I have to say, although the trains at this station are crazy crowded after work, the performers on the platform are pretty great. There is the duet that performs Same Cooke songs in gorgeous harmony, the seeming brothers who look straight out of Deliverance but who belt out some pretty rockin' guitar country, the woman who plays a guitar with picks and a violin bow and accompanies this with tap shoes Flamenco-style, and the elderly Chinese couple that plays waltzes on an accordion and a Chinese stringed instrument.
I love them all.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Sunday, November 21, 2010
"Will things ever return to normal?"
So says the woman I play, who calls her husband on his cell phone. She does this because her husband has checked out of it all and gone to live in the stairwell of their building.
I like this couple; she is disturbed by his withdrawal from the world (and to an extent, her), but she understands him and loves him well enough to see that he's been happier now in the three days in the stairwell than he's been in years. So she brings him food and misses him and worries that he'll never come back, and talks to him at 2 am when she can't sleep for the worry that he doesn't want her any more.
He has taken to drawing the bricks in the stairwell, and pictures of his wife. The artist in me knows that the best way to see something is to draw it, to be forced to look at every line, every shadow, to be unable to overlook detail if I'm going to render something faithfully. He tells her via phone that he feels closer to her than ever, and you believe it. It's a lovely scene, and I'm looking forward to getting it really honed.
There are two scenes from this play, and another from another play, in which I play half of a middle-aged couple having a brief argument in a museum. My main scene is a two-person scene between a mother and her pregnant 18-year-old semi-estranged daughter. It's a long scene, and would be considered my "big" scene, but honestly I'm kind of over the whole trite Complicated Mother/Daughter drama. So I look at it as a good chance to practice nuance, and to make lines I don't really buy seem believable. The woman playing my daughter is the playwright's daughter, who is in school in Wisconsin. We've had two readings together, over Skype. It's kind of hard, so I just practice my lines on my own. It's a fun kind of challenge. We'll rehearse in person in the next week.
By contrast, my phone call with husband in the stairwell is fairly brief, but I really love it. The man playing my husband is much younger than I, but he has a nice deep voice and I like him in the part. We still need a little work, but I'm enjoying it.
Last Saturday we had rehearsal, and I was early, so I joined the production meeting at the restaurant across the street. The playwright's younger daughter, who is in 7th grade, was there. She began digging in her mouth and produced a piece of a tooth.
"Mom, it's loose, and I got a piece of it," she said.
I was glad I'd already finished my meal.
"It's slippery," she complained. "I can't really get it."
"Well, what you do," I advised her, "is to take a napkin and -- not at the table, but in the bathroom-- use it to grab the tooth."
Across the street at the theater I suggested I pull it for her. She thought it over.
"No, I'll have my dad do it."
"OK, but tell him that when he does it, he has to say 'Is it safe?'"
She's used to me being a little loopy, and she kind of likes it, so she didn't question my instructions.
Oh, and my husband's reply to my question, in the scene?
"No. But that's a good thing when normal was not so good."
I like this couple; she is disturbed by his withdrawal from the world (and to an extent, her), but she understands him and loves him well enough to see that he's been happier now in the three days in the stairwell than he's been in years. So she brings him food and misses him and worries that he'll never come back, and talks to him at 2 am when she can't sleep for the worry that he doesn't want her any more.
He has taken to drawing the bricks in the stairwell, and pictures of his wife. The artist in me knows that the best way to see something is to draw it, to be forced to look at every line, every shadow, to be unable to overlook detail if I'm going to render something faithfully. He tells her via phone that he feels closer to her than ever, and you believe it. It's a lovely scene, and I'm looking forward to getting it really honed.
There are two scenes from this play, and another from another play, in which I play half of a middle-aged couple having a brief argument in a museum. My main scene is a two-person scene between a mother and her pregnant 18-year-old semi-estranged daughter. It's a long scene, and would be considered my "big" scene, but honestly I'm kind of over the whole trite Complicated Mother/Daughter drama. So I look at it as a good chance to practice nuance, and to make lines I don't really buy seem believable. The woman playing my daughter is the playwright's daughter, who is in school in Wisconsin. We've had two readings together, over Skype. It's kind of hard, so I just practice my lines on my own. It's a fun kind of challenge. We'll rehearse in person in the next week.
