In which I go back to class...

Reader, I have started going to a weekly acting class.

Ok, so you'll probably read that and go 'so what?' but here's the thing: I haven't been back in training officially for almost 5 years. I'd been through a bit of a patch of feeling unexcited and frankly a bit crap about the whole acting thing-too many bad scripts, auditions with rude directors and less than fun experiences. I needed something that would make me feel the passion again, and having watched my guy do these weekly classes and come home brimming with enthusiasm and excitement, I decided to take the plunge, hoping to refresh my skills and re-awaken the joy a bit.

What I hadn't expected were the nerves.

Nor that the nerves would be about meeting my classmates.

Reader, I think I've mentioned in the past, I got quite badly bullied as a kid. I didn't know how to interact with other children, because I spoke like a 30 year old and had spent a while before school travelling the world with my parents. Groups of kids and the way in which you're supposed to behave around them baffled me. Making friends was hard, and bullies picked up on the fact that I was different to them, leading to years of just not wanting to go to school. I didn't speak the language, or understand the conventions. I thought perhaps I was past that nervousness around large groups of strangers now, what with the fact that I have lots of amazing friends and constantly have to meet new people as part of my career, but as it turns out, I am just as awkward as ever.

The first day I was so nervous I could barely speak. I sat in a cafe opposite the theatre beforehand, trying and failing to read the same page of my book for half an hour before (thank god) my wonderful teacher bumped into me and walked with me to class. She dropped me off in the hallway with a small group of my classmates, who were ridiculously welcoming. A friend who had done the earlier class walked by and I got into a chat with her about how she'd been doing-by the time I turned around the small group had turned into what seemed to me to be a teeming mass of humans. Oh god. And they all looked really young, confident and absurdly cool. And they all knew what to wear to a weekly acting class (lycra and funky tops, which, as I am swiftly approaching 30 I find harder and harder to pull off). The nerves returned. They all knew each other and were excitedly chatting away. Heading up to the class, I was roughly 3 minutes away from a panic attack. Thank god I sat next to two lovely people who confided in me that they were crapping themselves at their first session too, and that I had nothing to worry about. And quite suddenly we'd begun. The thing is, it's hard to feel anxious when you're really enjoying what you're doing, and what I had forgotten is that I actually LIKE acting. In fact, I LOVE it. Being handed a script I've never seen before and being asked to perform it is pretty much my idea of heaven. But somehow I'd forgotten that, because how often do you actually get to perform without risking your career as an actor? Practically never. And the longer I spent with the other actors, the more relieved I was. These people don't judge. They are genuinely lovely, talented, warm and open folk who want you to succeed. The relief, dear Reader, was fairly overwhelming. I came home from class and one of the first things I said to my expectant boyfriend was 'I want to be everyone's friend in that class. They're all so...brilliant'. I don't know if you get friend crushes Reader, that feeling when you meet someone and you internally cross everything that they'll like you because they are so ridiculously wonderful that you want to hang out with them lots, but my class is full of people like that.

I have my 4th lesson this week. I'm really looking forward to it, not just because I'm learning so much (which I am) but also because I get to see this amazing group of people and play with them.

And just like that, I love being an actor again.
Ash
x

P.S. If you're an actor who needs to refresh their skills, their passion or just wants to learn some awesome new stuff, you'd be hard pushed to find a better class than The Actor's Class. Here's the link if you fancy having a wee gander

Fanciful about Food...

Reader, when it's breakfast, I am deciding what to have for lunch. When it's lunch, I am deciding what to have for dinner. When it's dinner, I'm working out a way for us to have snacks later without me being the one to overtly suggest it. I am obsessed.

The first thing I ever baked in my current flat

The thing is, food really does shape my life-most of my memories as a kid are tied around food-the worlds best banana pancakes in Bali when I was 3 that spoiled me for all other banana pancakes forever, ranbutans [sic?] eaten from paper bags in muggy hotel rooms with my parents whilst in Asia then being horribly disappointed by them back in the UK, my dad's ice cream floats (drunk on our front doorstep with all the neighbourhood kids), my Irish nan's roast potatoes that I will never be able to fully replicate and my English nan's date slice (for which I have the recipe, kept safe in a book, written down by 11 year old me and with everything spelt grossly, luxuriously wrong).

