Let there be no doubt that I am grateful for every audition that comes my way.  That said…occasionally with auditions, you can feel a bit like Goldilocks…this one seems a  little too easy to book. And this one is a little too tough (read -impossible).   Where’s the audition that is just right? 

So….some days (like yesterday) having an audition means that at 7pm you get a call from your agent stating you have a 10am audition the next morning and casting has sent 27 pages of sides. (Gulp!) They “want you to be familiar with all of it” and “they are focusing on the first and third scene but you should prepare everything…be off book, if you can”.  Ummm….ok.   Go-Go-Gadget-Memory!    I know this type of last minute scheduling can’t be pleasant for the casting offices either – but it is nearly impossible to show what you can really do when you have no prep time at all.  It is at worst, a complete mess. At best you miraculously pull something brilliant out of your hat…but even then it is a fraction of what you know you could do with proper time.

Other days (like last Tuesday) having an audition means that after a 1.5 hour drive to make it to the office, the casting director asks you to slate your name and then say’s “What’s your favorite movie?  But don’t answer like an actor”.    Ummmm…..a) I drove here so you could ask me my favorite movie?  That’s the entire audition?  That’s what all of my training has prepared me for?  That’s what will determine if someone gets this huge ad campaign? and b) how do you answer (or not) like an actor?   What does that mean?   I interpret this to mean answer truthfully and not in some presentational way that you think they want to hear…but who knows.  As I am an actor, doesn’t that mean I’m naturally answering that way?   That I can’t help it?   I don’t know.   I chatted about (one of) my favorite movie(s) and left for the 1.5 hour drive home.   Sadly, I didn’t book this job….I assume my movie choice was too ‘actor-y’.   Oy.