By contrast, my phone call with husband in the stairwell is fairly brief, but I really love it. The man playing my husband is much younger than I, but he has a nice deep voice and I like him in the part. We still need a little work, but I'm enjoying it.
Last Saturday we had rehearsal, and I was early, so I joined the production meeting at the restaurant across the street. The playwright's younger daughter, who is in 7th grade, was there. She began digging in her mouth and produced a piece of a tooth.
"Mom, it's loose, and I got a piece of it," she said.
I was glad I'd already finished my meal.
"It's slippery," she complained. "I can't really get it."
"Well, what you do," I advised her, "is to take a napkin and -- not at the table, but in the bathroom-- use it to grab the tooth."
Across the street at the theater I suggested I pull it for her. She thought it over.
"No, I'll have my dad do it."
"OK, but tell him that when he does it, he has to say 'Is it safe?'"
She's used to me being a little loopy, and she kind of likes it, so she didn't question my instructions.
Oh, and my husband's reply to my question, in the scene?
"No. But that's a good thing when normal was not so good."
Monday, November 15, 2010
The Callback
On Saturday I went to the callback for the classical play in which I was up for the role of the queen, who is a sort of Lady Macbeth character, only more unbalanced.
The callback was for the entire cast, and as there were roles for three young woman and numerous soldiers, and since people seem incapable of picturing seasoned warriors as being older than 28, it looked like a 4th-year college reunion.
On the bright side, this made spotting the women up for the queen (Isabel) role much easier. I sat in a large, bright empty room where folding chairs had been set up around the perimeter, and gazed around the circle of people, checking out the other Isabel-wannabes. Uh-huh... uh-huh... uh-huh....
Uh-oh.
At three-o'clock sat a very tall, statuesque dark-skinned African-american woman with a nearly shaved head. She was called in to do the Isabel scene, and as she rose from her seat, her perfectly-fitted clothing clung to a very well-muscled body of impossible perfection.
Basically, I was up against Grace Jones.
The room where they did scenes was right off of the waiting room, and one could hear the voices coming through. Although they were a bit muffled, I could still tell that her voice was rich and strong.
And there was when any illusion that I could be intense enough to overcome the fact that I'm five feet tall with a rather high voice went right out the window.
They had her read a number of times with a number of people. I was the final Isabel, and when assigned the other people with whom I'd read, I went into the kitchen with three young men and practiced.
I was feeling a bit dispirited at this point. I'd been there for two hours and hadn't read once, and had watched very pretty boys chat with very pretty girls, and been generally ignored. Had this been 20 years ago, I would have had a complete internal breakdown; ten years ago, I'd have felt completely defeated. I also would have been undone by the huge nervous-sweat pit stains on my poorly chosen gray top, but instead I told myself it lent character. I thought, "you are all younger and prettier than I, but I will bring it, and even if I don't get cast, I will read the hell out of this scene, and that will be my victory."
And I think I did. We went in, I did the scene, I got some direction, re-read the scene accordingly, and that was all. I left with a certainty that I didn't get the part, but I hope to God the Black Chick did, because she was impressive. Sometimes you're right for the part; sometimes someone else is more right. That's the way it goes.
On the bright side, the showcase that I was cast in is beautifully written, and they have given me another scene to be in because they hadn't cast one of the parts yet, and the director for that scene liked me in it when I stood in for it. In addition, the writer added a follow-up scene that I really like, so now I'm in four scenes in the show, including two two-person scenes. And the people in the show are really nice. I'm pleased. I don't know how much attention the show will get, but I anticipate a good experience.
The callback was for the entire cast, and as there were roles for three young woman and numerous soldiers, and since people seem incapable of picturing seasoned warriors as being older than 28, it looked like a 4th-year college reunion.