I knew I was head over heels for my boyfriend when I didn't even think about food on our first date, then on our second insisted on taking him to an Irish pub so that he could try red lemonade. I wanted him to be able to taste the drink that was the memory of so many childhood trips to Kerry because I knew he was important, even then. I was so delighted when he liked it that I threw my arms around him and kissed him.

For me, food means more than just nutrition-it's logged with emotion, nostalgia and memories. I've never been great at dieting for that very reason (which is a shame given that staying trim is part and parcel of being a screen actor). I grieved when my favourite Chinese take away closed down (I've never really recovered that particular betrayal).

In recent years more layers have been added-I know that at some point I want to have kids, so I know I have to keep my body fit and well, which means not only avoiding the wrong foods, but making sure I eat the right ones too. The past few years have had be eating meat and fish, discovering that my severe anaemia (despite my 17 year old protests) was linked to my vegetarianism and that steak is delicious. I don't just eat veggies because I have to now, I eat them because I love them and feel pretty rough if I don't. I make sure protien happens in every meal and that it's not always cheese. The older I get, the less food I can get away with eating without drastically changing size and shape. Which isn't to say that I don't still have huge pizzas and burgers-of course I do-but they had better be worth the damn calories. Frozen pizza doesn't cut it these days, it has to be the real deal or I feel cheated.

I can't tell you any dates from history but I can tell you what I ate the day we went to my first ever football match (smiley faces with soy sauce and ketchup-we were out of salt), or what me and my housemates talked about the first night we got drunk together and ate free buttery toast from the Christian tent ('Sorry man, we don't want to talk about god, we're mostly here for your food'). I can tell you the first meal Rob and I ever went out for (Thai food, which we barely ate because we were too busy laughing and doing Eddie Izzard impressions), what was served my first day on a proper TV set (veggie chilli and rice and loads of treacle sponge to ward off the cold), what I ate after my first proper break up (quorn hot dogs, one a day for 2 weeks. I lost almost a stone and looked DREADFUL), what I ate my first night in New York (TGI friday popcorn shrimp), what I ate when I found out my great uncle died (a really bad pizza from Pizza Hut), the drink my dad made me when I got mugged (very sugary tea, even though I hated tea, he said it was good for shock), what I ate the first time I was hungover (beans and chips, which I then threw up).

I feed people when they're sad-mashed potatoes, as Nora Ephron once said, are the best thing to treat melancholia. I also feed people when they're happy, celebration recipes stolen from Delia or Ottolenghi. I feed people to express my love for them, making Rob poached eggs on spinach and avocado is often my way of saying 'thank you for being incredible', cooking for my mum when I visit is my way of saying 'thank you for giving me a day job and being great at advice' and my dad's favourite carrot cake spells out how grateful I am for him putting up with all of my madness as a child (the man cut toast into pirate ships for me for god's sake)

So what's the moral of this blog post?
God, I don't know. I must be hungry. I think it's probably that food is a beautiful and special thing and we're lucky we have so much of it or something. Ask me again after lunch.
Ash
x

Hello 2015...

Ok. So in all reality, I should have written this blog post in January, not *looks at calendar* MIDWAY THROUGH FEBRUARY?! Bloody hell Reader, what happened?



Ok, so 2015 has been ridiculous so far. Pretty much from the second day in I've been so awash with auditions, acting jobs, teaching jobs, coaching gigs, social life stuff etc that I've not even dyed my hair yet (I think I actually have more root going on at the moment than I ever have before...seriously, it looks like a bar of chocolate dipped in carrot juice). Add to that the fact that a huge proportion of people I love were born at this time of year and you have a very expensive, very busy chunk of time...and now I have roughly a kajillion hen do's to attend as well because I am now of an age where half my friends are getting married and the other half have taken up very expensive hobbies. Like having children.

