Things are starting to pick up with on-camera work and in August, I had my first audition and booking during COVID. Then in September, I was the live VO announcer for a virtual conference. Here’s what it was like being on-set during COVID…
My first experience was with the agency Ferebee and Momentive. Ferebee is in Greenville, South Carolina and to say I was excited just to get out of town was an understatement. I stayed in a hotel that felt like a ghost town. The sweet woman at the front desk said she was doing the job of several people because they were short staffed. I ended up sending her flowers afterwards because she was so wonderful and through our conversation knew that COVID had taken a toll on her spirit. Hope she ended up getting them.
On-Set Sanitation:
Since the Ferebee staff are working remotely, they set up a small set in their office. This allowed them to control the sanitation, people in and out and social distance. There were only 3 Ferebee people present, plus a makeup artist, Latia Curtis along with myself and another actor (Brian LaFontaine). Latia was awesome! Not only was she a great makeup artist but she took all the necessary precautions. She had a mask plus a face shield on and was on top of sanitizing every single thing she touched.
Changing “Normal”:
Brian and I were hosts for a Momentive informational video presentation. Normally, as is the case with many companies, they typically have a yearly company conference. Because of COVID, they’ve had to change to more virtual and digital means of communication.
Overall, it was a wonderful shoot and I felt very safe and SO grateful to just see people and get out of town. I did lose my sunglasses somewhere along the way, so I stopped by the gas station on the way home for a cheap pair. Didn’t think about the fact I had no scissors and couldn’t for the life of me get off the sunglass tag, so I rode the whole way back with a sunglass tag hanging over my nose. I apologized to the woman in the Starbucks drive-thru and she said, “I wish that was the weirdest thing I’ve seen today.”
Change Brings Innovation:
My second experience being “outside my booth and home” was for a Virtual Live VO announce job. It was such a cool experience to be a part of something so innovative. I’ll share more about that next month!
I do hope things begin to start feeling more “normal” soon but it’s also been so cool to see how (yes…I’m about to throw the dreaded word out…) companies have pivoted during this global pandemic. Despite the weird things that have happened this year and the hard stuff, I’m grateful to still be able to work and to see how people are so resilient and creative.