On the bright side, this made spotting the women up for the queen (Isabel) role much easier. I sat in a large, bright empty room where folding chairs had been set up around the perimeter, and gazed around the circle of people, checking out the other Isabel-wannabes. Uh-huh... uh-huh... uh-huh....
Uh-oh.
At three-o'clock sat a very tall, statuesque dark-skinned African-american woman with a nearly shaved head. She was called in to do the Isabel scene, and as she rose from her seat, her perfectly-fitted clothing clung to a very well-muscled body of impossible perfection.
Basically, I was up against Grace Jones.
The room where they did scenes was right off of the waiting room, and one could hear the voices coming through. Although they were a bit muffled, I could still tell that her voice was rich and strong.
And there was when any illusion that I could be intense enough to overcome the fact that I'm five feet tall with a rather high voice went right out the window.
They had her read a number of times with a number of people. I was the final Isabel, and when assigned the other people with whom I'd read, I went into the kitchen with three young men and practiced.
I was feeling a bit dispirited at this point. I'd been there for two hours and hadn't read once, and had watched very pretty boys chat with very pretty girls, and been generally ignored. Had this been 20 years ago, I would have had a complete internal breakdown; ten years ago, I'd have felt completely defeated. I also would have been undone by the huge nervous-sweat pit stains on my poorly chosen gray top, but instead I told myself it lent character. I thought, "you are all younger and prettier than I, but I will bring it, and even if I don't get cast, I will read the hell out of this scene, and that will be my victory."
And I think I did. We went in, I did the scene, I got some direction, re-read the scene accordingly, and that was all. I left with a certainty that I didn't get the part, but I hope to God the Black Chick did, because she was impressive. Sometimes you're right for the part; sometimes someone else is more right. That's the way it goes.
On the bright side, the showcase that I was cast in is beautifully written, and they have given me another scene to be in because they hadn't cast one of the parts yet, and the director for that scene liked me in it when I stood in for it. In addition, the writer added a follow-up scene that I really like, so now I'm in four scenes in the show, including two two-person scenes. And the people in the show are really nice. I'm pleased. I don't know how much attention the show will get, but I anticipate a good experience.
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Hypothermic Crush
I did my granola gig last Sunday. I saw a young man I'd seen before, and then I saw him an hour later, and then even later. He carried a bag with two oranges.
"These college kids must really be hard up to hang at Whole Foods all day eating sample," I thought.
He came over. I'd talked to him the week before; I have lots of regulars.
"You wearing wool socks today?" he asked.
"Yup," I replied. "So, you keeping an eye on me, making sure I don't palm some wine? (I was in front of the liquor department, facing the dairy section. Much warmer than being in front of the open juice fridge).
I was teasing, but then it hit me: Of course! He WAS a store detective!
He clearly thought I'd known, and made some joke about it. Well, how could I not know? He's there ALL DAY. I'm so stupid sometimes.
A little while later, another young guy I'd seen before came by. He, too, was a store cop. You would never notice them unless, like me, you were there for four hours and saw them regularly.
We started chatting about his job, my gig, sharing stories. He was so much that I haven't experienced lately: attractive, conversational, confident. He strolled off and then came back. He was eating some cheese.
"Here, have some," he said, and handed me a piece before strolling off again.
I began to notice him hanging around my area, and I caught him watching me.
"Either he's interested, or I seem really suspicious," I thought. I was incredulous. I mean, this guy was cute -- seriously cute -- and way younger than me. Although I'm used to being taken for younger than I am, which in this case, was just fine with me.
After I was done I put my stuff in my car and came back to catch up on some shopping. I bumped into him in the beans aisle. We exchanged names, and he offered me a Starburst.
I can really go for a guy whose main impulse is to feed me.
He doesn't work this weekend, which is too bad, but that's OK. Something to look forward to.
Seriously cute.
"These college kids must really be hard up to hang at Whole Foods all day eating sample," I thought.
He came over. I'd talked to him the week before; I have lots of regulars.
"You wearing wool socks today?" he asked.
