Overnight Success: A History

My name is Jennie Floyd. I started acting in September of 2001, although technically my first performance was in the play I wrote for my class to perform for Thanksgiving in the fifth grade. I've always been what my mother likes to call a "ham," a natural entertainer who loves attention and making people laugh. My father couldn't carry a tune, but he loved music, and he taught me "Summertime" from "Porgy and Bess" when I was three years old, and I have been a singer ever since. I always thought that if I became a professional entertainer, it would be as a singer. But life didn't work out that way.

Let me give you a little background. I was born in North Carolina, the third child (of four) of Henry and Rubie Floyd, a well-educated, upper-middle-class couple from South Carolina with roots in the South that predated the Mayflower (seriously; I have an ancestor who signed the Declaration of Independence, and another who fought in the Civil War, on the losing side). We moved to Huntsville, Alabama, when I was five, and I lived there until I was 23. I recall giving my first public singing performance for my Sunday School class when I was three (every verse of "Here Comes Peter Cottontail"), and like most little girls of my generation, I studied piano and dance for eight years during elementary and junior high school, but oddly, never voice. I began to discover I had an aptitude for pop singing when I starting dating a drummer for a garage band, who encouraged me to sing Carly Simon, Carole King, and Heart. I could really sing, and when I saw my first performance of "Oklahoma!" and realized one could sing and act at the same time, I said to my mother, "that's what I want to do when I grow up." But she just laughed. We never discussed it seriously.

I guess in the South in the mid-70s, a smart girl like me just didn't go into acting. For I was really smart too - I graduated in the top 20 of my class of 450, and was offered four scholarships to colleges, one to the local arm of the University of Alabama. I don't have many regrets in life, but my biggest one is taking the scholarship to UAH and studying business there, instead of pursuing a degree at Bryn Mawr, the Philadelphia girls' school that recruited me and that my father had encouraged me, mildly, to at least consider. But I was in love, and afraid to leave the South; it would take me 15 years before I got the courage to move North and really begin to act on my musical ambitions.

So where did acting come in? Well, I had acted in a short film in my freshman year, starring in a friend's student film as a sexy hitchhiker that included a epic Volkswagen bug-packing scene (we crammed in, I think, 15 people). I also played Guinevere and Moll Flanders in a couple of short plays in literature classes. Each time I loved the feeling of being someone else, completely liberated from the normally shy, somewhat reserved girl that I was. But after I graduated from college and went into sales, I saved my performing skills for sales presentations. I didn't even realize community theatre existed until much later. I was very successful in my business career, and I dabbled in a singing career on the side for almost 20 years, singing in various bands and choirs, and as a soloist at church and in countless weddings. This may have been enough to sustain me, but my health began to mysteriously deteriorate beginning in the early 1990s.

I was newly divorced, working full-time as well as getting an executive MBA at Vanderbilt, active in my church music program, and juggling a busy social life, and suddenly I just seemed to lose all of my energy. I developed persistent bronchitis and became dangerously thin. My company re-organized me into a job I hated, and I decided it was time to make some changes. With the help of a career counselor, I managed to get myself into a less-stressful job, finally make the move to the Northeast, closer to Broadway, and start pursuing my musical dreams again by recording my first demo tape and became a "wedding singer" at my new home in New Jersey. All of these changes made me much happier, my health improved, and I met my now-husband.

After an idyllic three years, though, industry changes made us reconsider where to live, and we moved to the San Francisco Bay Area at the end of 1995 when the dot.com boom was in full swing. Unfortunately, I got right back into a job that I ultimately hated, and within three years my health collapsed again, this time for good. I was diagnosed with a serious genetic autoimmune disorder, and then in 2000 took a bad fall that ruptured a disc in my back and put a permanent end to my business career.

And this is what gets me, finally, to acting. Because I had to retire from business, I had all kinds of time to think about what I wanted to do, and what I was able to do, physically, instead of work in business. At first I thought this would be the time for me to finally pursue my singing career full-time, and I tried my best to make that happen. I formed a jazz band, learned standards, took voice lessons, and recorded a demo CD. I also fulfilled a lifetime goal of recording an album of my own songs (mostly country-flavored rock). My band and I did perform at quite a few venues, but the other members were in other bands, and not devoted to the marketing it takes to make this kind of thing happen. Then in late 2000 I had a ruptured appendix and could not sing for several months. So the band slowly dis-banded. I also tried "mystery shopping," a fun job that allowed me to do customer service evaluations as an independent contractor. I liked this because I could pretend I was "acting" when I was doing the scenario that companies wanted, and I got two great trips to evaluate hotels in Buenos Aires and Venezuela. But ultimately I got really tired of how hard I had to work for so little money.

Then in May of 2001, I saw a class in Musical Theatre offered at my local community center, and I remembered seeing "Oklahoma!" as a child. I thought, why not, and signed up. I had a wonderful instructor, who taught me how to "act" a song, and who encouraged me to audition for the local community theatre's upcoming production of "Little Shop of Horrors." I told him that, at 42, I thought I was too old to start acting. He laughed and said it was never too late to start acting. I was dubious, but I summoned up my courage and surprised myself by loving the audition process. What was a monologue but a sale presentation? And I got to sing! So, I was offered a part in the ensemble as a prostitute (one which has proved to be one of my best types!), and I have pretty much been a working actress every since.

So, what's with the "overnight success?" Well, there is an adage among actors that "it takes eight years to become an overnight success." I now have been acting for eight years, so if this adage is true, 2010 should be my year to be "an overnight success." Although I have had an apartment in LA before (three months in 2005, 16 months 2006-07), this will be my first full year of actually "living" in Hollywood as a member of a union (AFTRA), with an agent, and with a pretty impressive body of work. I also have three feature films coming out this year, and will be featured in the web series "Coming2Hollywood," which showcases rising stars, beginning in January. So I thought now would be a good time to write about what happens this year, whether I "make it" or not.

There are many ways to "make it:" many actors consider working steadily and making enough money to live on as an actor to be the definition of making it. It's a little different for me. I've been working nearly every week for the last two years, and I don't need to make enough money to live on, because my husband's generosity, and my disability income, cover my expenses. Obviously, I'd like to work every week and make $800 a month (to cover my expenses in Hollywood). But to me, really making it would mean a co-starring or supporting role on a network or cable sitcom, making mid-six-figures a year. The ultimate "making it," though, would entail winning an Emmy for this work, or winning an Oscar for my work in film ("Child of God" would be my first opportunity, in a leading role). I figure one should dream big.

I'm going to try to do this more or less daily, or whenever I have something interesting (I hope!) to say. I look forward to your comments, and I hope you enjoy reading about my "overnight success."
Blessings,
Jennie