There were only a coupld of people who made it into the auditions that ought not to have. The quality of actors was up drastically. Now, that being said, there are plenty of people who are good enough to be there, but not right for the parts that I'm casting currently, so I still was selective as to who I'll be calling, but this was a good pool of folks to see.
I won't mention the names of either of the bad auditions, nor of the folks who I thought were wonderful. No names... not today. Instead, however, I want to relate one thought. If you are an actor and you're going into an audition of this ilk (meaning a cattle call), go ahead and throw out your preconceived ideas about what is a good audition. We saw people bring in props, we saw people who set all thei pieces around a theme, we saw a guy spend 15 seconds galloping around the stage snorting like a horse! Those are the people we remember without looking them up in the headshot book. Take a risk, have fun, and let us know that you'd be fun to work with. That being said, if you're auditioning just for a single show, don't do that crap... but for the Unifieds, or MWTAs, or UPTAs, or whatever... go for it! What a riot the guy was who announced "and for my second piece I'll be doing something from 'Equus!'"
I am currently looking for casts for three separate shows. The first is The Mandrake by Machiavelli, which I am directing for In the Basement Productions. After that comes Kakistocracy by David Schlosser for the Fringe (assuming we get off the waiting list), and finally, Burning Bright by John Steinbeck. Which should be really good. We'll be putting that up in the fall.
Boo! Did I scare you?
And now for this episode's random stuff:
- My daughter and I watched "Quest for Camelot" last night. It was a lot of fun. It was inconsistent, but all things considered, it was a lot of fun.
- The first thing I saw when I woke up this morning was the nose of one of my cats.
- My new favorite board game is "Deadwood" by the folks at Cheapass games. My favorite way to kill 30 minutes on the computer is now Adventure Quest, a cheesy little RPG game at www.battleon.com
- Random fact from www.hookedonfacts.com: "Only 55% of Americans know that the sun is a star." -- All right, I knew that there are a disproportionate amount of stupid people in America, and this just proves it. Nevertheless, it's sad, isn't it? My 5 year-old daughter knows that the sun is a star. They teach that very early on in the public schools, so it shouldn't be something less than common knowledge. Last night I was perusing an online slideshow called "Best of the Hubble" that featured pictures taken from the Hubble Telescope. Space is an amazing thing, and the stars that have exploded, the galaxies formed, and everything like that--just beautiful to look at. Beautiful.
- It is fundraising time again for TPT, and I hate that! Not because they are asking for money, that's actually fine by me (I used to do fundraising for a public radio station in Iowa). What's the problem is that they alter the kids shows in the morning, and I depend on those to let me know what time it is while I'm half asleep. My daughter watches the shows, and I know that when Clifford is done and Dragon Tales is coming on, that I've got to get up and take her to school. 15 minutes of awkward solicitation built in to every show throws off the rhythm of my morning, and quite honestly freaks me out a bit. I still got her to school on time, but Aargh!
- They should change the title of the book Best American Poetry: 2004 to One Good Poem and a lot of Crap: 2004. It would be a much more appropriate description of what is contained therein.
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