"Yup," I replied. "So, you keeping an eye on me, making sure I don't palm some wine? (I was in front of the liquor department, facing the dairy section. Much warmer than being in front of the open juice fridge).
I was teasing, but then it hit me: Of course! He WAS a store detective!
He clearly thought I'd known, and made some joke about it. Well, how could I not know? He's there ALL DAY. I'm so stupid sometimes.
A little while later, another young guy I'd seen before came by. He, too, was a store cop. You would never notice them unless, like me, you were there for four hours and saw them regularly.
We started chatting about his job, my gig, sharing stories. He was so much that I haven't experienced lately: attractive, conversational, confident. He strolled off and then came back. He was eating some cheese.
"Here, have some," he said, and handed me a piece before strolling off again.
I began to notice him hanging around my area, and I caught him watching me.
"Either he's interested, or I seem really suspicious," I thought. I was incredulous. I mean, this guy was cute -- seriously cute -- and way younger than me. Although I'm used to being taken for younger than I am, which in this case, was just fine with me.
After I was done I put my stuff in my car and came back to catch up on some shopping. I bumped into him in the beans aisle. We exchanged names, and he offered me a Starburst.
I can really go for a guy whose main impulse is to feed me.
He doesn't work this weekend, which is too bad, but that's OK. Something to look forward to.
Seriously cute.
Auditions, Act 3
I had an audition for The Maid of Orleans last Saturday. I was really excited about this, because I was trying for the role of an antagonist, Queen Isabel. I'd jotted down the address, checked Google, and took the Red Line to the closest stop.
I'd given myself a ton more time than I needed, because I have this fear I'll be late. Turns out that was good, because when I got to 629 N. Sheridan I stood facing a mid-rise condo building. I looked at my date book.
I'd written 629 N. Sheridan on another paper; in the date book was 6129 N. Sheridan. They are not close.
I'd dressed up for the audition in a dress, long sweater and wool coat and knee boots, and considered the walk back to the station. I decided that since I had time, I'd just take the Broadway bus, which would come right by where I was.
What made me think that this was a good idea on a Saturday I can't say. All I know is the bus crawled up Broadway, stopping at Every. Single. Stop. At Argyle, our merry band on the People's Bus was joined by 817 Vietnamese shoppers. Had I not been pressed for time, I'd have thoroughly enjoyed it. But I was pressed for time; yes, I was.
I watched my time surplus head towards deficit with each tug of the cord, each "Stop Requested" flashing across the screen at the front of the bus.
The cultural center where I was to go is actually very close to where I used to live; the irony is that I could have gotten there by taking the El all of three stops, or riding my bike for fifteen minutes.
I finally got off when it seemed the remaining distance was faster traveled on foot. I ran the five blocks, gasping out my lines in preparation. I was reading a monologue by the goddess of love from Euripides' Hippolytus.
"I am called...*puff puff* ...the goddess Cypris..."
I ran up Broadway, dodging shoppers, taking a right at Granville.
"...has blasphemed me... *gasp*...naming me vilest of the gods in heaven..."
I finally arrived. The building is a gorgeous old thing right on the Lake. It's empty, available for functions and.. well, auditions.
A young woman sat at a table. She had me fill out the usual form, then told me I was third in line. She was very pleasant. I'd had a lot of tea, and asked for the bathroom. She pointed.
The bathroom was smelly and old, and had no toilet paper, as I discovered...after. So I just pulled my tights up, feeling distinctly unlike the goddess of love.
I began running my scene, walking through the empty hall off the bathroom. My nose was running from the dash from the bus, and I needed to blow it badly. There was a grim kitchen, and I opened cabinets in search of paper towels, anything. Nothing.
I could not audition while sniffing every three seconds. I was getting desperate. Just as I considered the inside of my sweater, I spotted a discarded paper towel in the trash. Someone had clearly used it to dry their hands, leaving a large portion of it untouched. So yes, the Goddess of Love, having just drip-dried in the toilet, blew her nose on a discarded paper towel scavenged from the trash.
