I auditioned for Shakespeare last week. It was OK. I was less confident than I pretended to be, and that sunk the prepared solo read.
They told us callbacks would be choreography, and that didn't happen because of a large number of new auditionees, for which I am grateful.
Lots of kids, so my role, after not making too big a fool of myself on the text and pronunciation section, is just to make the kids look good.
Last week, that was improving a scene with guy who is probably actually two or three years graduated, but I put him down as a high school junior or senior. Whoops. He put the idea together and I directed the scene and tried to be the straight man, and picked up all the laughs. Maybe because there's a room full of people who know me, but haven't seen me perform.
This week for callbacks, high school senior. Same thing, she presented the idea and I blocked and directed it, but she wanted to be the straight man. We got a shit-tonne of applause for that, because we had, you know, character beats and goals and stuff. It was successful.
Callbacks were interesting. He wasn't looking for an ensemble, he was looking for versatility in his actors, which means he didn't get that information from the audition. I can tell him why; he keeps saying the show isn't about the text or the poetry, it's about the story. So, dude, it's ENTIRELY about the text and the poetry. That's why you do close reading. But he set out the monologues intended to catch an actor; all of them required research to do correctly. If you wanted to see what an actor can do, and you don't care about text but about story, you want to see them make choices, and because they're largely middle and high school kids, you have to give them the framework to make choices within. You've got to set the challenge and let them blow you away.
My high schoolers have taught me that if I want to see them work, I don't watch them audition, I watch them watch the audition. I watch them play games and warm up before auditions. That process is way more valuable to me as a director than having them stand up and confirm for me that, yes, they are high school actors. I know that already. I know what the challenges are, and I can teach any of them to act. It's harder to teach them to focus in rehearsal, and care about what's going on, and not to be afraid.
I do better the less I care. Which isn't accurate. I do better when I feel confident about my abilities. Not about my work, but about the playing ground I walk in on. When I figured out I was going to get to play around and try to make other people look successful, I thought, "good, I'm a director, I devise theatre, I can direct someone in such a way as to make it look collaborative, and it's in messing around with Shakespeare text, this is the role I was born to play no matter how they cast me."
There's a role I don't want. Actually, there are several roles I don't want- the ones due to me by my age and gender. I'll acknowledge that's weird, especially when the roles for the opposite gender aren't really any much better, but I think there's more chances I'd get to do some stage combat if I go opposite gender.
I am a better performer than I think I am. I think.
