303 – She’s a 30 year Actor who trains other actors: Tom interviews Raquel Gardner

Episode 303 – Raquel Gardner
[00:00:09] Welcome to Screw the Commute. The entrepreneurial podcast dedicated to getting you out of the car and into the money, with your host, lifelong entrepreneur and multimillionaire, Tom Antion.

[00:00:24] Hey, everybody it's Tom here with episode three hundred and three of Screw the Commute podcast. I'm here with Raquel Gardner. She has been a working actor for the last 30 years and she's been coaching actors for the last seven years. Now, of course, you will not believe this when you look her up online because she doesn't look like she's even 30 years old, let alone been working for 30 years. So check her out. Raquel Gardner. And I'm really looking forward to introducing her to you in a minute. Now, I hope you didn't miss Episode three hundred and two. That was Barbara Glanz. She is the first speaker on record to have spoken on all seven continents and in all 50 states. And check this out while we're talking about acting. She was the first drama coach for David Hasselhoff.

[00:01:18] I don't know how many people really want to claim that that they but.

[00:01:25] She was his first thing in high school and still she gets together with him today. So that's pretty, pretty cool. Now, how would you like to hear your own voice here on screw the commute? Well, if the show's helped you out at all in your business or given the ideas that help you start a business. We want to hear about it. Visit screwthecommute.com and look for a little blue side bar that says Send a voicemail. You can click on it, talk into your phone or computer. Tell me how the show's helped you and throw your website in there and you'll get a big shout out in your own voice on a future episode of Screw the Commute. Grab a copy of our podcast app at screwthecommute.com/app. Of course, all these links and all Raquel's great stuff will be in the show notes. This is episode 303 and you get to the show notes by going to screwthecommute.com slash and then the episode number. All right. Now we're sitting at home here. This pandemic's going on. I've been living this lifestyle for 26 years and I've had people call me Tom. You're all right? And I'm like, yeah, what's what's the difference? I've been sitting here for years and years doing this lifestyle business. And they say, well, we wish we'd listen to you. Twenty years ago. Bet you do. A lot of people are freaking out, but you can create a really great lifestyle business right from your own home and computer or office. And we actually formalized my training. I have the only license dedicated Internet marketing school in the country. It's IMTCVA.org and it teaches highly in demand skills. Every business on Earth needs Internet marketing, social media, email marketing, shopping cart stuff, all of this stuff. We teach those hard core skills. We have people making money before they even graduate because people are begging them to take over their social media and do all the stuff they're clueless about. So check it out at IMTCVA.org. It's also a great legacy gift for your kids, your grandchildren, your nephews and nieces, so that they're not spending a fortune at a traditional university, learning how to protest and and then competing for jobs at Starbucks while they're going broke with debt. So none of that happens when you're around me.

[00:03:43] All right. Let's get to the main event. Raquel Gardner is a private acting and goal coach and mentor to many successful actors on the screen today. Her actors are currently working on Netflix, Stars, Fox, NBC, HBO, Showtime and many other networks. Raquel founded The Actors Mark in 2015. It's a safe space for actors to build a solid technique in their craft and also understand the business side of their career. That's really important. Raquel has a wealth of knowledge about the industry. She was a commercial agent also for three years, so she knows both sides of the coin. And she believes coaching is a calling to help the new generation of actors be the best they can be so they can bypass the pitfalls and get to the work faster. Raquel, are you ready to screw? The commute?

[00:04:39] Yes, I'm am.

[00:04:40] I'm glad. Great to have you on. I'm so thrilled about it.

[00:04:45] It's so interesting to hear your own bio. It's like, wow, you know, we we try so hard to keep pushing ourselves and be so motivated. And then you're like, you don't give yourself the credit that you deserve, you know? And then when you hear somebody say that, you're like, wow, I really I've done a lot.

[00:05:04] You have. And I had to abbreviate it so we wouldn't. The whole show up, because you've been around the horn with acting and modeling and commercials and and the business side of it.

[00:05:16] Booking, casting agent and all that stuff. So it's very rare that we get somebody that's got all of that, you know, experience in one place. So tell everybody what you're doing now, and then we'll take you back to the beginning and see how you came up through the ranks.

[00:05:31] Well, it's interesting how you were talking in the beginning about what you do and about, you know, using an opportunity to create a business at home. And during this Covid, I mean, I've had The Actors Mark, which is.

