Alana Schoen

by Omar Salas Zamora

September 9th, 2023

Alana Schoen is an actor living in Los Angeles.

Omar Salas Zamora: Was it your intention to become a multi-hyphenate (writer, actor, model) or do you think that was pushed onto you?

Alana Schoen: I never really thought about it. I moved here just to act and then people kept asking me to model, so it kind of just came to me. I was like, “oh, I can make money doing this. This is fun.” And then it wasn't anymore because what I wanted to do was very artsy and moody, and I wanted to tell stories. But the people that wanted to pay for modeling were, like, the opposite of that. So, I got bored of it and stopped doing it. I only do it if, like, it’s something that I think is safe.

I've read some of your writing.

Have you?

Yeah!

Oh, yeah, you have!

Do you feel like you write to act, or do you write to write?

Oh, I don't. I write to act because I don't know how to write.

It doesn’t interest you.

I always wrote, like, poetry or short stories and journal a lot. So, I write to write for myself. Script wise, I write to act, which is why I'm not very good at it. I don't know, I want to take some writing classes.

You have a very specific science fiction edge, at least more than most modern writers.

Do you think so?

Yeah, don’t you think that sci-fi is becoming more and more of a retro genre? Like, I don't see it a lot in movies or, or TV and you seem really interested.

I love it because I, like, grew up on things like Mars Attacks and Earth Girls Are Easy - those were always my favorite movies growing up. And sci-fi doesn’t technically have to mean sci-fi. It can represent the inside of your mind outside. Rewrite that to make sense.

Okay.

It’s hard for me personally to describe what's going on in my head. Analogies are easier.

For at least a level that I'm at, it’s a lot of like human stories. It's a lot of like, well, they broke up or whatever – much more affordable stories, you know? That made it even more fascinating when you were like “well, I’ve been working on this” and sent me a whole ass science fiction script.

It's sci-fi, but it's also human. That's the whole point of it, I think, where it's like its kind of outstretched a little bit, but it's not because it brings you back to like those ground emotions of that ground to like human design of, like wanting to fit in, finding your family and finding your place but instead you’re running out of time.

What are the questions you ask when you’re approaching a character you don’t know?

What makes them human? Obviously the first thing I do is take whatever cues I can from the script, like how they speak, like how old they are or whatever, how they interact with the other characters. I like characters that are farther away from me because I feel like I’ll get to show parts of my soul I rarely get to and that’s scary. Then finding parallel experiences, you know? Pain is pain. Heartbreak is heartbreak.

Right.

(Looking at my camera) That's so cool. When did you get that?

I got this as a birthday present from someone and a week later we were broken up and he was coming by and getting all of his stuff, I left the camera out, not wanting to deny him it, I guess. “If he takes it, he takes it,” I thought. I came back and everything was gone but the camera.

I have a good point and shoot that I need to get fixed.

Film? 

Yeah and I don't know why it's broken. Like I can't fix it.  My ex-girlfriend gave it to me for Christmas.

Exes. They're so good with cameras.

Right.

We’re approaching a project that, I think - I hope, challenges ideas of the fetishistic view of the bisexual woman. I’m really fascinated by this idea of passing or not passing in the culture and the preferences within that. I think if you line up the partners of a straight man, that’s going to be a wildly different group of women, but I don’t really see that in bisexual and lesbian women. The preferences and “types” are more rigid.

I think it's different for everyone.

You do?

Well, I definitely have a type in women. Yeah, like, my first girlfriend, she was very femme presenting but now she's very much cut her hair off - very butch but still with feminine features – olive skin, dark hair, dark eyes and with a bunch of tattoos. I like those same dark features and ambiguity in guys, too. I’m like, “do I want you or do I just want to look like you?” What about you?

My type? I realized it’s been years and years since I’ve dated someone seriously that wasn’t Jewish.

I’m Jewish!

Yeah? I didn’t realize how interested I am in the Jewish people.

We love our Jews. They’re great.

It's always like three dates in before they say “my mom would think you're so funny.”

Oh, my God, I definitely do that. I thought it was a gay thing.

What movie do you feel that people need to talk about more?

 Earth Girls Are Easy.

Oh, I’ve never seen that one.

Geena Davis.

Yeah?

Yeah. It's just ridiculous. It's kind of like a musical. It's just so good and it's so fun and just makes me smile all the time.

I’ve seen you on stage quite a few times in these really short run productions. Plays that run for sometimes one or two days. Do you feel like you can put the same emotion into work like that or do you feel that they're a little more mechanical since you only have so much time to make it happen?

Honestly, the last one did feel more mechanical because it was one night only, but I loved it. The next day, they were like, “would you guys be willing to do it again next weekend?” and I said no.

Why?

Because this was so special to me, and I put so much effort into it. Chris [Haas] wrote that role for me and there were these phrases that I say in real life in the script, and it made me even more nervous. I worked really hard on that show, and it was so cool to have this one special moment with the people that came out to see it and support all of it. And, I don’t know, I feel like something is taken away if it's…

If it’s repeated?

Yeah. Because we all, we're banking on just one performance. Everyone's doing it for the love of it and for the love of each other more than anything. And yeah, it's really cool to have longer productions because you discover so much more and every night is different and you learn a lot and it’s fun but there’s something special about these short sweet things, I don’t know. I put my all into all of them because I have to.

I've flirted with writing plays a lot.

Do they flirt back?

Sometimes, yeah. I’ve lived my entire creative life as a director in a director’s medium so it’s intimidating going to play in someone else’s court.

That's the coolest part about theater. You have to trust each other so much. The last play I did with Chris [Haas], after the show, he goes, “well, honey, you really are a film actor.” And I was, like, “what does that mean?” He goes, “you really wait for the last moment to get it, don’t you think?”

I don’t get it.

It always works out if even if it doesn't, you know?

Photography by Omar Salas Zamora

Interview by Omar Salas Zamora