Amazing Grace @ Goodspeed Auditions

Goodspeed Opera House is putting on a new musical called Amazing Grace, which is about the song's author, John Newton.  The audition notice specifically said that they were looking for performer's who played instruments; which meant almost everyone decided NOT to go the the call.  I wasn't going to go either, but then decided that I since I do technically know how to play the violin I should give it a try.  When I arrived at the call there was barely anyone there.  I came exactly on time and was put in the first group!  Thats how few people were there.  I had to hurry and get dressed so I could go into the room.

The choreographer of the show is Benoit-Swan Pouffer the artistic director of Cedar Lake Ballet and while he wasn't there that day his assistant was to teach us the combination.  Hello, contemporary concert dance! It was a combination of contemporary and African dance, fun to do, but pretty sure I looked like a nut!  We danced the combination in groups of three and after each group went they asked if anyone wanted to tumble.  After I danced in my small group I volunteered to tumble.  I swear this winter I have tumbled at almost every audition, its insane.  Anyways, I was kept after the first cut and had some down time while the non-equity girls went into the room to dance.

During the wait, I rented a room so I could warm up and practice my song.  I have started doing this recently at auditions and it really helps!  I decided to sing Come Down From the Tree from Once On This Island and prepared about a 32 bar cut despite the fact they had asked for 16 bars.  When it was time for me to go in and sing the accompanist told me my cut was too long!  Whaaaat??!  So he suggested we start from a different location, which I agreed to do, but wasn't exactly thrilled that I had been caught!  Lesson learned.  The song went awesome!  Yes I used the word awesome because its the first time I felt like that after singing at an audition.  The casting director then asked me if I could bring in an instrument if they called me back and I agreed.

A couple of weeks later I got a callback for the show.  We came in to dance again and I realized that I was in a room filled with former Alvin Ailey & Philadanco company members.  I had to wonder why I was there, but I stuck it out and learned the combintion.  By the time we were finished learning the combination we were all exhausted and sweaty and then we learned that the choreographer wouldn't be coming in!  Instead he watched the auditions on Skype!  Very interesting this new fangled technology.  We danced two at a time and then a few of us were asked to read sides, sides are small parts of the script actors get to perform at auditions.  When I went in to read, I was awkward and terrible, but it was my first time doing sides at an audition!  The director thanked me and I knew I had just taken myself out of the running for the job.  Learning something new everyday.

Anything Goes!

After the Flashdance failure, I headed uptown to the chorus call for Anything Goes.  The musical, currently on Broadway starring Sutton Foster, is going on tour in the fall of 2012.  Now, I'm not sure if I'm even remotely interested in going on tour again, but there is always a voice in my head saying "beggars can't be choosers" so I went anyways.  I made it to the call in time to hear my name called from the list and was given number twenty-five.  Which just so happens to be my lucky number!  Once again there were 80+ equity women there and they refused to see any non-equity dancers.  Since we were in a smaller studio than earlier that day, I was in the second group and had to sit and wait.  The wait wasn't bad though and I was soon headed into the audition room.

Once inside the room, there are a couple of things I always try to do.  First, obviously, is to stand in the front or at least somewhere I can see whoever is teaching the combination.  Second, I always try to determine who all the non-auditioning people are in the room.  A lot of times you can figure out how serious they are about hiring people just by seeing who's in the room.  If you have the casting director, music director, and choreographer all in the room, then they are probably trying to cast a show quickly.  However, if you walk in and its the assistant dance captain and a random assistant from casting you know they are either: a) in the very beginning of looking and there are many rounds of auditions left or b) they are not looking for anyone at all.  The later usually happens at required calls.

Anyways,  I get into the room and go stand in the front.  The dance captain (d.c) and someone from casting are there but no one else.  Oh well.  We begin to learn a combination the "angels" in the show do during "Blow, Gabriel, Blow".  It was a sultry combination complete with hip thrusts and fan kicks.  While not difficult, we were told multiple times by the d.c. not to make the hip thrusts "vulgar" and that the combination was all about focus.  I love stuff like that, so I had a good time.  We performed it four at a time and I was in the very first group of dancers to go.  After I finished I noticed they were separating headshots into separate piles to make a cut, but after everyone had danced they just thanked us and told us we were done! Booo!  No cuts, only one dance combo, and no singing!  Who knows when they are planning to get serious about casting.  I feel good about my performance though so we will just have to see what happens next.