[00:05:47] It's basically an acting community for me. I do a lot of private coaching for actors that are working on set. I do a lot of goal coaching for newer actors that are looking to strategically get themselves in a position to work as an actor.

[00:06:03] I work with all levels of actors, which is great. But during this Covid, it was interesting because I thought, how am I going to sustain my business?

[00:06:16] Because most of my stuff is in person. My classes are in person. My coaching is in person.

[00:06:22] And so I really had to sit down and think about that because I thought this could go two ways. I could let you know what's happening in the world, kind of determine my direction, or I could create my own direction.

[00:06:38] And so I started reaching out to a lot of these online portals that were the casting portals like backstage and casting networks and casting Frontier and Hollywood casting and film. And, you know, they were holding these seminars.

[00:06:54] And I thought this is a good way for me to grow my business, because if I do a free seminar for them or a free class for them, you know, I'm getting in front of five hundred thousand people. Right. I'm getting an opportunity. And so I reached out to them and I said, you know, it's not going to hurt just to email them.

[00:07:12] And I emailed a bunch of them and they responded and they were like, yeah, that sounds like a great idea.

[00:07:17] So I went on and did a couple webinars and with all that, it was just booming, like people were really responding a lot. And I realized that there was a big need for a for young actors. And I don't mean young as an age. I mean young as in developmental actors that were looking for guidance, like they didn't have any guidance from anybody that was a trusted source. And so my best friend of 30 years who I live with, you know, we've partnered before in the past and she's like, you really have something here. And she's got a major marketing background and she's a business owner. And I said, really? And she goes, yeah, we need to sit down and we need to talk about it. And so we came up with this whole plan to do affordable classes for people to have a private Facebook group that is dedicated to individuals and actors that are really serious about what they want to do and about their growth. And we you know, we have been moving forward really fast. It's really amazing.

[00:08:22] So this pandemic cloud, so to speak, is actually have a silver lining. And because it pushed you into this different arena that you hadn't been thinking about.

[00:08:35] Yeah. And I've just done everything on Zoom and Facebook Live.

[00:08:40] I've held some pop up classes on Instagram live and have been really successful with that. I do a lot. I've been doing tons of private coaching and goal coaching, you know, helping actors right now position themselves. So when everything opens back up that they are ready to go.

[00:09:00] Exactly. You know, so that they know what they're doing and they're not sitting around going, oh, how do I get an agent? What am I supposed to do first? And how do I meet these people? So we give them a plan. Yeah.

[00:09:14] Actually creating a course right now, the business of the actor course. So that's going to be completed probably within the next month and a half. And we'll roll that out. That's going to be amazing. That's gonna give actors an actual step by step program where they can learn how to position themselves to be a working actor. What's most important, what they need to focus on, what they can do for themselves. Typecasting. What kind of headshots? They need to take, though. We'll have examples of that in there. We'll give them exercises. It'll be really great.

[00:09:50] Yeah. You have to have the business and the craft.

[00:09:53] I mean, in just about anything nowadays, like in my professional speaking world, like I mentioned, the lady that was on the other day, you can be the greatest speaker in the world. But if nobody if you don't know how to handle the contracts and find where the buyers are and do all that stuff. No good. And then on the other hand, if you know where to find the buyers, but then you suck on stage and that's bad.

[00:10:17] Yeah.

[00:10:18] You know, I've learned something a long time ago from Tony Robbins, who I absolutely love. And I think he's so knowledgeable when it comes to building, you know, your own sustainable business and empire and self-esteem. He said, don't ever try to do something yourself that somebody else can do better. You know, have like. Don't do it by yourself, because that's the one thing. If you're starting a business and like this speaker, she probably has a team of people that help her facilitate so she can focus on the creative. And then she oversees the business end of it. For me, it was like that's where I was. I was so overwhelmed trying to do everything by myself. I said, I just I can't move forward if I'm by myself.

[00:11:06] Yeah. I just warn people that still they can't divorce themselves totally to what's going on. They, like you said, they have to oversee it because it's too easy to get ripped off. If somebody tells you you need five or ten thousand dollar photo shoot and you know how to get it for three or four hundred. Well, guess what? You know, they just if they did for five or ten grand, they have to make that money back. Just to break even.

[00:11:30] So that a person. But that's you know, you absolutely as a business owner need to oversee everything, I believe. Yeah. But that's you know, for me, I guess I'm lucky because I have somebody that, you know, is my partner and I've known her for 30 years and we're best friends and I trust her with my life.

