Under Trump’s presidency, immigration is the priority. Having campaigned on removing dangerous, undocumented criminals, one of his first actions was to increase the budget for border control and immigration to $170 billion. But instead of targeting criminals, Trump has sent out Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agents to make random sweeps on the streets of Los Angeles – illegally arresting people with brown skin, or who speak English with a foreign accent, and denying them due process.
In July, I joined a pro-democracy group and learnt about adopting a day labor corner. Day laborers congregate outside home improvement stores such as Home Depot where they wait to be offered employment for the day on construction or landscaping projects. Masked agents with no identification started to raid these locations, essentially kidnapping people. The Latine and Asian immigrant communities in Los Angeles were being terrorised, some, of course, being too afraid to leave their homes to obtain work.
The Democratic Socialists of America and the National Day Laborer Organizing Network amongst others, started to provide training so that members of the community could support the day laborers by handing out information about their rights, patrolling areas for sightings of ICE and if day laborers couldn’t be notified in time to avoid a raid, to make sure that any arrests were documented and the names of the workers’ taken so they could be tracked in the system and provided with funds and medication after being detained.
This has taken up most of my time and headspace throughout July to October along with canvassing for Prop 50 which has been presented to the people of California to ask if they would be willing, temporarily, to redistrict in order to gain more Democratic seats to counteract the redistricting that Trump has urged Republican leaders to carry out in Texas in order to gain “five more seats”. Trump realises how poorly he is doing and knows that he can’t win enough votes without cheating, and although California has an independent commission to create voting districts, Californian’s are being asked if they feel it has become necessary to cheat ourselves in order to fight fire with fire. The vote for Prop 50 will take place on November 4th.
Apart from volunteering, I have had some voice over work and auditions picked up a little in October only for me to be offered two callbacks while I was away for a few days in Malta for a friend’s wedding. Having self-taped for the first round of auditions, these callbacks were online auditions through Eco Cast, the Actors Access audition tool. I’m getting more than a little tired of productions not providing a room to meet actors in person. If they aren’t even going to bother at the callback stage, then actors just don’t get the chance to be free in the room to create their best work. They are always constrained by the technical limitations of a self-tape or online audition.
Alongside the lack of respect for actors in Los Angeles and the loss of connection between casting directors, directors and producers when auditions aren’t held in person, there are several other factors that have led me to take the decision to leave LA and return to the UK for at least a couple of years and then reassess. More to come on that decision in my next few blogs.
To end then, my favourite film this year so far and so, naturally, the recommendation for this blog is, Twinless. From the very first shot, I was drawn in. I always want to see original material and this is a very cleverly constructed comedy. I hope you enjoy it too.
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