For your viewing pleasure:

What a Feeling! Flashdance Comes to Broadway

Yes ladies and gentleman, you read that right.  The movie Flashdance has been made into a musical and will soon be making its debut on a Broadway stage near you.  The musical already had a debut in London (see here) and is making the big puddle jump over to the USA.  It is choreographed by Sergio Trujillo the wonderful choreographer of Memphis, so I was excited to go audition and see what he planned on doing with the show.  Getting back on the audition scene was a little bit of a shock to the system, there were just sooo many girls there.  They refused to see any non-equity dancers and the even closed the call to equity girls promptly at 10am.

I signed up on the chorus call list at the Actor's Equity building before hand, and made it to the audition in time to here the list called *see note if you need further explanation* I was number twenty-six and made it into the first group of dancers to be seen.  When we get into the room Sergio wasn't there but two of his assistants were.  They began teaching us a contemporary ballet combination!  What a surprise!   The combo was not at all what I was expecting for Flashdance and I immediately had to lose my shoes because it was so slippery in there.  The routine was fairly short and was a mixture of ballet, body rolls, and off the leg kicks to the side.  So much fun, but a little hard for me to do since I am NO concert dancer.

After we all learned the combo we went in groups of five  and I was in the last group to perform.  We did the combination twice and it went fine, but I had a hop on my double pirouette which is never good and felt a little awkward all around.  They made a cut and I was not asked to stay, boo!  They kept a lot of shorter girls, but there were a few taller girls in the mix.  I know that afterwards they did a second combination which was a mix of hip-hop and jazz and that no one sang that day.  While I was bummed not to continue on I am excited about what Sergio Trujillo is going to do with the show.  It looks awesome so far!


*side note: For every equity chorus call, both singers and dancers, there is a list that is put up at the Actor's Equity building about a week before the audition.  Anyone who wants to audition can sign up on the list.  Then 30 minutes before the start of every audition the names on the list are read and those people are given numbers in the order in which they are called.  Anyone who does not sign up on the list, must wait until all the names have been read and then they will get a number.  Signing up gets you a lower number and better odds at being in the first group, thus less waiting around time.  But you must get there in time to hear the list read or you miss your spot and have to wait until the end like everyone else.

Carrie the Musical

I'm so behind on blogging about auditions!  July has been a crazy month of auditions, class, and odd little projects.  But, the inspiration for last weeks post came from the equity chorus call for Carrie the Musical.  This 80s musical went down in history as a colossal flop, but is currently being reworked for an off broadway revival.  There are pretty much no youtube clips to go off of, so I had no idea what to expect at this chorus call. 

Now, this audition happened THREE weeks ago, so forgive me if the details are a little fuzzy.  It was a lovely 10am audition, which for most people might seem like a perfectly reasonable time for an audition, but I HATE morning auditions.  My life doesn't have a set schedule which means I usually wake up at 10am.  Forcing me awake a full 2 hrs earlier (and I still cut it close) so that I can get dressed cute, warm up my voice, and get to an audition at 9:30am is just torture.   As I roled into the audition at about 9:45 of course there were already a bunch of girls there. 


I always find it interesting to people watch while I wait to go into the audition room.  The responsible people were warming up and stretching (yeah..not me), others were busy gabbing away with friends (shyly raises hand), some were out trying to catch a glance into the audition room to see the combination, and the rest were keeping to themselves (me when I started this whole audition game).  There were people are wearing leotards and dance shoes, some are completely 80s, and everyone in between.  I myself had chosen to wear a pair of capris, a tank, and my favorite purple converse.  Trying to look  youthful, without dressing for the part.  See previous entry.


After waiting for about an hour, its my turn to go into the room.  The choreographer, Matt Williams takes some time to explain the musical to us and we then begin to learn the choreography.  Whoa!  First the combination is from the scene where all the teens are at the dance and Carrie unleashes havoc on everyone.  So there was a lot of acting like you had just seen the most horrific event of your life and also a move where we got to pretend we were levitating! Second, have you seen this clip from the Fresh Prince of Belair?

Ok, so it wasn't THAT bad, but still.  The choreographer basically taught us the ENTIRE combination, which had several changes of direction, and even included skipping in one take.  Then after he had gone through it said "Does anyone have any questions?"  I swear I've never seen so many hands shoot up so fast.  So after clarifying all the walking patterns, counts, and directional changes, it was time for the judging tables to come out.  I had a few small mistakes when it came to timing but other than that it wasn't too bad; however, sometimes you can just tell you're not being watched.  You glance over at the table and you never see any eyes on you.  Its a disheartening realization to have in the middle of a combination, but there is really nothing you can do about it.  After finishing the combo, I waited to be cut, and that was it.