[00:11:52] Yeah, of course. But most people don't have.

[00:11:55] Yeah. Not all people are that lucky. But I say that, you know, you know, find somebody that you connect with and really do that work. But when you do find that person, you know, baby steps into trusting, you know, the relationship. But you've got to be able to delegate some stuff if you really want to be successful.

[00:12:17] Yeah. And I was just thinking about, you know, you're getting into the Zoom world. You oughta be able to train actors because they're doing dog training.

[00:12:26] You know, they've got I have I have a class right now and Zoom. Yeah. We have students and it's absolutely amazing.

[00:12:35] Yeah. Yeah. So. So it's a good skill to have. I don't think anything will ever replace in person stuff, but having both sets of skills can really help your business and help more people that that you could, you know, just doing one or the other. So let's take you back. So how did you get started?

[00:12:53] Did you get on a bus from Iowa or something in town and and waitress for a hundred years?

[00:13:03] I, I started acting. I moved. I'm from Ohio. I'm from Cleveland, Ohio. Okay. Yeah. Born and raised. I moved to Chicago when I was 16 to model. And when I turned 19, I wanted to move to L.A., and I always knew I wanted to move to Hollywood. Even when I was little, I would tell my mom that I was going to move to Hollywood.

[00:13:27] So I was very set in my ways. I moved to Hollywood at 19 and I got Twin Peaks within six weeks of being here. That was one of the 50 to pick up girls on the Twin Peaks pilot. And I got my SAG card, and that was super exciting. And I got a manager and, you know, just started the process and was modeling at the same time.

[00:13:51] I was doing a lot of fitness and swimwear modeling, and I was just I just had a blast.

[00:13:58] I mean, it had a lot of ups and downs. You know, this business has a lot of ups and downs.

[00:14:03] And it really taught me to be a really solid person.

[00:14:09] It taught me a lot about myself. It taught me about what I let bother me. And, you know, how to have a strong self-esteem and how to build my confidence no matter what.

[00:14:19] And, you know, you're in a business that, you know, 80 percent of the time you're hearing, no, you're getting rejected.

[00:14:28] And so you have to be OK with that. You can't let that bother you.

[00:14:31] And it's hard to not let that bother you when you're a young girl in a big town.

[00:14:35] And speaking to. No, I mean, how do you.

[00:14:37] Do you actually teach people and talk about staying away from the predators that might be there trying to take advantage of of young women and young men?

[00:14:47] Absolutely. 100 percent. But that comes from the need to, you know, your desperation. People are very intuitive. They just don't tap into the intuition.

[00:15:00] They just don't tap into that, you know, that knowingness inside of themselves because they're clouded with the desperation of, oh, I'm going to be famous or, oh, I want this or oh, I want to meet that person or oh, this person can do this for me.

[00:15:15] You know, so I always teach my actors.

[00:15:19] To start with your own self-esteem.

[00:15:22] And because acting is so closely tied to self-esteem and you can't be a successful actor unless you start working on that because you are going to be judged all the time, you're gonna be in the scrutiny of the public eye all the time. And you have to be OK with all that stuff. So there has to be some level of, you know, acceptance within yourself to where that stuff doesn't bother you. So I lead with that.

[00:15:51] Now, you also have something that you don't see usually together, acting, coaching and goal coaching. So tell us about that. The goal is indeed the goal.

[00:16:03] Coaching is, you know, it's so funny. I actually did not anticipate being an acting coach around you, right?

[00:16:12] Yeah, totally. Yeah.

[00:16:14] So my girlfriend of many years is a very successful African-American afterwards. And she started in acting school many years ago and it's been really successful. She was on the road and then she decided to get an actual building and that's when she asked me to coach for her. And I was like, no, I don't want to. Now, that's not for me. And she pushed me and pushed me and pushed me.

[00:16:37] And I finally said, OK, I will try it. And it ended up becoming my calling. And what happened was I realized when I was coaching there, these actors had no direction. I was like, nobody was telling. Nobody was a trusted mentor to these actors. That was somebody that was loyal that they could count on that wasn't going to screw them over.

[00:17:01] All these places I started researching were charging all these actors, all this money to do this and that. And it wasn't really getting them in the direction that they needed to go.

[00:17:12] So when I started my private coaching. I said, you know what, everybody's been asking me?