Saying that, I wouldn't have it any other way- we're both so busy and skint, the gorgeous boyfriend and I now don't feel guilty having dates where we refuse to leave the house (time spent in comfy clothes watching cartoons, cooking and playing each other music we used to listen to when we were young and stupid-or younger and more stupid-is utter bliss when our lives are so frenzied). I love having regular acting work and the projects I'm working on at the moment are interesting and varied. And of course, since I've been working so hard, I've felt no shame in booking two holidays for later this year!

I am pretty stunned looking at my diary though. Every other weekend contains a wedding, a hen do or acting work. I have wisely booked my second holiday at the end of the wedding season (when Rob and I will be so full of cake, debt and booze that a week in Tuscany sunning ourselves and weeping gently into bowls of pasta will be required). I am actually quite impressed that I am of an age where not only am I perfectly able to book hotels, hen do's, travel etc for weddings, but that I also book my own holidays. When did that happen? I'm pretty sure last week I was blissfully unaware of the price difference between flying on a weekend in school holidays and flying in a time when no one wants to travel, and the only thing I had to worry about when going to a wedding was if I could remember all the moves to the macarena.

It's looking to be a pretty fantastic year-loads of juicy acting jobs to sink my teeth into, a producer role on a film I'm very passionate about getting made, adventures to plan, family time to enjoy, friends to hang out with and celebrate massive events with and a man who not only loves me but also has taught me the joys of popcorn mixed with malteasers. 2015-I think we're going to get on.

Ash
x

Night shooting...

Reader, it is 3.30 in the morning and I am halfway through my second night shoot in two nights. I am starting to go a little doolally. We're all that kind of exhausted where you end up having long discussions that go round and round and round, then you find yourself trapped in a discussion loop that you can't escape from. We've all just had burgers and mash, which felt weirdly indulgent in the middle of the night and we're slightly juddery from too much Diet Coke and coffee.

I quite like the whole night shoot thing. I think. But you might have to ask me again when I'm actually awake, because I'm pretty much hallucinating pink elephants at this point.

We're at the point of looking up people we fancy and trying to explain exactly why we fancy them to non-believers. The costume mistress and I have just been attempting in vain to justify our Domnhall Gleeson adoration to a confused male lead and first AD. Apparently the phrase 'I like men who look like serial killers till they smile, then they look like puppies' does not fully make sense. To be fair it is almost 4am and our brains are scrambled.

Someone is in the hallway singing 80s rock and more than half of the crew are dangling off the balcony getting a nicotine fix as the rest of us just barely stay awake.

Being this tired is a bit like being drunk, it makes me soppy and emotional and wanting to tell everyone how great everyone else is. I wax lyrical about my family, my cat, my boyfriend, my friends, my old housemate, my doctor, to anyone who will listen (or who will at least stay still for long enough for me to realise I'm monologuing).

My belly is bloated with catering table chocolate and bread and I need to go to sleep, work out and have a green smoothie or ten. Outside the window, we have a view of Tower Bridge that you'd normally pay a fortune for-it's so stunning that every time one of us looks up we gasp, even though we're all dreaming of heavy duvets and soft pillows. It's times like this being an actor is wonderful, when the cast and crew have all bonded and are laughing over new in jokes, using a private language that will vanish with the packing away of the equipment and you're seeing and doing things most people can't even conceive. When you're all on the brink of tired, slightly hysterical tears but also excitably nervous to see the finished product and everyone looks a bit like a recovering drug addict, because let's face it, no one looks good at 4.30am.

In another 3 and a half hours I'll be in my own bed, sleeping guiltily as everyone else rises.
And I'll probably still want more chocolate.
Ash
x

p.s. watch my new series of vlogs! Letters to Autumn

Country life...(or how everyone in Salisbury thinks I'm a hooker)....

