Callbacks for Memphis

In March I wrote about attending the equity chorus call for the national tour of Memphis.  Well, in the middle of April I received an email from Telsey casting to come in for a call back! Hooray!  After a long harrowing ordeal to get to NYC, I arrived an hour late for my appointment and had to go in the next group.


Unlike some other equity callbacks, this call still had a ton of people, and the first group took a very long time in the audition room.  However, once they were done the later group of girls, and there must have still been 50 of us, went into the room to learn the combination.  The combo turned out to be the same combination learned at the chorus call, with a few differences.  Mainly that there were two different variations that you had to learn and then based on how you were lined up you did one or the other.  A bit much to have to remember in an audition situation.  But we learned them and then went five at a time.  They then made a cut, and I was kept.


For the second combination all the girls were brought back into the room and told to put our heels on.  The asst. choreographer, Edgar Godineaux, then taught us a second combination which was very fun!  It was a cute combo, which I can only describe as being in the style of a Motown doo-wop singer.  It was a little longer, but despite being exhausted I managed to pick it up.  When it came time for my audition, I gave it all I had at the time, didn't mess up, and thought I did pretty good.


Unfortunately when it came time to move on to the next thing, about nine of us girls, were called over by the casting director and told that "It wasn't a bad thing, they were just considering us for another track, and that they didn't need to hear us sing today"  Booooo, there were still about 50 girls left so I was a little disappointed not to sing.  At the time, I wasn't sure if I had just been cut or if they really were considering me for another track in the show.  But as of last week, offers went out for the tour, so I guess it was a cut.  Its all for the best though, but I sure do love that musical!  Maybe next time!

Walking in Memphis!

So the other day I mentioned attending an EPA and leaving to go to another audition in between.  Well, that in between audition just happened to be the equity chorus call for Memphis the musical!  The 1st national tour will be going out in the fall and while I'm not sure if I'll be ready to go back on tour just yet, I figured there would be no harm in going in and getting seen.


After leaving the Ogunquit audition, I arrived at Memphis around 10:45.  The awesome thing with having my equity card is that I was able to walk right in to the monitor and grab a number!  I was only #49 at that and they were doing groups of twenty-five, so I knew I would be in the second group.  I took some time to change and warm up and before I knew it, I was going in to the audition.


The combination was taught to us by someone who is still currently in the show running on Broadway.  It was a fun little combination called radio, where we were supposed to pretend we were bad, misbehaving teenagers.  It had an odd little penche step in it repeatedly, along with a short stomp combination!  This being my first audition in over six months words can't express how nervous I was to 1. now be in a room with all equity dancers and 2. to have to pick up, remember, and perform a combination so quickly!  After learning the combination, they told our group to leave and go practice it outside, while the first group went back in to do it three at a time.


We all filed back out into the holding room and began to practice.  Its always amusing and good to have time to practice a combination before having to do it for the casting crew, but at the same time you don't want to tire yourself out or get messed up watching everyone else do it.  So I practiced it a few times, and then focused on stretching, considering they had stated that when we kick our knee should be by our ear and they didn't care how it got there! LOL


After a very short time, we went in to perform the combo.  It was fun and went fairly well, I just had one minor mistake at the very end of the combo.  But I don't really think it mattered.  Unfortunately I will never know because they didn't make a cut!  Well they did, but they didn't announce it.  Instead the casting director told us that they were going to be seriously casting for the tour in April and there was only one Broadway spot opening up in May.  So we wouldn't be hearing from them for a while even if we did make the grade.  Booo!  Another anticlimactic audition, but it was good to dip my foot back in the audition pool.  Only two more months before I'm unemployed again!