P.S. Yes I just REALLY wanted to have that clip from the Fresh Prince in there.  I loved the original Aunt Viv!

Where is Everyone???

I think once about two years ago I talked about going against the grain and heading to a smaller audition on a day when there is a bigger call going on at the same time.  Well yesterday that is exactly what I did.  Northern Stage Theatre is a smaller equity house in Vermont that was holding a call for the musical Annie.  As a child I always dreamed of being Annie but given that I probably couldn't pull off the red hair, it was a dream never to come true.  (My mom and dad weren't Will and Jada..shout out to Willow!)  But I headed over to audition for it as an adult on the same day that auditions for a new upcoming musical called Becoming Chaplin was coming out.


Now, I expected fewer dancers to be there, but I walked in and there were only six equity girls there! Six!  And when all was said and done only twelve non-equity girls showed up!  So we all got to go in as one rather small group and learned a combination to the number "I Think I'm Gonna Like it Here".  The combination was very ballet influenced and right up my alley!  Nothing makes you feel more joyous in an audition than being in your comfort zone, let me tell you.  So I got to have a lot of fun, which is not always the case. 

We get to go three at a time for the casting folk and I am in the 2nd group of three since there were only six equity girls total.  I had a lot of fun and felt good about my performance and I could tell that a cut was being made, but they never announced it to us.   Instead they had all eighteen of us come back and sing.  I sang a fairly traditional song entitled A Little Bit in Love from the musical Wonderful Town, which went OK, but I pretty much decided at that moment that I cannot wait another week without taking my tush to voice lessons.  After singing that was it! We were all free to go and I headed down to that other audition for Becoming Chaplin.  Two auditions in one day? You bet, but more on that later!

Young Frankenstein cont.

Tuesday morning, was the morning of the callback for Young Frankenstein.  It was set to begin at 10am and me being my early-arriving self got there at 9:30.  There were several new faces that were not there yesterday and only a few people I recognized from the day before.  Apparently, getting called back from a chorus call gets you into the "Invited Dance Call" which is what other people are just invited to in the first place.

The audition starts out with tap again, only this time its the combination all the equity girls learned yesterday.  I practically run to the front of the room, because I know I'm going to need to be able to see if I want to get this right, but it really didn't matter because the assistant choreographer kept making everyone switch around so we all got a chance to see.  He started teaching the combination and it was fast and a little complicated.  One girl left the audition before he even finished teaching it!

Have you ever studied for an exam and then when you sat down to take it realized it was nothing like you had planned?  You studied straight facts, and suddenly its an essay test?  That's what this was like, but just like when sitting in a surprisingly difficult exam, you have a choice.  Either give up and sit there staring off into space until its over or try to get it together and make sense of what you're looking at.  I literally felt my brain turn on and forced myself to take it all in.  Luckily they let us go over it a couple of times before we had to do it three at a time and I made the cut!

Next we did the same ballet combination from the previous day, so my brain got a break.  They didn't make a cut at this point since there were 13 people left (yes I counted!) .  It was time to sing again,  after doing such an awful job the day before I wanted to practice a bit before I went in but there was no where to do it.  Every time I tried to practice a lovely employee from the studio would tell me not to. Ugh.  I had planned on singing A Little Bit in Love again, but when I got in the room.  I asked the casting director and choreographer what they wanted and they said whatever I was most comfortable with so I completely switched gears and sang Waiting for Life to Begin from Once on This Island.

Surprisingly, the casting director told me how much better this song was than yesterday's!  She also took the time to give me feedback on my performance.  It was the first time anyone had every taken the time to do this and I was extremely grateful.  Still upon leaving I let all hope go out the window.  Its better as a performer to just know you didn't get it when you leave an audition so that its a surprise when you do rather than a disappointment when you don't.

Yet somehow, the next day, I look at my phone and there's a missed call from Tara Rubin casting!  I've been called back again!  This time, the call back is for next week and Susan Stroman is going to be there!  The woman has one FIVE TONYS!! She directed and choreographed The Producers!   This is really quite the opportunity and I'm really excited.  I don't know how many spots there are on the tour..I've heard two females and I don't know how many girls will be there next week.  But this whole experience has been awesome! Wish me luck!

P.S. Please listen to LaChanze sing Waiting for Life to Begin and KNOW that I SOUND NOTHING LIKE THAT.  She sings it a whole step higher than me and she's an icon...that is all.

And We're Back!

Today was the audition for the national tour of A Chorus Line. The national tour has been running equity for the past couple of years, but will soon be turning non-eq, presumably to save money. So today Binder Casting held an open non-equity call for female dancers.