Well Reader, we're not in Kansas anymore. I'm in the wilds of Salisbury for the week, filming for short Lost Boy/ Lost Girl, in which I play a porn star called Leanne, who's sort of lost grip on her life a bit. I was determined only to bring my small carry-on suitcase for the week, but forgot that part of my costume is an enormous fake fur coat that makes me look a bit like Pat Butcher, so I wore it instead, and now I think the woman who runs my B&B thinks I'm a hooker. This isn't helped by a number of things:

1. I am actually playing a porn star, so tomorrow I'm leaving wearing a fur coat, mini skirt, false eyelashes and lots of boob on show
2. I am the only girl in the B&B (which despite being all chintzy and covered in fake flowers and Laura Ashley prints from the 80's, seems to be entirely populated by burly, slightly stinky truckers who grunt as they pass each other on the stairs) 
3. I've left the B&B at about 10.30 pm every evening so far (to go and have dinner with the crew, who finish pretty late.) I never have a chance to explain where I'm going, so she just sees me leaving late at night in fake fur, getting in a car full of young men, and coming back at about midnight
4. Last night, the other actor (a lovely young chap who's just about to do a national tour of 'Our Country's Good') finished shooting too late to collect his room key, so I let him crash in with me-meaning last night she will have heard us coming in past 12 (after another very late dinner), me telling him to shush and then letting him into my room. We're actors, so we're used to having to bunk in together when stuff like this happens, spending the evening going over scripts and correcting lines, but she can't have known that.

Oh dear. I'm being really careful to be very polite to her and dropping things like 'on set' and 'filming with the students' into the conversation, but I have noticed she's gone a little hyperactive around me. Bugger. 

Salisbury is pretty interesting. Until today, I'd only seen a couple of bits of it, but met with my lovely friend Dave from many years ago, who is now a director at the theatre here, and he gave me the guided tour. It's actually a very pretty place, but still decidedly odd. There's a campus here for Bournemouth Uni students, but none of them seem to go out. They don't have a student union here and the streets are empty by 9pm on a weeknight. I went to uni in Canterbury, and every night you'd find at least a few gangs of students in the pubs having a jolly old time, but not so here! Plus the conversations you overhear are very strange. Last night, I watched in fascination as a group of very young, intimidatingly pretty and done up girls tried to chat up two old, ugly, rude squaddies. The Squaddies were practically beating them off with sticks! I couldn't quite tell why the young ladies were interested to be honest, the men looked a bit like they lived under a bridge and ate goats who lost their riddles and their personalities seemed rather pants. Add to that the fact that they were roaringly drunk and you had an enigma in your midst-what were the girls so attracted to that they kept throwing themselves at these blokes? The service industry here is incredible, I've had taxi drivers who gave me history lessons as we drove to set, shop people complimenting my hair and look and just now, when I clumsily knocked over my bottle of diet coke in the cafe I'm stealing the wifi of, the charming young barista not only mopped it all up, but brought me a new one and winked at me!  Of course, there are a few downsides. There are NO free cashpoints, you have to walk for ages to find one. My B&B, although cosy, has no WiFi, so I'm getting behind on work and emailing and having to catch up today (next week will also be very busy now as I'll be working extra evening shifts to cover the loss of wages). People see me in my teddybear fur coat and look at me like an escapee of a local mental hospital, wheras at home I would just be seen as a bit eccentric. Plus, the area I'm staying in isn't within walking distance to ANYTHING. No sweet shops, pubs, Tesco Extras. So once I'm in the B&B, that's sort of it, a day of reading my pile of books and nothing else. Not having internet is driving me slightly mad, every hour that passes without me popping on Linked In to do a bit of work makes me think of the noise of money tinkling down the drain. Being able to sit and blog in this cafe is HEAVEN. I've even checked my facebook and applied for a few bits on casting call pro! 

Makes me realise just how much of a city girl I really am. I'm already dreaming of sushi and hot yoga and being able to hop on a bus and find a jazz bar or a snazzy theatre cafe to work in. It's a nice change of scene though, and dear lord, it's worth it to work on the camera that the crew is using. Everything looks beautiful and I'm already hopelessly excited to see the film. It helps that the actor I'm working with is really easy to bounce off of as well, fingers crossed it'll come out beautifully! 

Plus I got to see Dave. Which was like lots of birthday presents and Christmas presents all in one go!

Hope you're having a lovely week Reader, wherever you're based!

Ash

x 

Filming in the countryside...

