Top Ten No-Holds-Barred Audition Tips

posted by Melissa on Tue, Jan 8, 2008
in Making Theatre

[Note: this piece first ran last year, but since it was so popular, and since the TBA Generals are this weekend, we thought we'd run it again. Enjoy.]

Actors deserve to know the truth about what casting directors and directors think about their auditions. Speaking as someone who's watched hundreds (if not thousands) of actors audition over the years, I have seen a lot of great auditions and a lot of crappy ones, and despite the amount of audition workshops going on in the world, for some strange reason lots and lots and LOTS of actors make the same, easily avoided mistakes. I have no desire to be less than fully honest or to pull punches here, so here's what I think -- NO HOLDS BARRED.

Here are my top ten audition tips. They're not in any particular order. Just follow them all as if they are the WORD OF GOD. ;-)

For the auditioner, every audition is a set of problems that needs to be solved. If you're casting, oh, I don't know, say, Measure for Measure, you have a minimum of 13 problems that need to be solved -- 13 parts that need filling. Each and every person who walks through that door is a potential solution to one of your problems, and trust me, all casting directors are rooting for you hardcore because of that. There's no adversarial relationship here -- quite the opposite! These tips are here to help you avoid disappointing a casting director who wants you to kick ass. Remember: When you're offered a part, the director is essentially inviting you into her theatre home and into her life for a minimum of a month. Make sure that you are presenting your most professional, talented, put together, sane, and reliable self.

1. When you make your audition appointment, be polite.
Seriously. There's no way of knowing if the person on the other end of the phone or email is an intern or is the casting director herself, and either way, you must know, if you think about it for even five seconds, that we gossip about this or that actor who was a dick on the phone. Be a dick to an intern and five minutes later that intern and the casting director are laughing about it in her office. This also goes for every professional minute you spend as an actor. Casting directors and ADs in this area do talk to each other, and if you act like a diva or an asshole or an irresponsible flake for your three months of rehearsals and performances at one theatre, I wouldn't be surprised every other theatre in town knew about it by the next TBA event.

FUN FACT! Some bitch cut me off and took my parking space as I was on my way to La Val's for auditions a few years back, and guess who was my first audition? Mm-hm. Be nice, even in the parking lot.

2. Dress appropriately.
By this I mean that you should wear something clean and comfortable. You don't have to wear something uber-dressy, but you should look presentable. You should not look like you just tumbled out of some strange bed in the Castro and barely managed to get on BART in time. You should wear something that makes you feel like hot shit. You should wear something you don't have to fuss with every five seconds. You don't want to be pulling down your jacket or futzing with your sleeves every three seconds, because then we'll start to watch that instead of watching you. For this same reason, you shouldn't dress like a ho. I don't want to stare at your cleavage or the edge of your ass hanging out of your skirt, so don't make me. I'm as straight as every other straight woman in the world (so, like, um 84.5%, right?) but when you dress like Jenna Jameson on the red carpet at the AVN Awards, pretty much all anyone will notice is your outfit. That finely-tuned Rosalind goes right out the window. Also, please do not wear something "costumey." While an audition is indeed a type of performance, it is first and foremost a job interview. If you wear something that looks as if it is intended to costume your monologue, we will assume you are at least borderline insane.

FUN FACT! This woman came to audition for me once straight after her workout. She was sweaty and yucky in workout clothes. I am serious as a heart attack. I was like, WTF? You couldn't even throw some street clothes on for me?

3. Do a monologue that you've rehearsed and that you're familiar with.
I'd MUCH rather see something that's tonally slightly off the mark of the play for which I'm auditioning people than something that matches perfectly but that you threw together earlier in the week. Under-rehearsed monologues always, always, always look like shit. I don't mind so much when people ask to start over -- everyone freaks out sometimes and needs a do-over -- but an under-rehearsed monologue always has bland choices, blank spots where you're hunting for lines, unmotivated pauses -- pretty much everything you come to expect from things that are under-rehearsed. I know you think you can totally pull it off, and maybe you can, but you'd be in the vast minority. Be mindful of the difference between doing it in front of the bathroom mirror and the pressure of doing it in front of the auditioners.