My turn came and I did my bit in front of three people in a wonderful old room with big windows. It was the first time I'd used the monologue, and I felt good about it.
I got a call-back and a scene to review for it. I know I can play this character. I just have to convince them that five-foot me can command a stage.
Watch me.
I'd given myself a ton more time than I needed, because I have this fear I'll be late. Turns out that was good, because when I got to 629 N. Sheridan I stood facing a mid-rise condo building. I looked at my date book.
I'd written 629 N. Sheridan on another paper; in the date book was 6129 N. Sheridan. They are not close.
I'd dressed up for the audition in a dress, long sweater and wool coat and knee boots, and considered the walk back to the station. I decided that since I had time, I'd just take the Broadway bus, which would come right by where I was.
What made me think that this was a good idea on a Saturday I can't say. All I know is the bus crawled up Broadway, stopping at Every. Single. Stop. At Argyle, our merry band on the People's Bus was joined by 817 Vietnamese shoppers. Had I not been pressed for time, I'd have thoroughly enjoyed it. But I was pressed for time; yes, I was.
I watched my time surplus head towards deficit with each tug of the cord, each "Stop Requested" flashing across the screen at the front of the bus.
The cultural center where I was to go is actually very close to where I used to live; the irony is that I could have gotten there by taking the El all of three stops, or riding my bike for fifteen minutes.
I finally got off when it seemed the remaining distance was faster traveled on foot. I ran the five blocks, gasping out my lines in preparation. I was reading a monologue by the goddess of love from Euripides' Hippolytus.
"I am called...*puff puff* ...the goddess Cypris..."
I ran up Broadway, dodging shoppers, taking a right at Granville.
"...has blasphemed me... *gasp*...naming me vilest of the gods in heaven..."
I finally arrived. The building is a gorgeous old thing right on the Lake. It's empty, available for functions and.. well, auditions.
A young woman sat at a table. She had me fill out the usual form, then told me I was third in line. She was very pleasant. I'd had a lot of tea, and asked for the bathroom. She pointed.
The bathroom was smelly and old, and had no toilet paper, as I discovered...after. So I just pulled my tights up, feeling distinctly unlike the goddess of love.
I began running my scene, walking through the empty hall off the bathroom. My nose was running from the dash from the bus, and I needed to blow it badly. There was a grim kitchen, and I opened cabinets in search of paper towels, anything. Nothing.
I could not audition while sniffing every three seconds. I was getting desperate. Just as I considered the inside of my sweater, I spotted a discarded paper towel in the trash. Someone had clearly used it to dry their hands, leaving a large portion of it untouched. So yes, the Goddess of Love, having just drip-dried in the toilet, blew her nose on a discarded paper towel scavenged from the trash.
My turn came and I did my bit in front of three people in a wonderful old room with big windows. It was the first time I'd used the monologue, and I felt good about it.
I got a call-back and a scene to review for it. I know I can play this character. I just have to convince them that five-foot me can command a stage.
Watch me.
Auditions, Act 2
It was a single-night audition. Basically, a young local man has written a play about Relationships, and I landed the role of the 40-year-old woman. The jaded, bitter divorced attorney 40-year-old woman. Yes, I am once again playing a cliche. So there are no performance dates yet, because they are hoping for "backers," so we are reading for "potential financiers" next week.
Trust me, this all sounds way more weighty than it is. The script is not, in my opinion, in a final form. I know it's hard to write a play, and lord knows I've never written one, but really, when the only women in the play are competing for the same man, your Inner Feminist heaves a great, big annoyed (and bored) sigh.
So last Saturday the cast met in the playwright's Streeterville apartment just behind Watertower Place. Think Chicago's equivalent of Central Park West. There was a doorman. I mean a literal doorman whose job it was to open the door.
I am never comfortable with this arrangement.
The playwright, "Alex," had baked muffins and had plates of pastries, and offered us coffee and tea and orange juice laid out in a large dining room. He gave us a tour, and I asked him to pause in the kitchen so that I could make out with his butler-pantry cabinets. We glided over walnut-stained hardwood floors to the living room (yes, Virginia, there was a fireplace), and I looked through the full-length windows over the Juliet balcony at my sad car being bullied by an Audi.
