On Empty Review
In 2009, Vince Foster and Tyler Haines arrived in Los Angeles with the goal of becoming major movie stars. While Hollywood is often depicted as the land of hopes and dreams, however, a more accurate description would be a desert of disappointment. Every year, a countless number of aspirant actors and actresses make the migration to Los Angeles with the hopes of making it big, only to find bartending, waitressing and retail work as the only viable means of employment. Despite the odds of fulfilling their own ambitions, Vince and Tyler are still determined to break into an industry that is more adept at breaking the majority of its wannabes nonetheless.
It turns out that the two Los Angeles transplants are not only “wannabes” but “newbies” to both Hollywood in particular and the acting profession in general. Instead of attending auditions, honing their craft and paying their dues, for instance, the aspiring duo immediately approach the William Morris Agency for representation, show up unannounced at the gates of Warner Brothers and Paramount, sneak onto the lot of Universal and are summarily dismissed from the corporate offices of NBC. All of these efforts are depicted in a self-produced documentary that Vince and Tyler crafted to showcase their attempts at breaking into the industry, and the subsequent footage serves as episodes for the comedy webseries On Empty. Although Vince Foster and Tyler Haines are real actors, however, On Empty itself is a mockumentary-style fictional narrative along the likes of the classic sitcom The Office and Rob Reiner film This Is Spinal Tap.
A more contemporary analogy for On Empty would be the webseries Last Man(s) on Earth, in which two similarly misguided twentysomethings produce a series of videos designed to offer advice on surviving any potential oncoming apocalypse. Despite claiming that having “seen every disaster film at least twice” makes them experts, Kaduche and Wynn are in actuality totally inept when it comes to the necessary skills. While the acting talents of the fictitious Vince Foster and Tyler Haines are never revealed in On Empty, their knowledge of the profession is equally lacking. Initially unaware of the importance of “headshots” within the industry, for instance, they are later forced to primitively draw sketches of themselves as a form of “IOU headshots” after discovering that the photo reproduction equipment at the local CVS is in need of repair.
Their attempts at networking prove equally futile. After staking out the parking garage at NBC Universal, the two lose the potential corporate executive they eventually follow and end up in the heavily African American community of Watts instead. Vince later gets a job at Abercrombie and Fitch, but quickly rejoins the unemployed when he hands out his headshot to customers. Tyler, meanwhile, constructs a protest sign mockup of his own headshot and stands with it along the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In yet another endeavor at making contacts, the two self-proclaimed “working actors” convince an airplane pilot to fly them to Catalina only to become stranded when the aviator realizes that they are not meeting with Los Angeles bigwigs after all. Even an attempt at volunteering to put out wild fires in a nearby community ends in frustration when Vince and Tyler discover that there are no actual fires in need of being extinguished.
“On Empty began as an experiment more than anything,” the real Vince Foster explains. “I had an audition and Tyler decided to crash it. Since we were now both auditioning I brought a camera to record the process and to see how far we could sneak around with it. And once we hit record, we just instinctively turned into these two buffoons. It was fun and freeing, so we decided to run with the idea.”
On Empty does indeed have an innocent nature and rebellious “how far can we go” feel to its narrative. In the opening episode, for instance, Vince and Tyler decide to take a picture of themselves with the infamous “Hollywood” sign as the backdrop. The iconic symbol is too far away to adequately serve their purpose, however, so the pair drive closer and closer until they reach the bottom of the hillside on which it resides. Despite posted warnings against trespassing, they then climb upward until they reach the base of their destination—leading to the duo being chased away by the police. In a later installment, Vince and Tyler enter NBC headquarters and are immediately told by a gruff security guard to turn off their camera. The scene is similar to the classic 1986 Late Night with David Letterman episode in which the talk show host attempts to deliver a fruit basket to new NBC owner General Electric, only to be met with the same negative derision that greeted Vince Foster and Tyler Haines.
On Empty is thus a mixture of the real and fictitious, scripted and off-the-cuff, as the two fabricated thespians infiltrate the actual world of Hollywood with both humorous and authentic results. “The series is a formula of taking what’s available around you, then building a narrative around that availability while also being open to any unpredictable moments,” Vince Foster elaborates in regards to On Empty. “Basically just structured improv. We knew the stories we wanted to tell in each episode, we just had to do it with flexibility.”
In the end, it is a formula that works well for On Empty. With the innocent cluelessness of Kaduche and Wynn from Last Man(s) on Earth, the mockumentary style of the fictitious Spinal Tap and the mischievous spontaneity of David Letterman, Vince Foster and Tyler Haines have created a webseries that is funny, entertaining and original—even if the two fellow actors are following in the footsteps of so many failed attempts to make it big in Hollywood.
Anthony Letizia (April 11, 2012)
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