FUN FACT! One woman came in so under-rehearsed she didn't even know her fucking LINES. She whipped a piece of paper out of her pocket halfway through and READ her monologue. I thought to myself: If she clearly can't prep for an audition, there's no way I can rely on her to be prepped for rehearsals and performances.

4. No, you can't "use" me.
Don't look at me. Don't EVER look directly at the auditioners. It makes us uncomfortable and that's the last thing you want because then we stop thinking about you and your monologue and become fully absorbed in the fact that you're fucking STARING AT US. You place your mark over the auditioners' heads. And for the love of God, please face forward so everyone in the room can see you. No, you can't do your audition to an empty chair SL or in complete profile SR and look professional. You will look like a noob and we will make fun of you later. That is the sad fact of it. It's not necessarily a dealbreaker so don't freak out if you just did exactly that at the TBA Generals -- if you kicked ass but looked like a noob you might still get a callback or two from some of the 50% of the people there who could actually see your dumb ass -- just learn your lesson and never do it again.

FUN FACT! At the TBA Generals one year, a woman delivered her entire monologue to an empty chair UPSTAGE LEFT. Her ass was pointing directly at A.C.T. (Meryl Lind Shaw) and Berkeley Rep (Amy Potozkin). Nice going, dipshit. Plus she screamed the entire piece at the top of her lungs like it was breakthrough day in group therapy. Which brings me to:

5. Make bold, interesting, but sane choices.
New actors tend to make bland, boring choices in audition monologues. I think y'all are afraid of bold choices because they'll lock you into one "type" or another, and you want to be seen as awesome AND awesome for any and all roles. However, all you've shown me is that you're bland and boring. Make bold and interesting choices! Show me your chops! On the flip side, don't make insane choices. Lots of screaming, lots of bizarre movement (unless you're auditioning specifically for a movement-oriented piece), and lots of unmotivated maniacal laughter are unwelcome. And by "unwelcome" I mean we assume that you're, again, at least borderline insane. Also, please don't bring props. I know it seems like a very logical thing to do, but for some reason everyone assumes that you're insane or at the very least a huge noob if you bring one. It's just not done.

FUN FACT! A woman did a monologue at the TBA Generals a few years back and, right at the end, WHIPPED OUT A GUN. Luckily, she was someone who had worked in the area a bit and who had already proven herself to be at least passably sane to some degree, but whipping out a prop -- especially a prop firearm -- put her directly into my "Only in Case of Emergency" file.

6. Choose your audition pieces wisely.
Because all your audition pieces need to be well-rehearsed, you should always be in the process of stocking your arsenal of pieces. At the very least, you need one comic contemp, one dramatic contemp, one comic Shakes, and one dramatic Shakes. I know we all say "classic" instead of "Shakespeare," but it's hard to find good classic monologues that are NOT by your friend and mine the immortal bard of Stratford-upon-Avon. I have a PhD in this shit and even I do not want to sit through a monologue from Tamburlaine or The Spanish Tragedy. Good non-Shakes classic monologues do indeed exist (*coughEdwardIIcough*), but they take some effort to find, especially for the ladies. Anyhoo, you want at least those four, and you really want at least two more that focus on your desired area of specialization, whether that's period-specific, type-specific, or what have you.

In addition, when you choose your audition pieces bear a few things in mind: Most auditioners have no idea who you are, and our only real taste of you is in your audition. Try to avoid choosing pieces that, while potentially awesome in a performance situation, could be unsettling in a monologue situation. I understand that this sounds unfair, but life is unfair, bubbeleh. Yes, a monologue that is too creepy or insane will make you look creepy and insane unless your contrasting piece is so completely contrasting that we are convinced that you're not planning to shiv us after rehearsal one night. Also, exceptions are very well-known monologues like all of Shakes, etc. Creep it out with your Shakes, no worries, but if you come in doing as your only audition piece a monologue wherein your character contemplates killing an infant (true story) you're not getting a callback and then we talk later about how creepy and weird you were.

Also, beware of monologues with lots of overt sexual talk and/or swearing. Many auditioners, including myself, don't mind that at all, but many do, and who they are would surprise you. If you make your auditioner uncomfortable, your auditioner is no longer paying attention to you and your monologue, no matter how kickass it is.