With the call scheduled to start at 10:30, I arrived at 9:15 and had the pleasure of being #159. Joy. Luckily they started early and they decided to type. Now, typing is when a large group of guys/girls go into the room at the same time, and the casting director or choreographer, will have them do something simple (like turns) and then make a cut. Often times they are just looking for basic technique and more importantly the "look" of the characters they are casting.

Anyways, they took groups of 35 girls in at a time, and after waiting about an hour my group went in the room. Of course who should be in the room running the audition? The one and only Baayork Lee (see photo)! She is THE ORIGINAL Connie in A Chorus Line and she is just ridiculously amazing. As soon as we got in the room she just started walking up to people saying "Don't wear shorts to an audition!" "You need more lipstick" "You need more makeup!" It was hilarious and not done in a mean way at all, just very matter of fact. I could tell at that moment that this was going to be very interesting. So Ms. Baayork lines all of us up and then one by one we do double pirouettes(turns) on both the right and left side and that was it! The first cut was made and Ms. Lee tells all of us on the way out, "If you got cut, get to ballet class!"

I was kept to the next round and had to wait around for another 90 min to two hours to dance again. This time we learned the combination that Chorus Line was known for, I Hope I get It (Full Combo Starts at 1:03) It was a shortened version, but it was fast, sharp, and had to be very precise. Ms. Lee wanted hands in an exact spot and stated that she wanted the combination done exactly as she showed it, no variations. Several times while going through it, she would say "I'm teaching this too fast, you all are not getting it!" It was never intimidating though, it just made you want to work harder. After finally getting the combination we had to do the combination two at a time across the floor, just to tire you out and then you had to do it two at a time for the actual audition. There was so much energy in the room it was just amazing! When it was my turn to dance across the floor I tried to make sure that I hit every count and really perform it with the intensity it needed and I made the next cut.

Crazily enough the day was still not over, we were all told to come back at 4pm to sing. Oh singing, my arch nemesis, why must you rear your ugly head ALL the time? Now I had picked a song to sing with my voice teacher because I had been intending to go for Sheila. Now Sheila is an older Broadway vet auditioning for the Chorus and she has quite a bit of attitude. She is the first singer in At the Ballet. So I sang a song with more "gravitas" as my teacher would say and after all that prepping and planning the casting director asks me if I can sing something else!..."something a little lighter" So I pick my go to Waiting for Life and all I get is a "Thank you, have a good day". Crap. I've been cut. Really? Really? For once I thought I didn't do too bad and still nothing.

Ah well, despite being there from 9:15am to 5:30pm, and receiving nothing, I did get to spend the day with an awesome lady AND I obviously didn't sing too bad since they wanted to hear me sing some more. So I'll keep going back to the drawing board until I find something that works.

Catch Me if You Can

The new trend on Broadway is turning popular movies into musicals and today's audition was no different. The Leonardo Dicaprio movie Catch Me if You Can is coming to Broadway and has been previewed in Seattle's 5th avenue theater. The audition was held yesterday and it was crazy in there! The call was at 10 am, and the monitor basically shooed all the non-eq girls out into the hallway where we had to wait just to find out if we would even be seen for the day. At ten he announced that we were to all "go away" until 12:30pm. Now, I had gotten there at 9:30 so waiting for three hours was highly unappetizing and I didn't have anywhere to go in midtown anyways. So a friend and I went upstairs to the 2nd floor of the audition studio and just hung out for 2.5 hours. If I'd have been by myself I know I would have taken my little tushie right on back home.

Now I have learned that hanging around no matter what the monitor (guy/girl who is running the waiting room) says is key when you are a non-eq. When he first made his announcement he said that they would probably only see the first twenty non-eqs at 12:30 and I was number 78, but I stuck it out until 12:30 and guess what? They saw all of us! This was so nice of them because they really didn't have to do that and I am grateful that they were willing to go that extra mile. Especially when 136 equity girls alone had shown up for the call! Just proof that if you really want to get seen, you hang in there until they close the door in your face.