[00:17:19] Can I book a session with you to help direct my career? And so I came up with this goal coaching. It's an hour and a half session. It's an ongoing session. You know, you do one hour and a half and then a few months later, you can do another hour or hour and a half.

[00:17:35] And we go over everything. We go over a strategy for yourself. Your marketability. We start to zone in on who you are as an actor instead of trying to be broad.

[00:17:50] We I really like try to typecast them so that they can have the most success in the business.

[00:17:57] We work on their headshots, all of their online profiles, on their resumes, their real's. I go over everything.

[00:18:04] Seems to me that that thing that's more valuable than the craft, because if they're just flopping around all over the place for sometimes years, that's very inefficient, equally work.

[00:18:17] It's equally valuable because if you have the business sense but you and you get the opportunities because you know what to do and you're prepared, but you go into that room and you don't.

[00:18:33] You're green. And we use the word green because it's like you're not really. You don't really have any type of technique or foundation in your acting. Then it's too competitive. Right now, you're not. You're gonna you know, the casting director is gonna see that. So you really you have to be prepared. You have to have a solid foundation in your work. You have to have a coach or somebody that you trust that you can work with or classes that you're taking that really help you develop into a well-rounded actor.

[00:19:07] So it's both. Again, they have to have them. Yeah. And the goal. So. So tell. So let's say somebody goes through the actors work website. What happens then? They're excited about it. What happens? What do they do? How does it go?

[00:19:23] Well, it depends on what they want. I mean, we have we have the members lounge, you know, link on there.

[00:19:30] So if you're looking for a community of actors and you're looking to connect with other actors, which is so great. We had our our members meet and greet last night because we just started the lounge a month ago and we had our members meet and greet last night and everybody got on there and talked about where they were from.

[00:19:51] And I have people from all over the country, some people in London, and they some of the actors had already connected with each other on the group, had reached out to each other. And we're talking about, you know, helping each other with self tapes and whatnot. And it's just I mean, it just gave me such a warm feeling inside because I thought this is exactly what I'm trying to do, create this community of actors.

[00:20:18] So you can go to the to the actors, you know, the private Facebook lounge, the members lounge. You can join that. It's a monthly fee and you get two classes a month. You get access to all my resources.

[00:20:33] You get access to all the other actors, resources everybody posts on there. I post all kinds of articles on there. You can reach out to me with questions about auditions at any point. So it's just having that person there for you.

[00:20:49] But then we have classes. We're doing online classes right now. We're doing private coaching, gold coaching. I coach a lot of kids. I've been doing a lot of youth coaching lately. And you can go on there and you can see testimonials from other people that have worked with me.

[00:21:09] We have we're putting up a scene lounge for our members only. That's a private scene lounge for when I do classes. They'll be over 500 scenes in there. So there's a lot that it offers now.

[00:21:21] I suspect and I would pretty much guarantee, knowing my entire scam background, that there are people out there that never did much acting that are trying to teach this stuff. One hundred percent.

[00:21:34] And that's not you. I mean, you just finished up some big Marvel thing, right? And tell me a little bit about your stuff. Good. Brag. Brag on yourself a little bit.

[00:21:45] I always have a hard time doing this. But OK, well, I just got off of a six episode reoccurring on Marvel Agents of Shield.

[00:21:55] It's on ABC. And I played Adrian Pasdar's wife, who Adrian Pasdar is from Heroes.

[00:22:02] A series regular on Heroes and played his wife and had a really fun time on that. Before that I did a few films.

[00:22:11] One was Cold Water with director Vince Ingrassia, who's from Sundance and Cut Back, which was a really sweet little Christian surfing film.

[00:22:21] And then I did I did a series in Mexico.

[00:22:26] Acapulco Bay that aired in 22 countries around the world and was extremely famous in Ethiopia. And still to this day, I'm literally like one of the most famous people in Ethiopia.

[00:22:38] You know, you've made it really right.

[00:22:41] Seriously, I didn't know that I'm going to bow down.

[00:22:44] Yeah, no, I didn't. I honestly didn't do anything with it for the longest time. And then my friend was like, what are you doing? There's hundreds and thousands of people type of thing on Facebook. Are you not responding to that now?

[00:22:58] Like, I feel so overwhelmed. I just don't know what to do. And she's like, you have to reach out. These are your fans. And so we've actually been talking, trying to get in contact with some people over there to go and visit. Wow. Ethiopia.