The French boyfriend, Mark, was asleep in the bedroom. Of course.
The group consisted of playwright Alex, the director, "Ned;" "Tracy," the Stage Manager; "Cassie,
the female lead; "Jack," the male lead; "Josh" in the supporting role of Gay Best Friend to the female lead; and "Sarah," airhead girlfriend to Jack. I play Jack lifelong best friend, Jane, who is also in love with him. Jack is supposed to be my age. The actor playing him is barely 30, but I think he'll be able to pull it off. I have to cringe through lines about 40-year-olds being old.
The other actors are all in their 20s. The female lead is in college, studying theater. Jack is understudying with Chicago Shakespeare and is fairly solid; Sarah is very good as the bimbo, and I think I've got Jane down.
The female lead, however, is awful. Just awful.
It could possibly be the reading thing again. I am not exaggerating when I say that the number of people I meet who cannot read is starting to really enrage me. When you are a senior in college, there is just no excuse for this. None.
"I spoke to Jack-eese," said Sarah.
This was how she read "Jacques" before finally being corrected.
Other terms that held up our collective brain trust included "indebted" and "Le Monsieur." At one point the female lead struggled mightily with a word before I blurted, "the word is ENEMA."
I want to add that they were all extremely nice, and you can invite me to your place any time to read your script when you feed me like that.
After we read it, the director asked whether we had any questions or comments. I looked around the table, watching people watch each other. I figured I'd take the lead.
"I don't understand why they don't end up together. I mean, it's refreshing that they don't, but I don't feel like I'm really given a reason to believe it."
My questions elicited a chorus of agreement, and we all began discussing the play. We had some good comments, and the playwright took notes. I managed to suggest that the relationship between my character and the lead be less nasty, that there were some great opportunities to let the audience in on what made them tick, and the other cast members agreed.
At one point, caught up in the discussion, I looked at Alex's face.
"Hold it," I said. "we're all excited about this, and we're all giving you lots of feedback, but I want you to know that you have a good basic work here, and it may feel like we're picking it apart, but we're just enthusiastic."
The thing is, it's hard to write about relationships without falling into cliche. And I don't know, maybe a gay man should write what he knows, and women, well, women who date men aren't it.
So we read the show for our potential financiers next Monday. I'm amused. Frankly, I don't know when the show will go up, and if I'll be around when it does, but I have a pretty small part and it's something to do.
Trust me, this all sounds way more weighty than it is. The script is not, in my opinion, in a final form. I know it's hard to write a play, and lord knows I've never written one, but really, when the only women in the play are competing for the same man, your Inner Feminist heaves a great, big annoyed (and bored) sigh.
So last Saturday the cast met in the playwright's Streeterville apartment just behind Watertower Place. Think Chicago's equivalent of Central Park West. There was a doorman. I mean a literal doorman whose job it was to open the door.
I am never comfortable with this arrangement.
The playwright, "Alex," had baked muffins and had plates of pastries, and offered us coffee and tea and orange juice laid out in a large dining room. He gave us a tour, and I asked him to pause in the kitchen so that I could make out with his butler-pantry cabinets. We glided over walnut-stained hardwood floors to the living room (yes, Virginia, there was a fireplace), and I looked through the full-length windows over the Juliet balcony at my sad car being bullied by an Audi.
The French boyfriend, Mark, was asleep in the bedroom. Of course.
The group consisted of playwright Alex, the director, "Ned;" "Tracy," the Stage Manager; "Cassie,
the female lead; "Jack," the male lead; "Josh" in the supporting role of Gay Best Friend to the female lead; and "Sarah," airhead girlfriend to Jack. I play Jack lifelong best friend, Jane, who is also in love with him. Jack is supposed to be my age. The actor playing him is barely 30, but I think he'll be able to pull it off. I have to cringe through lines about 40-year-olds being old.
