One Audition Down!

Well, today was audition number one: Wheelock Family Theatre! How did it go? WHO FUCKING KNOWS! No, but seriously, pretty good I thought. Here's a play by play; the last few auditions I've gone on, I've been a few minutes late. In the past, it hasn't seemed like that big of a deal, time slots felt like they were pretty loose at the auditions I was going on locally. But at these two, and at one in particular where I got what came close to being a hard time when I was there right smack on my time slot but wanted a minute to look over a side and the producer or auditor or whoever was like "well you know your time slot is for 3:30 and I can give you a minute but you'll have less time in the room" so I was like "OK let's just do it, that's fine". For me, personally, as long as I roughly know what the play is about I don't find that having an extended period of time with a piece affects my cold reading skills since... it's a cold reading. Your basically making it up as you go along and trying to follow your instincts and a few additional moments with the words, for me anyway, doesn't have much bearing on my ability to do that. Anyway, since none of the postings or correspondence I'd gotten said any different, I kind of figured I would be reading a side for this audition, and hadn't thought about a monologue. I had skimmed the play, the parts pertaining to my potential character particularly, and sort of knew what his deal was. Did I mention the play is the Miracle Worker, and the character the older half brother of Helen? Anyway, I was determined to be early for this one, my appointment was for 4:50 and I got to the green line platform at Park St around 4, a D train came a few minutes later and I was on my way to the Longwood T stop, a few minutes from the theatre. Except then the train went out of service at Fenway, a stop away from Longwood, I consulted my Iphone and decided the quickest thing was just to walk from there since it's basically the same distance and I would avoid getting a new train and going just one stop on it. Thank god for my Iphone, by the way, because I have a terrible sense of direction. I'm pretty good at following directions, and I've used Google Maps a hundred times to find a hundred different auditions, potential apartments, restaurants, stores, etc. Taking a different T-stop, I got a little turned around in the Fends, but found my way to the theatre at about 4:35, 4:40 and was brought in early. You see, they had slotted ten minutes per person, but they wanted a monologue. I assume it was a monologue, and not two, since they had never specified when I got up on stage I heard a "whenever your ready" from the director and said "Oh? You want a monologue? OK this is from The Glass Menagerie" and launched into Tom's speech to his mother. Mind you I was completely unprepared, still a little sniffly, my throat a little parched and my hands still thawing from the cold, but I've done that piece so many times I can basically pull it out of thin air and that's what I did. I gave it a solid beat of silence at the end, then turned to the auditors who seemed to be nodding and saying "yeah, pretty good" (subtext: for someone who didn't know they would be doing a monologue) and they said their "thank you, we'll let you know either way, might be a call back later" schpeel. And that was that!

In other news, reviews have started coming in for Uncle Vanya. If you read blog posts I don't link to from Facebook, then you might have seen one I wrote about secretly wishing in the back of my ego to have a reviewer comment on the effect of my guitar playing in our show. Well, right after I wrote that, I encountered Larry Stark's review on his Boston theatre website Theatre Mirror and this is from the beginning of the review: "Take for instance Mike Handleman playing a house-servant, with no lines to speak of. He turns up in several scenes, fetching things, but mostly learning to play a guitar. But when the farm's overseer comes in, the guilty snap with which he jumps up and bows, doffing his cap, defines not only him but an entire society." Hey! A positive notice! In a review! Of a play where I had next to no lines! This is a legitimate first for me. And it made me feel pretty proud. It doesn't reference the guitar playing as doing anything in particular, but it's cool that a little moment I came up with made that kind of an impression.

Larry's review as a whole was especially glowing, and so far all the press has been positive. The Globe review did not mention me by name which is fine, and felt to me... I don't know, kind of contrarian, the reviewer took issue with the translation (which I think is pretty good) and a few performances (which I also think are good) but hey, critics are critics. So far all the shows are selling out and audiences are enjoying themselves, and that's what matters.