Pilot Season - A Cast of Characters

Behind the Scenes of a Pilot

Sophie came to L.A. after working and struggling for about ten years as an actress. "Unless you're already established, it's stupid to go out. Besides, I couldn't even drive." But she got a play that brought her out here and it had "a lot of fancy pants people in it." So she got seen and got in for pilot season. She has now gotten a pilot every year. They've gone to series.

Her whole life has changed. But it wasn't after that audition. She remembers thinking, "Please don't say that I'm you're first choice until it's official." She went home not even having enough money to order a pizza. She called her agents, no word. She woke up the next morning and had to go to some "silly" mass commercial audition, still no word.

She didn't get it.

She also didn't get another show even though she "kicked ass and it couldn't have gone better" because her agents told her she didn't "work the room."

But she says, "It gets easier." When she did finally book a show, even though her $15,000 after taxes and commissions only turned out to be $3,750 and she was "still broke, in debt and hysterical," she still says, "it was amazing!"

Ana Ortiz was also elated when she booked her first pilot, "Miriam Teitlebaum: Homicide," a one hour dramedy for the USA network that didn't get picked up. "I was so happy. It was a wonderful experience."

Her first pilot season though she categorizes as "ridiculous." There's nothing for Latin women is what her agents kept telling her. To which she suggested, since she is half Irish, that they send her out for non Latino roles. They weren't aggressive enough for her and that's "necessary when you're just starting out." By the next year, she had different representation that "really believed in me," had done a play that got her a part on "NYPD Blue," and the NAACP had made a stink. Latino parts opened up and they were more willing to see her.

She's experienced both a long audition process of having to wait almost a month after her first audition and assuming she's "not in the running, totally out of it" to the hurry, hurry of going home and changing that day to come back in.

"The fear is what holds you back. When I put too much pressure on it, it never really works well. The moment I walk in, I have a way of psyching myself up. I read Judy Garland's biography and she would stand in the wings and look out at the audience and say, 'F*ck 'em' over and over." By the time Ana goes in the room, she is "totally electrified and on fire." Also, "the character was confident and cocky, so I could bring that."