[00:23:13] And and it aired in Hungary and Italy and Indonesia. And I have people Facebooking me from France. So that was really interesting and super humbling. And then I did a soap opera spin off of General Hospital called Port Charles. And I played a nurse that had HIV and I was on there for a year and a half.

[00:23:38] And, you know, just all kinds of the eight of the 90s series like Silk Stalkings and Renegade with Lorenzo Lamas and High Tide with Rick Springfield, all that stuff.

[00:23:48] Yeah, I've got a I've had a good go and I've done like the last four years. I've probably done 20 commercials.

[00:23:58] I've seen some some big stars on commercials lately, and I thought a lot of them went to China and Asia to do commercials. But I see them on here nowadays.

[00:24:09] Oh yeah. Yeah. Because it's like commercials are just fun, quick money. And they're good. They're fun, you know. And I really like doing commercials just because I love, you know, selling stuff. I love to be in that moment. I do a lot of infomercials on a host.

[00:24:28] I do a lot of hosting as well. But yeah, I just dabble in it all. Yeah.

[00:24:33] Look, I got my after card years and years ago. It just fell into it and then somehow I got a SAG card. Have no idea how I was.

[00:24:43] Well that's fantastic. You know how many people are jealous are you.

[00:24:46] I don't even know how it happened.

[00:24:48] I'm in fact the what the way I got started, I was taken this girlfriend who was doing a Heyns Pantyhose commercial and some guy didn't show up and they came out to me and they said, you got dark hair, blue eyes. I said, Yeah. Said, Well, come on, come over here.

[00:25:05] And then I started doing all kinds of commercials and stuff like that. But they had no idea or no skill at all.

[00:25:13] I'm sure another thing that actor, you know, people don't realize is you don't have to be you know, you don't have to go after acting, acting to be the next, you know.

[00:25:24] Nicole Kidman or Tom Cruise. You can. I don't know why I said their names together.

[00:25:29] Real, but you can be a fun actor that just does little things here and there and you can go after them and have it not be a hobby, but have it be a fun side job. That's something that you do for fun. And I always encourage a lot of like middle aged people to do that that are, you know, kind of at a dead end in their career and they don't really know what to do. And they're feeling kind of bored or, you know, maybe people that are a little bit older and go try it.

[00:25:59] It's fun. Yeah.

[00:26:01] And you can become a star doing commercials. Look at that, Flo, on the on the insurance commercials. And there's plenty of other brands where they're the the people that are there or known around the world because they've been seeing them, you know, day in and day out for years. So we've got to take a response or break and we come back. We're going to ask Raquel, what's a typical day look like for her. So, folks.

[00:26:28] But 20 years ago, I kind of turned the Internet guru world on its head. Guys at my level were charged in 50 or 100 grand up front to teach what they knew to people, to small business people. And I thought, you know what, I'm a small business consumer advocate and that's too risky. And I knew a lot of these guys. If you gave them 50 grand, you'd never see him again. So so I said, you know, I'm going to I'm going to fix this. So I charged it a small percentage of an entry fee, and then I tied my success to their success. So for me to get big money, they had to make way bigger money. Well, people kind of like this.

[00:27:03] And seventeen hundred students later, the program is still going strong and it's very unique. It's the longest running, most successful ever Internet mentor program on Earth. And it's very unique in that you spend an immersion weekend and my biggest stay at home in Virginia Beach and it's one on one tutoring. We don't do any group anything. It's all one on one. So you're not bored if I'm talking to a beginner and you're not lost if I'm talking to somebody at high level.

[00:27:33] So it's very, very powerful. And you can find the details at greatInternetmarketingtraining.com. And it comes with a scholarship to my school that I told you about earlier, which you can gift to someone or use it yourself for extra training. So check it out at greatInternetmarketingtraining.com.

[00:27:56] Hey, let's get back to the main event. Raquel Gardner is here and she is a highly experienced actor and acting coach and just a wonderful person. I was introduced to her from one of my favorite people in the world, Patricia Kara, the fine Number Nine on Deal or No Deal. Hey, did you know Patricia's husband just dyed her hair? Was all over the Internet.

[00:28:25] I used to dye her hair.

[00:28:26] Oh, well, you been replaced. Her husband did it.

[00:28:29] And I guess during Covid, she's happy. Yes. That used to be our like, we'd get together and dye each others' hair.

