Have You Seen These Actors?

Miscellaneous TV

By madeyoulaugh | Tuesday, January 25, 2005 | 11:13 am | 10 Comments

unscripted.jpg

Hopeless auditions. Sleazy agents. Chance meetings with Hollywood heavyweights. It’s all part of day-to-day life for the struggling actor in Los Angeles — and the setting for the new series, UNSCRIPTED.

Chances are, you’ve missed the show. Seems no one is watching, which is why TvGasm was compelled to share this hidden gem on a tiny little cable station called HBO. It is not as shiny, polished or scripted as Entourage and it is in the realistic feel of Unscripted, that the hilarity lies.

George Clooney and Steven Soderbergh executive produce this mockumentary style comedy with heart. The show follows the professional lives of three actors each struggling to make their mark in Hollywood.

Clooney’s and Soderbergh’s reach is far and wide, in the first 2 hours of the show, Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, Jerry Van Dyke, Gary Marshall, the cast of ER, Hank Azaria, Richard Kind and Sam Mendes have all donated their talent and time to help Clooney’s show succeed. This is indicative of the quality of show that you people are missing.
UNSCRIPTED is a half-hour comedy series that blends improvisation and real incidents to tell the tale of three promising young actors as they navigate the rough waters of show business. Having just aired its third episode, the series seems to avoid the sex and drug clichés and focus more on the humanity, perseverance and overall struggle of the average Hollywood actor. “The truth of the matter is less than five percent of our union makes all the money,” Clooney says. “And that’s just the people in the union. There are so many actors that get up every morning and — forget getting a job — they try to get an agent. Or an audition. We’re trying to show what it is that we do. It’s completely unlike the way it’s usually portrayed.”

As its name implies, UNSCRIPTED features no written lines of dialogue. The cast members improvise their lines in situations based on their own experiences and those of the show’s creators. There are no rehearsals, no retakes and no reshoots. The result is a dry-humored insider’s look at what it takes to make it big — or at least make a living — in Hollywood.

UNSCRIPTED stars Krista Allen, Bryan Greenberg and Jennifer Hall, essentially playing themselves as struggling actors. Stage and screen veteran Frank Langella co-stars as Goddard Fulton, a noted actor who leads them in an acting workshop at Los Angeles’ fabled Tamarind Theater.

Throughout the ten-episode series, Krista, Bryan and Jennifer appear in real-life situations, including a maze of offices and real film productions, crossing paths with real-life Hollywood stars and directors. From humiliating jobs and padded resumes to professional breakthroughs, UNSCRIPTED offers a revealing look at the sometimes raucous, often disillusioning world of the struggling actor.

Normally, the Gasm wouldn’t gush over a show. But having so many actor friends as well as a divine respect for hysterical and true storylines, I felt a sense of obligation to encourage the viewing of this show. New episodes air Sunday nights at 10pm on HBO.

If you have any hidden shows you love, and you fear no one is watching, let us know about it at madeyoulaugh@tvgasm.com and it could be the topic in a future Gasm post.

10 Comments

  1. 1
    B-Side
    Posted January 25, 2005 at 11:56 am

    If by “hilarity” you mean “not funny” and by “gem” you mean “pretentious piece of trash”, then yes, Unscripted is great!

    I will say that the show definitely captures the life of struggling actors in LA. I don’t begrudge it that. But do we really care? Do we really want to see the clique-iest element of Hollywood be given the “woe is me!” treatment?

    I don’t mind self-involved, self-deluded protagonists. But I do mind self-involved, self-deluded productions.

  2. 2
    Scot
    Posted January 25, 2005 at 12:52 pm

    So it’s sort of like that show on Bravo that follows non-acting actors around?

  3. 3
    Madeyoulaugh
    Posted January 25, 2005 at 1:16 pm

    Scot –

    Not exactly, though this is done as a mockumentary, there is a definate sense of mock within the “umentary.” There is no confusing this for the Bravo! show to which you refer. I would suggest giving the showe 2 episode try. if you dont like it after 2, it may not be for you, but thats how long it took for me to get into it.

    MYL

  4. 4
    IndianJones
    Posted January 25, 2005 at 3:01 pm

    rrrrreeAAAOW! B-Side, laying the smackdown on a fellow TVGasm staffer. I like it.

    TWO MEN ENTER

  5. 5
    B-Side
    Posted January 25, 2005 at 3:08 pm

    I did it for you, IndianJones. I did it for you.

  6. 6
    smithie
    Posted January 25, 2005 at 5:04 pm

    I thought that one girl, Krista Allen, was way too famous to be on a show for struggling actors, but when I looked up her bio, I realized I only recognize her from Liar Liar as the booby prize in the elevator and the lesbian in Anger Management. She must be very good for me to remember her for nothing…
    Also where is Curb Your Enthusiasm, it’s been a year since I’ve seen it…

  7. 7
    Jason
    Posted January 26, 2005 at 9:16 am

    Krista Allen is probably best known for dating George Clooney at one point.

    The struggles she goes through as an actress trying to get beyond the perception of her as “the naked chick” is the most interesting part of the show (which I found boring the first week) and the situations that they all deal with are all kind of engaging.

    I don’t know how I feel about Jennifer Hall but she totally plays like most young actresses I know.

  8. 8
    Madeyoulaugh
    Posted January 26, 2005 at 11:24 am

    Smithie,

    I think one of the things the show teaches fame doesnt equate to not struggling when it comes to acting. your only as employed as your next job.

    MYL

    Jason,

    So, you agree? You like the show? Or no, you dont?I wasnt sure what your comment was saying.

    MYL

  9. 9
    jack
    Posted January 28, 2005 at 6:42 am

    I gave ‘unscripted’ a look based on this recommendation (could TVgasm be wrong? Apparently.), and I have to concur with B-side. I thought ‘K-Street’ was bad (and i mean B-A-D), but at least it was about something halfway relevant. Who could have thought Clooney and Soderbergh could top all of those embarassing cameos by real-life politicians? Well, strap in, because everyone in Hollywood must clearly be elbowing past each other to be able to say they played themselves on ‘Unscripted’ and are thus part of the Clooney-Soderbergh cool-guy circle (yeah, I know, Soderbergh’s kind of a nerd, but being Clooney’s wing man and marrying a supermodel will definitely knock your cred up a few notches).

    We’ve all seen ‘Fame.’ And even us yokels in Florida and Missouri and Arizona have at least six friends who were high school theatre stars and at one point or another spent a year or two getting their souls crushed on the audition circuit in LA. So the struggling actor storyline is kind of a cliche. Less than a month after our latest massive human disaster and in the midst of an ongoing war, it’s a little hard not to laugh when Frank Langella gets all stern and goes into another Bobby Bowfinger-ish ‘do it for the art! you’re an ARTIST! You don’t just want to do a TV show for lots of money! You want to do Ionesco in the round for a has-been like me!’ monologue for the guy who looks like the singer from Matchbox 20.

    But hey–at least it makes more sense than ‘Carnivale.’

  10. 10
    madeyoulaugh
    Posted January 28, 2005 at 9:06 pm

    I have a confession…..One of my friends is one of the stars on the show. I felt compelled to write a good review. J-Unit told me you guys would see through it and appearantly you did. Though in my defense, the more I watch it, the less hard it is to lie about. It does grow on you.

    MYL

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