Since, we were non-equity there really are no rules for how they hold our auditions. So they bring all 75+ of us into the room at the same time!!!!! And guess who is there?? The one and only Jerry Mitchell (pic)! Mr. Mitchell is an award winning choreographer who worked on Legally Blonde , La Cage Aux Follies, Hairspray, and a multitude of other shows many of which are on Broadway. Anyways, here he is in person teaching us the choreography for his show! The material was really simple, he and his assistants taught us 4:8counts which included the Charleston (Thank you Miss Tauna!) and dancing pretending we had a hat on our head. All 75 girls went through the combination twice, then Mr. Mitchell broke us up into five groups of fifteen and each group got to run the combo once. Then as each group went through it for the second time he hand picked girls to go stand to the side. Surprise!!! This was the audition. I think a lot of people were shocked! Personally, I think that I gave it my all, but I was not hand picked....(frown face). Anyways, the girls the girls that were kept, stayed behind and learned some more of the combination and then a few of them were told about callbacks.

I think there is a twofold lesson to be had in all this. One, stick around no matter what the monitor says if you REALLY want to be seen and Two, when you are learning/practicing a combo in the audition room always remember that its part of the audition too! Not just when its three at a time and they have your headshot in front of them!

Overall, it was a long day (3.5 hours waiting) for 15 mins of time in front of Jerry Mitchell, but no complaints. Hopefully I can impress him on Monday at the Legally Blonde auditions!!!!!!

Sometimes it doesn't work out.

Tuesday, was the day of auditions for Elf the musical. Never heard of it before??? Well thats because somewhere, someone decided that this movie, yes the one starring Will Ferrell would be great to bring to Broadway. Now, don't shoot me, but I don't like Will Ferrell movies and I didn't really care for the movie, but I was interested to see what kind of dancing they would actually need for this show since the chorus call was for "comedic" dancers.

The call was at 10am, words can't express how much I hate 10am calls since I have to get there hideously early as a non-eq. But Tuesday of course I get out of the apartment late and don't get down to the audition until about 9:45. The place is packed! Whoever was running the audition had reserved the smallest holding room ever and dancers were spilled out of the room, lining both sides of the hallways all the way down the corridor. Utter ridiculousness. Expecting to be #100+ on the non-equity list I fight my way through the hoards and get to the list to find multiple blanks spots at the top of the list even though the rest of the list was filled in past 100. Apparently when the official list was created from the unofficial list (hard to explain) some people weren't there to transpose their own name so the spots were left open...and since they never returned the monitor (who runs the audition) said anyone could put their name down so I was #21!!! Awesome.

I head down the hallway to find somewhere to sit and put on my makeup (I hate makeup...) and about 20 min later the monitor comes out and announces....??? They're not going to see any non-equity girls!!!!!!!!!!! Sigh....I had been having so much luck getting seen at auditions that this was a possibility, but alas I wouldn't even get a chance.

At first, I wasn't even going to write about this because I felt people wanted to hear about my experiences at auditions dancewise. But then I decided that getting turned away is part of it too sometimes and I have just been lucky so far that this hasn't really happened to me yet, but I'm sure this will be the first of many to come until I get that equity card.

Welcom to Duloc.....now get out!

Yesterday I went to the equity chorus call for the Broadway musical Shrek and I got there an hour early! Go Me! But I was still number #86 on the non-equity list. I take my seat in the waiting area and the boys, who auditioned earlier in the day, begin filtering in all sweaty from their audition and it quickly becomes known that they are not keeping anyone after the first round and that means they are not really looking for anyone as they have no openings.

How is it that they are having auditions when they don't need any dancers? Well, being an equity employer all Broadway shows are required to hold auditions twice a year, regardless of whether they have any openings or not. AWESOME......its like going through interviews for a new job, several of them, only to be told at the end that they like you but they don't have the headcount to hire you.

Now after hearing this news, I began to contemplate leaving as there were 150+ girls there and since I get seen last I'd be waiting for hours. However, I had nothing to do anyways so I decided to wait. After waiting four hours....thats right FOUR hours, I finally get to go in and learn the combination which is a little snippet of the Duloc Number starring Lord Farquaad himself. The number was very character specific. Given that Lord Farquaad is an ego maniac, we the citizens of his town were expected to perform in these great musical numbers he wanted, however, we were terrified of being dismembered if we messed up. So we were supposed to have forced smiles with a look of fear in our eyes. It was ridiculously hard to do.

Now on the opposite side of things the dancing itself was....eehh. Insanely easy and definitely not for a dancer dancer. I could tell immediately that this was not the kind of show I would want to be doing 6 days a week. Nonetheless I put on my best forced smile and go out and perform for the choreographers. But like I thought, they don't make any cuts they just thank everyone for their time and we are free to go.

So am I glad that I wasted a whole day for nothing? Yes and no. On one hand I'm sure there was something more productive I could have been doing, but the other side of it is that I now know for sure, that I would not want to be in Shrek ever! Yay for revelations!

Over and out.....National Tour of Hairspray on Friday!