The other actors are all in their 20s. The female lead is in college, studying theater. Jack is understudying with Chicago Shakespeare and is fairly solid; Sarah is very good as the bimbo, and I think I've got Jane down.
The female lead, however, is awful. Just awful.
It could possibly be the reading thing again. I am not exaggerating when I say that the number of people I meet who cannot read is starting to really enrage me. When you are a senior in college, there is just no excuse for this. None.
"I spoke to Jack-eese," said Sarah.
This was how she read "Jacques" before finally being corrected.
Other terms that held up our collective brain trust included "indebted" and "Le Monsieur." At one point the female lead struggled mightily with a word before I blurted, "the word is ENEMA."
I want to add that they were all extremely nice, and you can invite me to your place any time to read your script when you feed me like that.
After we read it, the director asked whether we had any questions or comments. I looked around the table, watching people watch each other. I figured I'd take the lead.
"I don't understand why they don't end up together. I mean, it's refreshing that they don't, but I don't feel like I'm really given a reason to believe it."
My questions elicited a chorus of agreement, and we all began discussing the play. We had some good comments, and the playwright took notes. I managed to suggest that the relationship between my character and the lead be less nasty, that there were some great opportunities to let the audience in on what made them tick, and the other cast members agreed.
At one point, caught up in the discussion, I looked at Alex's face.
"Hold it," I said. "we're all excited about this, and we're all giving you lots of feedback, but I want you to know that you have a good basic work here, and it may feel like we're picking it apart, but we're just enthusiastic."
The thing is, it's hard to write about relationships without falling into cliche. And I don't know, maybe a gay man should write what he knows, and women, well, women who date men aren't it.
So we read the show for our potential financiers next Monday. I'm amused. Frankly, I don't know when the show will go up, and if I'll be around when it does, but I have a pretty small part and it's something to do.
Sunday, November 7, 2010
Auditions, Act I
I had an audition a week or so ago where I was scheduled to meet the playwright and another actor at a small community center in neighboring Evanston. I arrived to find them at a table in the main room. Accompanying them were the playwright's wife and daughter, who was about 10. The wife had brought little homemade cupcakes. already so much nicer than other auditions.
The playwright, Mark, is putting on a showcase of his work: some one-act pieces, some scenes from full-length plays. The other actor, Ken, and I were to read some of the work. Ken was about my age. I mentioned to Mark that I had trouble finding roles given my age, and he said that he had a really hard time finding mature actors. He had had some good younger actors audition, but he really wanted to balance out the cast.
The world is a big, fat conundrum.
So Ken and I read some scenes. Ken had some experience, but he had a shortcoming that drives me straight up the wall: he couldn't cold read. He wasn't illiterate, but he had trouble just reading the page, and kept stumbling and having to backtrack. Forget about injecting any real character into his lines. It's amazing how many actors I've met who, once they learned their lines, were fine, but who really had to work hard to actually *read* them.
Mark and his family reminded me of New York Jews. If you know me, that's high praise. By this I mean that they were intelligent, educated, had a worldview, and were good, kind people. They were a refreshing change from what I'm used to. I wanted to go live with them. Their daughter, Cathy, was greedily reading a thick 'tween fantasy book whose cover revealed a tough heroine protagonist holding a sword.
One script was rather heady; the proprietor of a philosophical cafe proposed a variety of things to a patron. We started the scene with Ken as the diner owner and me as the patron. Ken, who'd been emailed the script, said he first needed some clarification on some terms he'd never seen before. In a previous scene, we'd had to acquaint him with "Aeschylus," which did not bode well.
"This," he pointed to the page.
Art Nouveau. Bauhaus. You get the idea. I don't know what disturbed me more, that he had gotten to almost middle age without ever hearing of these things, or that he'd gotten the script online and never thought to look them up.
My Scottish coworker, Colin, told me the other day that someone had rated American cities according to their intellectual rating, based on things like number of libraries, number of nonfiction books purchased, etc.
"Boston came in number one," he said. "Chicago was 22."
