Secretly Cinderella

[NOTE: Part of this post was taken verbatim from yesterday's post on my grad school blog, but this one is longer and more detailed.]

Today was my first audition at grad school. And it was... weird.

Normally, auditioning doesn't make me nervous. My Shakespeare coaches taught me to go into every audition with the mentality that I'm proud of what I've worked on, I'd like to share it with them, I think they'll like it, and it doesn't bother me if I'm not what they're looking for.

But this wasn't like most auditions.

Usually when you audition for things, you don't know any of the people in the room with you. Today wasn't like that. When I walked out onto the stage, I saw:

- My Analysis Professor (who is also the head of the program)
- My Acting Professor
- My Voice Professor
- My Movement Professor
- The 2nd Year Acting Professor (who is the woman who called me back at URTAs both years)
- Three 2nd year directing students, who are in two of my classes with me
- One of my roommates (she was helping to run the auditions and time monologues)

Yeah. Weird.

And I know they're all on my side. But to see people out of the corner of your eye writing things down on notepads, and knowing that it's not just about whether to cast you, but also all the flaws that they need to correct over the next three years?

Nerve-wracking.

I totally rushed my pieces. By about 10-20 seconds. Which doesn't sound like much, but it's a lot (especially when you have 3 minutes to do two monologues).

I talked to my roommate, and she said I did a great job. She also complimented my choice of monologues, saying they were of excellent contrast (something that not everyone achieved with their pieces).

Apparently, most people start figuring out what their "type" is while there here. Some are obvious from the get-go. One of my classmates is clearly built to be an ingenue. One is a tough guy. One girl looks more maternal. One guy is the pretty-boy leading man. One is going to be our main "character actor". This is not to say that they can't do other things; they can. Everyone here is a versatile actor. But in this business, it's good to know who you are, what people think of you, and what you can specialize in. It'll help you get more work.

No one can really type me yet. One of my classmates said he was mentally putting me as "the sexpot", but now that he's gotten to know me, I think I've broken that in his mind. No one else has really given me a good idea of what I might end up being.

My roommate said that, based on my audition, she thinks I'm going to play both extremes: leading ladies AND character roles. I really, really, really hope she's right. That would be the ideal situation for me. Specialization is nice and all, but I'd really love to have the opportunity to try the leading lady role. Once I hone that skill, I think I can rock it. And, more importantly, I don't want to be shut off from any path yet. I want to try a little of everything.

I tend to be cast in "character actress" sorts of roles. Not that I don't adore character work; I do. (Clearly... I did, after all, create Carmella and Hot Cocoa.) But just once, I'd like to be something a little different. In college, I played an Irish priest, a karate-fighting Mexian lawyer nun, a dead 75-year-old British woman, an ugly stepsister, a 50-year-old church gossip, a new-age sort of hippie... But I've never played the protagonist. I've never been the love interest that the leading man was trying to pursue. I've never played the strong young woman that I think is part of who I am in life.

I want to know what it is to be Cinderella instead of an ugly stepsister. And I know I can do it. I hope they realize that, too.

Apparently, they type you with your understudy assignments. If that's true, then I should have a better idea sometime next week.

Well, I should go do some homework. I've been switching between working on my Oedipus paper and watching season 4 of Battlestar Galactica (which takes forever, because I'm doing it online and nothing loads quickly). I'm also headed to a party tonight that's being thrown by some of the program's donors. Apparently it's an annual event and usually ends with several people getting naked. I plan to leave before it gets to that point.


May you know who you are and, more importantly, who you can be.

~A~