So Reader, I've just returned from a few days working on 'The Kepler Deception' for Sky Sci-Fi channel in the wilds of Dorset with the fantastic people of Scanach Media Productions. Filming in the countryside is always interesting, from the people (we had a taxi driver who was best friends with Ray Mears and spends 3 months a year living with the Masai tribe!) to the weather (flooded roads meant our trips to set sometimes took twice the time they should have) and the locations (it was like filming Lord of The Rings. So much greenery...). I'm hoping the film is going to look rather beautiful, as the setting was fantastic!

We were staying in a couple of cottage/villa type houses on a working dairy farm, the crew in one house, the cast in the other and there was nothing in walking distance. And by nothing, I really do mean nothing. No pubs, no newsagents. Nothing. So making our own entertainment was an important part of the experience. Luckily, we're a resourceful bunch and every night made a group dinner together (my chef night recipe was caramelised onion and Gruyere tart with all the trimmings) and took the mick out of the people on tv a lot. One terrible thing did come of this though-I am now slightly addicted to Take Me Out. I'd never seen it before, and it is truly awful programming, but making fun of the people on it is a truly joyful experience. They are so cheesy, and so brilliantly, brilliantly thick. But now I want more. So far I have resisted the urge to watch another episode, but I don't know how long I'll be able to hold out! Send help!

Now I'm in serious recovery mode. After three days of getting up at 6.30 and working till late in rain soaked, windy conditions and travelling all the way to Dorset, I seriously need a break. In fact, I'm planning on booking a day of massages, manicures, pedicures and sofa time next week-I've had a headache for the past two days so some downtime needs to happen. But have some lovely things coming up-it's my gorgeous mum's birthday this weekend, so I finally get to give her the spoiling she deserves, Saturday I'm babysitting for my adorable godson AG, who I'm planning on giving all my cuddles to (he's at the age where he'll let you hug him, so I am taking full advantage) and during the day I'll be trying on bridesmaids dresses with The Bride and some of the other girls as well as a lovely lunch!

For my latest vlog on my filming exploits, go here (if you click on my picture below the video, you'll also find all my other vlogs too!) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7Fi1IOBcNk

Tarrah chaps!
Ash
x

Big City Life...

The thing is Reader, living in London is awesome. Seriously. If you haven't tried it yet, you are a loonie bin and should come for a visit. Sometimes I look at my life and go 'wow. I'm living in a Richard Curtis film.'

I'm sitting on my bed in North London, drinking a glass of vodka and diet coke with lots of candles burning, my housemate is about to show up with some friends and more booze, I have frozen yoghurt in the freezer and the music my downstairs neighbour is playing is so good that I just had a dancing/jumping on my bed session. Tomorrow, I'm taking driving lessons so I can do more film work. This week I'm going ice skating. For the past couple of nights I've watched a tv show I was in for the BBC. There is no part of this that is not AWE-INSPIRING.

2014 is doing well. A short film I wrote for SKY is in production, another is in Pre-Production with one woman MACHINE Caley Powell and every week I get another exciting bit of news about stuff going on later in the year. I'm going to be a bridesmaid for the first time since my boobs grew in and my gorgeous friend The Bride has great taste so I won't be stuck in a fuchsia silk monstrosity for the whole thing.

Frankly, living in London makes me very happy. On Monday evening I'm going for cocktails in SoHo with my producer Gary Morecambe and talented writer Vicki Baron of Empty Photo Theatre (read their blog here: http://emptyphototheatre.wordpress.com/ ) to discuss our next tv project together and at the end of next week I'm off for a week filming on SKY Sci-Fi film 'Kepler' with Scanach Media. I'm also going to take a day to go and sit in South Bank with my notepad and work on the book I'm writing, it's an incredibly beautiful area  and incredible for inspiration.

There's something about being in London that makes you feel like every day is rife with possibility, you could do anything and be anyone. You can be completely anonymous or you can surround yourself with loved ones. And right now? It's where I need to be.

