SOUTHLAND

It surprised me to hear on Facebook that people love this show. I got two replies from a posting I made that I was booked on this show. It seems that people who like it really like it. I caught a few episodes of the first season and something happened on the show that made me feel like it was so fake and unrealistic.

Ironically, the show actually uses real cops as background. I wondered if it was because they wanted to save money, but others say they want it to be as realistic as possible.

The show shoots at the LA Center Studios and took the place of Women's Murder Club. All the trailers were set-up pretty much where WMC was shot. It reminded me of the first time I worked as an extra as a cop on that show. For Southland, I was booked as a clerical type.

Wardrobe didn't give me too much of a hard time when I seemed to be the only person who didn't have a sports coat of some type. But I didn't hear anything about a sports coat on the info line. So wardrobe just told me to roll up my sleeves and that would be fine.

I wasn't given any props and just walked around the police station set like I was doing office work. I ran into Darin Cooper again who I had worked with on Monk previously. Everyone was called to set but us, so he came by and we talked more about the business and whether we would stay in it or not. He's a veteran, having worked in the industry for over 20 years. He's been making his insurance levels, so he's obviously doing something right.

On the other hand, it's not an easy life. It reminds me of a poker saying - it's an tough way to make an easy living. But he did bring something new up. He said he had a DVD he had produced and financed with some friends. It's called Big and Loud Video and essentially serves the young boys and parents market. Of course, I immediately started to wonder how he could market the video since I have some background in media advertising. Unfortunately, advertising means spending money, so I didn't have much helpful advice for him.

I do think the dvd could do well if marketed on a grass roots level. But again, that requires some work and you can really only make a decent amount of money when your products sell a lot of volume. Still, it's always so interesting to see how someone can make something and generate some kind of money from it. I guess that's what a business ultimately is and I keep wondering what idea I can run with to start making some honest money.

As we sat around after shooting a few scenes, the 2nd asked us if we wanted to stay or leave. I always wonder if that's a trick question, but since Darin said he would stay, I figured I would too since it's always easier when you've got someone to chat with throughout the day. So we stuck around along with a few other backgrounders and were driven to the next location.

Darin is a very cool guy and incredibly encouraging. He told me he could easily see me as a cop on the show doing what those guys on set were doing. He also said that since I have a mixed look (ethnically), they love that sort of thing. I guess you have to be able to see that there are always opportunities out there as long as you're willing to try to take advantage of them. Sure, there are tons of roadblocks, but there's always possibilities as well.

I did some calculating and wondered if it was a good decision to stick around. We could have been wrapped about 11:30am. That meant a five hour day for $134. Instead, I stuck around for another five-and-a-half hours for an additional $38. That meant a little less than $7.00/hour for the extra 5+ hours. Oh well, I guess an extra $30+ is still money in the pocket.

Afterwards, I went to Jansen's since there was just too much traffic to head home. We kicked it at his place, rode his bikes to rent a movie and ate some sinigang he had made. Then I asked Gisele if she had wrapped and since she had, we decided to grab a drink at a little pub I found off La Cienega in mid-Wilshire. Since we were both pretty tired, we got tipsy pretty quickly off our one drink.