FUN FACT! A local AD told me on break during the TBA Generals one year that monologues with lots of swearing and sex talk make him excessively uncomfortable. Knowing his theatre and the work they do, this greatly surprised me. I gave him a bunch of shit about it, and then we went back in to see the next group of actors. Lo and behold, the very first guy's monologue started with something super extreme, like, "She had my cock in her mouth" and I looked laughingly over my shoulder at this AD and he just had his head in his hands. Needless to say, neither one of us paid any attention to this guy's monologue -- I was having too much fun watching my buddy squirm and he was too busy squirming.

7. Beware of the classic pitfalls everyone else warns you about.
I'm no exception.

• DO NOT do an accent unless the play you're auditioning for specifically calls for it. Enough of a percentage of your brain will be engaged in performing the accent correctly that your performance will suffer. Either your acting will suffer, or your accent will lose its luster halfway through, or both. A lot of auditioners talk about how they sigh wearily to themselves whenever someone busts out a southern accent -- unless the play calls for it.

  FUN FACT! I have a real ear for accents, so I can hear instantly whether or not someone's fake accent is up to snuff or not. I'm kind of persnickety and Henry Higgins about it, so I will spend an inordinate amount of time stressing over someone's vowel shapings and miss the monologue entirely. I understand that I am a huge dork, but there are more like me out there. So unless you're Meryl Streep, on the real, no accents.

• Please avoid the monologues that are ludicrously overdone. I realize that this is subjective to the individual auditioner, but by and large, all your standard lists are generally applicable -- No Durang tuna fish monologue, no Laundry and Bourbon, no A...My Name is Alice.
  
• Also, never do a self-written monologue. Even if you're the next Spalding Gray or Marga Gomez, a self-written monologue tells me exactly nothing about how you would handle standard material. It's simply beside the point of an audition.

8. Know WTF you're talking about.
Please don't come in pronouncing words incorrectly. Read the entire play if at all possible -- if the play is unpublished, you can bet there is something about it somewhere online, and google is your friend. Even a crappy review from six years ago can tell you valuable information about the play's tone, about the characters, etc. Make sure the monologue you're doing isn't a POS that gets its facts wrong, particularly if you got it from one of those "1001 Monologues" books. Again, these are the kinds of things that pull auditioners out of your monologue and makes you look like a huge dumbass.

FUN FACT! OK, I have two.

1: I judged a high school Shakes contest once upon a time and two girls did the Willow scene from Othello -- as SLAPSTICK COMEDY. I wish this was an exaggeration or a downright lie, but it's on the real. Clearly they had not read the play, heard of the play, or had any concept what their lines meant. It was a golden moment of asshattery.

2: I had a hip replacement about two years ago. I have congenital hip dysplasia like a German shepherd, and instead of putting me down (my recommendation, seconded enthusiastically by Kaiser), my surgeon gave me a shiny new titanium and ceramic hip joint. So let's just say I know a thing or two about hip replacements. Well, this guy wanders in to the TBA Generals sporting a monologue about hip replacement surgery that is completely, wildly inaccurate. The actor wasn't bad, but I was annoyed and distracted.

9. Bring a good resume and headshot.
Some places, like Impact, are cool with xeroxed headshots, but most dislike them. The reason why you want to bring a real headshot to auditions is simple -- many if not most of us file headshots in a filing cabinet, and the thinner, xeroxed headshots sometimes can hide between two thicker paper ones as we're rooting through the "Women G-J" file. Please make sure your resume conforms to standard. Check out examples online -- lots of actors have websites now and their resumes are posted for all to see. Check out Patrick Alparone's website for one good one. (Hi, Patrick!) You'll see a very well-formatted resume with everything an auditioner could want on there. Too many actors leave off their most recent email address, the names of directors or the names of the theatre companies. Please also make sure that you have the name of the producing company, not the venue. La Val's Subterranean Theatre and EXIT Theatre are venues, not theatre companies. Finally, make sure that everything on your resume is spelled correctly.

FUN FACT! An actor I had worked with previously came to audition for me with a resume that was a ridiculous MESS. The formatting looked like fried ass and there were spelling errors everywhere. The best part was that my own name was spelled incorrectly. Nice touch.

10. Exude confidence.
Don't apologize for being there, either verbally or by the way you present yourself. Even if you fuck up and need to start over, be confident. KNOW that we are on your side and want you to succeed!

All right, actors -- go out there and kick some ASS!