"So now I have hard data to support my growing impression that people here are just plain thick," I said.
I mean, really. ART NOUVEAU? BAUHAUS?
Ken and I got through the slow death that was him reading the script, then he got to leave while I read a two-woman scene. In this scene a woman tries to connect with her estranged 18-year-old daughter, who's single and pregnant.
"Cathy," the director called. "Can you come read with us?"
Cathy put down her book and bounced over. She was clearly used to this. She was adorable in pigtails and glasses. She sat down next to me and by golly, the kid could read, and she could deliver. Although I confess it was odd to have her play the character.
"I said I was sorry. that was four years ago already, for Christ;s sake," she said. We were discussing her driving her drunk boyfriend home. She was great.
We all had a nice chat. I really like Mark and his family, and I got a role in two of the scenes, including the mother/daughter scene. I confess the scene reads a bit like a piece from Lifetime TV, but I think it can work with the right approach. The daughter will be played by Mark's older daughter, who is attending Northwestern and majoring in theater. Although, really, doing it with Cathy as daughter might be really fun. If I could keep a straight face.
The playwright, Mark, is putting on a showcase of his work: some one-act pieces, some scenes from full-length plays. The other actor, Ken, and I were to read some of the work. Ken was about my age. I mentioned to Mark that I had trouble finding roles given my age, and he said that he had a really hard time finding mature actors. He had had some good younger actors audition, but he really wanted to balance out the cast.
The world is a big, fat conundrum.
So Ken and I read some scenes. Ken had some experience, but he had a shortcoming that drives me straight up the wall: he couldn't cold read. He wasn't illiterate, but he had trouble just reading the page, and kept stumbling and having to backtrack. Forget about injecting any real character into his lines. It's amazing how many actors I've met who, once they learned their lines, were fine, but who really had to work hard to actually *read* them.
Mark and his family reminded me of New York Jews. If you know me, that's high praise. By this I mean that they were intelligent, educated, had a worldview, and were good, kind people. They were a refreshing change from what I'm used to. I wanted to go live with them. Their daughter, Cathy, was greedily reading a thick 'tween fantasy book whose cover revealed a tough heroine protagonist holding a sword.
One script was rather heady; the proprietor of a philosophical cafe proposed a variety of things to a patron. We started the scene with Ken as the diner owner and me as the patron. Ken, who'd been emailed the script, said he first needed some clarification on some terms he'd never seen before. In a previous scene, we'd had to acquaint him with "Aeschylus," which did not bode well.
"This," he pointed to the page.
Art Nouveau. Bauhaus. You get the idea. I don't know what disturbed me more, that he had gotten to almost middle age without ever hearing of these things, or that he'd gotten the script online and never thought to look them up.
My Scottish coworker, Colin, told me the other day that someone had rated American cities according to their intellectual rating, based on things like number of libraries, number of nonfiction books purchased, etc.
"Boston came in number one," he said. "Chicago was 22."
"So now I have hard data to support my growing impression that people here are just plain thick," I said.
I mean, really. ART NOUVEAU? BAUHAUS?
Ken and I got through the slow death that was him reading the script, then he got to leave while I read a two-woman scene. In this scene a woman tries to connect with her estranged 18-year-old daughter, who's single and pregnant.
"Cathy," the director called. "Can you come read with us?"
Cathy put down her book and bounced over. She was clearly used to this. She was adorable in pigtails and glasses. She sat down next to me and by golly, the kid could read, and she could deliver. Although I confess it was odd to have her play the character.
"I said I was sorry. that was four years ago already, for Christ;s sake," she said. We were discussing her driving her drunk boyfriend home. She was great.
We all had a nice chat. I really like Mark and his family, and I got a role in two of the scenes, including the mother/daughter scene. I confess the scene reads a bit like a piece from Lifetime TV, but I think it can work with the right approach. The daughter will be played by Mark's older daughter, who is attending Northwestern and majoring in theater. Although, really, doing it with Cathy as daughter might be really fun. If I could keep a straight face.
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