So here's to London, with it's grimy streets and tame foxes. Here's to crotchety black cab drivers and hipster cyclists. Here's to 24 hour Asda, buskers and street lights gleaming through a heady mist of rain. Here's to street food and Soho and secret places that you accidentally discover when you've walked past it every day for a year. Here's to drunk teens on the underground, strange flavoured ice cream in Camden and the view from London bridge. Here's to London. And all it signifies.

Londoney love Reader!
Ash
x

Solitude...

So Reader, for the past couple of days, I have been alone. House sitting. Now, the first night, I freaked out slightly. Couldn't sleep at night because I kept thinking I could hear noises (despite the fact that the house is more secure than Buckingham Palace and I am surrounded by safety conscious neighbors). I ran out of things to do, started talking to the cat in funny accents and did so much crafting that my fingers now look like they have chicken pox from the needle prickles.

Now however, I am loving it. I am taking every night as as solitary sleepover. Films, face packs, popcorn and many hot baths. Singing loudly and out of tune has become a must whilst cooking dinner. Solitude, I have discovered, is very me. Saying that, I have already caved and spent a night back visiting my housemate last night because I missed her too much (living with one of your besties is a committed relationship, you miss them as you would a boyfriend after a while).

One thing that I have come to notice is that my taste in films has definitely got more silly since being single. No longer do I make an attempt to watch a range of genres. Or much in the way of new, edgy films. This week I have chomped my way through The Bachelorette,  My Best Friend's Wedding, SATC2, Dark Shadows and The Cinderella film with Hillary Duff. I can feel my brain cells dying and I am loving it! Next week The Purge and Byzantium are on my list. I've now watched all of The IT Crowd and restarted on American Horror Story. Fantastic.

The cat is very confused by me. He is unimpressed with my singing and my various accents. I dressed him up as an arab cat the other day using a teatowl and a hair band and he glared at me for the rest of the day. I'm not convinced he is enjoying me being his carer quite as much and I am enjoying caring.

In between work (and self pampering) I have been seeing a lot of my grandparents. Today I took my gran out to get her yearly dose of the ENTIRE CLINIQUE COUNTER and as usual she forced cake down my gullet and gave me a talk out of the blue about how 'there is someone out there for everyone, any ye'll find ye'reself a lovely man at some point, ye need someone mature. Maybe someone who's got a house'. My gran is clearly the queen of advice. This is the same woman, who when asked about how she met the love of her life said 'The Eegit stole my handbag'.

Anyway folks, I'm going back to Carrie and the girls and starting to run my bath. Up super duper early tomorrow and it looks to be a busy ass day!
Tarrah!
Ash
x

I'm BACK BABY!

Reader, I know, I know. You're staring at me and shaking your head with disappointment. I haven't written a new entry in a kazillion years and my last one was all serious-I have LET YOU DOWN. I am writing this from the naughty seat in the corner.

In my defense though, life has been a bit intensely mad this year. It all started with getting booked to do a couple of short films for a channel on SKY. Then was swiftly followed with two shows in London and a break up of my long term relationship. Which was then followed by a trip to Ireland, moving in with one of my best friends and landing a small part in a TV series that I've watched for years. And then the two short films for SKY turned into five short films, one of which I was commissioned to write as well as act in. I haven't had time to have a bath longer than 2.5 minutes for as long as I can remember and I haven't seen a current film at the cinema for about as long. BUT ALL IS WELL.

So life has changed a bit! I lost loads of weight with the whole break up thing (then gained it all back with the whole 'I'M SINGLE, I'M GOING TO GET DRUNK AND EAT ALL OF THE POTATOES' thing), I now live in a sweet little flat (which I can barely afford but love too much to give up), I've spent most of my days on set in my trailer reading and prepping (I showed myself up on the first day of filming by being overheard on the phone to my mum going 'I HAVE MY OWN TRAILER, THIS IS THE BEST'. No cool points at all.) and I'm fully embracing being ginger again (albeit with rather intense roots from filming).

Now that my internet is finally fixed in Bag End (the name given to our flat given that we are alcoholic hobbits) I'll be back blogging a bit more regularly with any luck, so keep your eyes out!
Tarrah for now Reader!
Ash
x