November 10, 1998
Could I possibly have made a mistake? Maybe back in July when I picked up a pen and signed a year of my life away to the conglomerate known as ABC, I may have made the biggest mistake of my life. There is a burgeoning network out there, appealing to thousands of teen-age girls every week, with sitcoms lasting almost full seasons (when they actually get on the air before being cancelled)! And here I stood, seconds away from my second audition for the WB, fresh off my joyous adventure on Katie Joplin, working side by side with Park Overall, and I was staring down the path I had voluntarily blocked off for twelve months. For as exhilarating and rewarding as my WB experiences ever were, they would only be a taste of what could have been, what I had turned my back on to embrace the Disney-coated world of the American Broadcasting Company. No one said the decisions would be easy.
As far as I could tell, I was one of only three gentlemen reading for the role of Jon Marc, the auction-house snob hoping to use the lead's house to hold an auction. And while those odds might seem to be pretty good, a 1-in-3 chance one might say, as I stood waiting to go in and studied the other two contenders, I calculated my chances at about 1-in-100. There was just something about each of them that made them really right for the role. One was a dark-haired, cocky looking guy in a dark suit and dark turtleneck. Perfect. And yet... the other guy was tall with curly-hair and bit weathered looking, but had the perfect British accent for the part. Even I would have had a hard time choosing between the two of them, but even I would also easily eliminate the least-likely candidate right off.
Despite that, they laughed a couple of times. I got to go first. That helped get the laughs. That also helped them forget about me as they focused on the two guys who were actually right for the job. So I'll take my laughs and crawl back to ABC, tail between my legs, hoping they'll take me back in, hoping they'll give me a role with a little more to it than the 'mean boss' or the 'snooty art critic.' Farewell, WB. Parting is such sweet sorrow.