Malin Akerman's first stretch in Los Angeles involved a pile of sweaters, cheap wine and muffins she didn't pay for. On Call Her Daddy, she tells the host how she and her best friend moved to LA with almost nothing, and how she stayed afloat during the year she booked no work at all.
Clip: Viral Podcast Shorts YouTube Short from the full source linked below.
She tells it as a fond memory, not a hard-luck story. "It was so much fun," she says of those days.
From Toronto bartending to an LA screen test
Akerman says she and her best friend were bartending together in Toronto, putting themselves through university. Her friend was also dabbling in the business. For Akerman, modeling picked up, and that turned into some TV commercials and then some very small roles on Canadian TV shows.
Then came an audition that got her flown out to LA for a screen test. "I didn't get the part," she says. But a manager told her she should come out to LA. In Akerman's retelling, the manager's pitch was simple: "I think you'd really do well."
That was enough. A part she didn't get ended up being the reason she moved.
"Let's just do it"
She turned to her best friend, who was also her roommate and her fellow bartender. "Babe, let's just do it," she remembers saying. "We're 23 years old. Like we're bartending. School can wait."
The safety net, as she pitched it, was that they could always come back to school if LA didn't work out. Her friend agreed. "So it was just the two of us," Akerman says, "us against the world," along with the manager who took her on and sent her out on auditions.
A year of nothing
It didn't go quickly. "Nothing happened the first however long, year," she says. "I got nothing."
When the host asks how she was making money, Akerman says it was residuals from the work they had done back in Toronto. Her friend also landed an MTV job, which she calls great.
They put money down on an apartment, but there was nothing left over for furniture. That's where the sweaters come in. "We like fluffed all our sweaters on the floor," she says. "That was our mattress."
Two Buck Chuck, ramen and bank muffins
The rest of the budget, by her account, was just as creative. They bought Two Buck Chuck from Trader Joe's. They ate ramen noodles. In her telling, it was all part of the fun.
And in the mornings, she says, they would go to the bank for the little free muffins and coffee, and "pretend like we're checking our bank account, which we didn't have."
She remembers that stretch warmly, but she is honest that the wait was long. "It took a while," she says.
The singer who doesn't sing
Eventually, she says, she decided "this isn't working." She met some guys who were in a band, and they asked whether she wanted to be their singer.
"I was like, yeah, sure, why not? I don't sing," she says. They were three Italians, and they told her they would teach her. She agreed.
She says she did the band thing for a year and a half and played the whole LA circuit. The clip ends there.
What stands out is how little she dresses it up. There's no big break in this part of the story, just two 23-year-olds, a manager sending her to auditions, a year with no bookings, and a run as the singer of a band even though, by her own description, she doesn't sing. The sweaters, the cheap wine and the bank muffins are the details she keeps.
Related reading
- Malin Akerman's real name
- Malin Akerman bio
- Jennifer Lawrence on Call Her Daddy
- Lucy Hale on choosing sobriety, from Call Her Daddy
FAQ
How old was Malin Akerman when she moved to LA?
She says she and her best friend were 23 when they decided to make the move.
Why did Malin Akerman move to LA?
She says she was flown out for a screen test, didn't get the part, and a manager told her she should come to LA and thought she would do well.
How did Malin Akerman get by in her early LA days?
She says she lived on residuals from her Toronto work, slept on sweaters on the floor, drank Two Buck Chuck, ate ramen and took free muffins and coffee at the bank.
Was Malin Akerman in a band?
Yes, by her account. She says three Italian musicians asked her to be their singer even though she doesn't sing, and she did it for a year and a half.