that that would engender that I believe that's as good as time as any but like your scalp vibrating, that was a new one to me.
Speaker 4:My whole scalp was going like that. I was like I don't know your scalp can move. So I'm lying through and and now I'm terrified, okay, and I can hear them all around the thing and I'm like I'm just trying not to move, not to breathe, not to do anything and finally it's like two o'clock 2 30 and I'm like, okay, it's quiet, okay, they go on. Oh, thank god, okay, I go to bed. So I go to bed. I'm just falling asleep and I hear, and I hear and the bear sticks his nose in under my tent.
Speaker 4:You know, the tent has a little flap at the bottom his nose in, like under my tent, like this, and I knew. I knew the next thing was a paw. Okay, now, I had kept all my food in my car. However, what I didn't put in my car was my toiletries, right like my toothpaste, my toothpaste my soap Scented stuff right.
Speaker 4:Wow, they never left my tent. So when he stuck his nose in there I knew, because I'm in a paper-thin tent, the next thing's going to be a claw going through to try and get to whatever this is. In my tent I had a little fold-up chair and I just had a box in there and I just hit the box super hard and I screamed super loud in this little dark tent like I'm sure I woke up that entire canyon because you could hear the bear as bears as they were going through the campsites, you can hear people banging pots and pans and you can hear them going down to all the way to the river. They finally left. They finally left. But when it was morning and I mean I just opened it because now I'm like I'm not sleeping at all I asked the ranger, who came in and they had picked up the trash cans at one of these camps.
Speaker 4:I just lifted it that's how strong that do you know? It's giant trash cans and they flung it like that and just missed another couple in a tent. Just missed them because they started coming down from the mountains. They want the food. They have all these campers there and this place, apparently, is known for bear. I actually made a whole video about it. That's the location, because I made a video that day about it. If you go on my youtube channel, you can watch my bear story, but it was the most terrifying thing I have ever experienced in my life, so oh, my gosh, yeah, listen, but I'm still going.
Speaker 4:I'm still going camping soon and I'm taking my tent and I'm sleeping on my car.
Speaker 2:This time, oh my god truck and not in bear territory. Hopefully Not the same, it is in bear territory.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh.
Speaker 4:I'm going to be a lot wiser about it, but it can't stop me. It's like I wouldn't let it stop me. I love nature. It's the whole point of being in the middle of nowhere with nobody around you.
Speaker 2:You're lucky with what you did and also that you yeah everything my goodness oh wow, so that's my bare necessity story. Yes, you're at harrowing on that harrowing note.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we ain't topping that.
Speaker 2:That'll do it. This has been amazing. Thank you so much for sharing your time, your stories, your experience with us. It's just been really incredible. We've never gotten the chance to speak before and I feel like somehow I've known you.
Speaker 4:Right, it's the same way, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it's been really really lovely. So I'm so excited that we got to do this and can't wait to hear about all of your new adventures as well.
Speaker 4:Likewise. Likewise. So lovely meeting you guys and thank you for the opportunity, and I love sharing my stories.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much, and you're good at sharing them. Thank you so much.
Speaker 2:Thank you, bye, thank you, bye-bye. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1:Please follow us on our socials. We have TikTok slaying a podcast, x slaying a podcast, youtube slaying a podcast, and going forward, going forward. All of our video content on the youtube, as well as little shorts on tick tock to reach us all on our socials. All the links are in the show descriptions. Thank you, folks, so much and have a buffy day is that it wait, wait hold on is that the buffy scream?
Speaker 3:I think it is. I think that's what I was attempting. I think it is. I think that's what I was attempting.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:See you next week, when we'll do it again. Do it again and, most importantly, until next time, go out and slay it.