Still struggling with the monologue for Stonehenge, but I put my 1950s Mafia widow into a different outfit and it made a huge improvement in my delivery. Initially I put on a loose, floral print dress, beige cardigan, low-heeled shoes, drop earrings - what I thought looked vaguely “Italian.”  Trouble was, the dress kept gaping at the buttons down the front when I sat down and the beige washed me out and I just felt uncomfortable. 

And if you feel uncomfortable nothing works. 

So I decided that there’s nothing in the script that necessarily says this woman is a frump and radically changed her look to something more upscale – high heels, black pencil skirt, black/gray sweater, black/white polka dot scarf, double strand of pearls, button earrings.  The pearls still say 1950s.  The monologue went much better.

So, we’ll see how it goes on Sunday.  This may be my last Stonehenge audition. The one I did in June has been very helpful in getting some big roles in small, non-union productions, but I’m hoping to join one of the unions in February and that will change what kinds of work I can accept. 

For now I’m just happy to be making progress toward my goal of having 10-12 significant on-camera roles by the end of the year so that I can put together a decent demo. 

So far I have 8.  I’ve played (or will soon play) a police detective dealing with a hostage situation, an elderly widow with a late-night visitor from her past, the mother of a troubled teen, a grandmother holding a family together after the death of her daughter, a corporate executive regretting her life choices, and a judge who must rule on a man’s sanity.  All dramas.  I’ve also been a hotel gift shop clerk and shopping mall information officer in two industrials and was the telephone voice of a kidnapper in another short film (good roles, but still up in the air as to whether I work those into the demo.)  

Somewhere in all of that has to be three minutes of good face time.  I might even use a few seconds from the Stonehenge auditions, if it makes sense to do that. Then I’ll need to find a video editor who will work with me to achieve exactly what I want.   No standard-issue demo. I’m a contrarian.