[00:28:37] That's got to be desperation when you trust a guy to do so.

[00:28:42] You? Well, no. I mean, I would trust in all to do my hair. He's extremely precise.

[00:28:47] Well, I would.

[00:28:49] I've been telling people when I do the live events that I do is at eleven thirty at night. When you're exhausted, don't take the dog clippers to your own hair.

[00:29:00] Do not. That's it. Well, that's what I did. And I pretty much buzz cut myself, but nobody trusts me with anything like that. So.

[00:29:09] So anyway, Ricot, tell us. So what's a typical day look like for a working actress, an actor's coach?

[00:29:16] You know, I sat here first of all, I can't wait to go. What was the name of your the Web site again?

[00:29:24] GreatInternetmarketingTraining.com.

[00:29:26] Yes. I can't wait to go on that and see what you got going on. Yeah. I was sitting here thinking, what does a typical day look like for me? And it's so funny because every day is different.

[00:29:39] Now, have you been kind of hunkered down lately or are you anywhere near the riots?

[00:29:44] But but yeah. Yeah, we've been hunkered down over here. So I had interesting enough, I had shoulder surgery in February. Oh.

[00:29:54] And then covered. Hit. So I've been doing a lot of telemedicine rehab. But anyway, so my typical day is getting up. Doing, you know, having some coffee. But it varies because I have self tapes that I have to do. I have private coaching that I have to self tape.

[00:30:14] A self tape is now all the auditions are self taped. So you have to set up an area in your house with a plain backdrop, a couple of lights and a camera. I say. And you self tape your material instead of going to a real audition.

[00:30:31] Is that because of Covid or that's a trend that's been happening?

[00:30:34] It's a trend that's been started already. But Covid, it's like accelerated. Oh, completely like there. Well, there have been no in-person audition, right? Right.

[00:30:45] Well, like, for instance, on Monday I had an audition for a commercial and I had to self tape myself in the pool doing a backstroke throw.

[00:30:59] And our friend helped you out with that.

[00:31:02] Yeah. And and then they I had to get out of the water and, like, speak the line on drying off my hair.

[00:31:10] So this is the. And then I have to go straight from there to. Well, I had to get ready and then I had to teach a class for three and a half hours. On Zoom. So I'll do that. Or yesterday, I had a Facebook live and I have, you know, which I have so much stuff going on.

[00:31:28] Yeah, well, I'm young. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:31:32] Have you have you ventured out at all and been amazed that the lack of traffic out there.

[00:31:38] Oh yeah, completely.

[00:31:40] But it's starting to you know, I don't know how I feel about this whole thing, but everything's really starting to open back up over here.

[00:31:47] I know for me, the only thing that I've really done is gone to the pet store a few times and I've gone hiking a couple of times because that's what I love to do outside.

[00:32:00] But no, I haven't really I haven't gone to any restaurants.

[00:32:04] So besides your your shoulder injury, do you work out regularly? How do you keep so fit?

[00:32:11] I work out a lot. It's been a part of my life since I was 14. I love exercise. I love like just to feel good about myself. I do. The one thing I've missed is my yoga. I was really, really active and heavy into yoga before I had my shoulder injury.

[00:32:29] And so I'm that's why I've made the decision to get the surgery so I can really rehab and get back to my yoga. I want to get my yoga teaching license at some point.

[00:32:39] Just to have time again.

[00:32:41] Miss Dynamo. Like I said, folks, when you look her picture up, you're going to say there's no way she's bullshitting. There's no way she's been working for 30 years. Yeah. I know.

[00:32:52] It's weird to go there is create products on. You'd be like the fountain of youth kind of lady.

[00:33:00] You know, I just love to try it all. All different kinds of stuff like Tricia Nyah. You know, it's funny thing about is like we're so supportive of each other.

[00:33:08] We've, you know, we're in the same business and we're basically, you know, at the same type of luck. So but we don't look at that in competition with each other. We go, you know what, I want to you know, if I have something that comes up for me, I send it to her.

[00:33:23] If she have something that let me work to go around and who knows what those people want.

[00:33:28] You know, when actually do we really support it's so great to have a good support group in this industry and just in life in general, you know, have a really, really great group of friends. And she's definitely one of them.

[00:33:40] All right. So tell them how they find all your stuff so you can go to while personally.

