Hey there,
Good morning and happy Sunday to you!

I’m driving back from Los Angeles today after a weekend of doing my play, MEISNER down there. I had an amazing weekend and I am so incredibly grateful to each and every person who took the time and effort to come see the show.

What are you grateful for today? Right now?

So the Academy Award nominations were just announced and I wasn’t nominated.

Again!

(I hear you have to be in a film to get nominated so that’s part of my problem because it’s been awhile since I’ve even been in one so I didn’t even have a chance to be skipped over.)

For most of us who are actors the Oscars are complicated.

On the one hand they excite us, they motivate us, they inspire us and on the other they’re a reminder of how far away we are from one ever happening for us.

I’ve been an actor now going on twenty-nine years and I’m not even close to having one and now that I’m fifty-eight and I plan on living until I’m at least ninety-five (I used to say ninety but that was five years ago!) that means I only have 37 more chances to get one.

Maybe I will and maybe I won’t but one thing I know for sure, I’m grateful for the Oscars and for the most incredible thing they’ve given me over the years – the acceptance speeches.

Not all of them of course. In fact most of them are the obligatory “thank you’s to agents, publicists, friends and family” and then the music comes up and here comes the hook.

But every once in awhile someone gets up there and truly speaks from their heart and the things they say are like an elixir for us dreamers who have yet to reach their heights.

I love those speeches.

They inspire me – not to so much for winning an Oscar but to continue to march forward with my dreams. Because as I said in last weeks newsletter, it’s one thing to have a dream it’s quite another to pull it off – and my acting dreams have evolved well beyond having an Oscar.

This weekend I got the chance to live my dream to the fullest. To be able to stand on stage as Sanford Meisner and give this show to people is a highlight for me, for my career, and for my life – every time I do it.

And I know doing MEISNER in LA is like an elixir for a lot of dreamers as well so quite the honor.

… But back to the Oscars.

Did you know that for many people who win one they go into a deep depression afterwards? Do you know why? They say that they finally got this thing they’d spent their while life going after and now that they have it they realize it’s not “it” and it doesn’t bring them the happiness they thought it would.

In fact, many say it’s a HUGE letdown.

As cliche as it is, what I’m trying to say today is it truly is the journey and not the destination. So if you’re really an actor then every time you get the chance to work celebrate it because you’re living your dream – whether you’re in a play, a film, an audition, or an acting class – you’re getting the chance to express and create and do this thing you love to do so much.

I’d like to leave you with two questions that I hope you’ll answer either to me directly or on our Artistic Family Facebook page.

#1) What has been your greatest moment as an actor so far? Your absolute highlight?
#2) Would winning an Oscar really top it?

An Academy Award wouldn’t come close to topping what happened for me this weekend in Los Angeles. To be able to say that, to feel that, to mean that … well I am so incredibly grateful to be living my dream.

How’s your dream doing today?

Let me know please! And also know how much I appreciate you.

My very best,
Jim