[00:33:48] RaquelGardner.com. Instagram it's Raquel Gardner official. On Twitter, it's Raquel Gardner official on Facebook, it's Raquel Gardner official. And I also have a YouTube channel. That's Raquel Gardner. Let's see The Actors Mark.com.

[00:34:28] And then we also have the actors mark, on Instagram, on Twitter and on Facebook.

[00:34:36] And if you're interested in joining are pop up classes that we have coming up. We have a pop up class coming up July 12th.

[00:34:44] We also have what do you mean by the pop up? Just so we do a mock up classes?

[00:34:49] We do pop up classes periodically. Most of the time, once a month, sometimes twice a month. And those are just quick little classes there. Twenty dollars. Twenty to twenty five dollars, depending on how long the classes. And we go over everything from breaking down the material.

[00:35:09] And I give everybody a scene, the same scene, and we all go through the next hour to hour and a half and break down the material and basically teach them how to make transitions in the work and how to make, you know, some objective choices to know what they're fighting for Islam in school and this acting.

[00:35:29] People don't realize, oh, yeah, know this is not watch stuff.

[00:35:33] It's so smooth. You I mean, think about it. But Jesus, rankly.

[00:35:36] Oh, yeah. Like connect. You know, we do. We just did one last month connecting to your character and creating a history of your character. So when you're given an audition, you give your four pages of material, but you don't get anything else.

[00:35:51] But maybe a breakdown and a breakdown is like a paragraph about your character that the casting director will put out. So you just get one little paragraph on what your character's like. And then you get these four pages of material and you have to figure out how to connect yourself with what's on the paper and what's on the breakdown and kind of make it all one.

[00:36:18] So we create this I do this whole history background that I've learned from many, many years. I mean, I've taken so many acting classes. I've studied with the best acting coaches in the world. And I you know, you you do a breakdown. You do. Whereas the person from. How do they feel about their family, how they feel about love. What's their intelligence like? What's their social status? What's their financial status? And you start building a character.

[00:36:45] And you start connecting yourself to that?

[00:36:48] Well, I don't want to brag, but I have an upcoming role.

[00:36:54] But now that you're telling me all this stuff, I think I probably should get you to help me with it.

[00:37:00] I said, well, let me tell you, if it's bigger than two pages of dialogue, you definitely need to do some of the back.

[00:37:07] No, it may not have any dialogue. You don't need to worry about it.

[00:37:12] Oh, yes, you do. You can't.

[00:37:14] This is an iconic film remounted I'm up for.

[00:37:18] And so what happened was I saved this lady's organization from going bankrupt. I came and did a fundraiser for and saved it. Well, it just so happens her husband was the producer of the original Blob movie.

[00:37:37] Thank God. So. So I said. She said, what can I do for you? Tom, you really helped us out here.

[00:37:42] I said, All I care about is whatever it takes when you remake this thing. I want a part in The Blob. I don't care what it is. I don't care if I'm the blob, just out of milk that for the rest of my career that spanned the past.

[00:37:59] So, yeah, I don't want to brag, but if I end up being the blob, I want to I want to be one with the character, you know.

[00:38:08] So anyway, thanks so much for coming on.

[00:38:10] Has it been a blast?

[00:38:12] And I want everybody to check out your actors mark stuff pro coaching and they don't have to be an actor in Hollywood to get coaching on Zoom for me. Right. They could be anywhere.

[00:38:22] No, no. I coach actors all over the world.

[00:38:25] Right. Right now. Beautiful. Yeah. And and I'm actually in the process of writing my first book. Yay! Yeah. It's called The Spirit of the Actor.

[00:38:38] Wow. That's awesome. And they'll turn out to be a screenplay and then you'll be rich on it and all that because it'll be a good book for actors to to add to their, you know, their collection when they're when I after I read that it will probably stimulate me to write The Spirit of the Blob.

[00:39:00] Exactly. Well, up unofficial version. Oh, exciting, though. That'll be great.

[00:39:07] All right. Well, thanks, Zain Verjee. You can pet your kitty for me because I saw the cute kitty before we got started here. So I'm going to go take my dog for a walk before they bite me. And.

[00:39:18] And we thank you so much for coming on and giving us some insight into Hollyweird.

[00:39:25] Thank you so much for having me. Tom. I really appreciate it. It was really nice to meet you.

[00:39:29] All right. Everybody will catch y'all the next episode. See ya later.

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