Making it through another open call audition

God, I hate this: 132 actors, each with exactly two minutes to convince 45 casting agents, directors, and producers that they're worth a second look. Everyone's nerves are on edge.  Some actors pace.  Some mouth their monologue and gesture to the wall. The veterans lean back in their chairs and close their eyes and hope their hearts stop pounding.

A few years ago when they staged a revival of A Chorus Line on Broadway, they put out an open call for cast.  More than 3,000 actors showed up in a line that stretched for blocks.  The auditions went on for months as the director winnowed the applicants down.  The actors kept coming back and coming back and giving it their all.  I caught that show. It was fantastic. But for all they went through, I can't recall the name of a single member of the cast.  Another reason it's tough to work on Broadway.

This line was not that long. They took us in in groups of 20 or so, all types, all ages. In my group there was one lovely little girl of 9 or 10 with long brown hair whose little knees were knocking together so hard.  I wanted to put my arms around her and tell her she was going to do wonderfully well, but I doubted somehow that my words would sound sufficiently convincing. As it was I just tried to smile at her reassuringly.  I do hope she was there because she desperately wants to be an actress.  She was such a sweet-looking little thing.  There should be a rule that children go first, so they don't have to suffer so.

How did I do?  Okay, despite my own knees feeling decidedly wobbly. It is rare that I wow myself - I'm much too tough a critic for that - but I did okay.  I looked fabulous.  We'll see if something comes of it.  Fingers crossed.

A better take on Anna Karenina

There's a full-page ad for Keira Knightley's Anna Karenina in today's New York Times.  I never cared for Tolstoy's story.  I remember reading it years ago and thinking the title character was a foolish addle-brain who was married to a perfectly decent man, blamed everyone else for the muddle she made of her life, and took far too long to finally throw herself under the train.  I somehow doubt that this version is going to change my mind.

a.k.a. One Woman's Story

But I saw a 1949 British film on television some time back that was a new and much more satisfying twist on the same story.  I was so enchanted I bought it.  The film is called The Passionate Friends and was released in the United States under the title One Woman's Story.  It stars Claude Rains as the husband and Ann Todd as the silly wife, straddling the fence between a secure if predictable life and a marvelous romance (that exists largely in her head as it turns out) with a professor, played by Trevor Howard (who was such a rock-solid actor in so many films.)

The ending is wonderful.  The fantasy romance becomes a public scandal (remember those?)  Todd realizes the professor actually doesn't love her, he loves his wife, and she has now put his life in turmoil. Claude Rains tells her off, says he doesn't want her anymore, then recants, says she's wounded him to the core, and that he loves her dearly.  But before he gets to that last point, she has slipped out of the room. In a daze and feeling rejected and ashamed (remember that?), she staggers down a darkened street and into an underground subway station.  She is clearly going to throw herself under the train.  She teeters, the toes of her shoes on the edge of the platform.  There's a rush of wind as the train emerges from the tunnel, she closes her eyes and begins to fall forward....and Claude Rains catches her in his arms.

Hey! It's a chick flick!

I'm watching The Ides of March this evening and doing a bit of on-line research for the short film that I'm shooting next weekend.  But after that I think I'll sit back and watch The Passionate Friends.  I like romance....

Daniel Day-Lewis on playing Lincoln

I'm off today to a gem and jewelry show and an elegant lunch at a posh hotel....a rare treat.  But before I go I want to mention a terrific article in today's New York Times on Daniel Day-Lewis and his role in Steven Spielberg's Lincoln, which was shot down in Richmond, Virginia, last fall. (Being neither male nor petite, I had not the slimmest chance at a part, but a few of my actor friends had roles.)

Daniel Day-Lewis

The article is "Abe Lincoln as You've Never Heard Him," and it reveals Day-Lewis' total immersion technique for getting in character.  It is fascinating.  He begins with a ton of reading to develop a foundation for the role, particularly if it's a biographical film, as this one is.  But then he works to become so in-character that he can allow himself to believe for a time that he is, in fact, that person.  He doesn't go out of character during the many weeks of filming, and sometimes for a period afterward.

If any actor has the guts to try it, I think it's a do-able approach that can add a great deal of depth to a performance.  You just have to be prepared to warn the other cast members in advance (so they don't start chatting you up about last night's hockey game) and to put up with snickers from the crew.  But the payoff could be a jaw-dropping performance.

Choosing your acting resources

David Suchet quoting Stanislavsky: If you speak any lines or do anything mechanically without fully realizing who you are, where you come from, why, what you want , where you are going, and what you will do when you get there you will be acting without imagination.

Or, what is your motivation.

You must listen to the words and understand the feelings of other characters. Be specific. Understand where the emotion is coming from.  Make your response fresh.

I am watching this evening John Barton and the Royal Shakespeare Company in Playing Shakespeare, a set of four 1984 DVDs available through Netflix, which I have just put on my Wish List for Christmas.  It's wonderful just listening to the discussion and watching such incredible actors - Ben Kingsley, Ian McKellan, Judi Dench, Patrick Stewart, Suchet, and a host of others - in a workshop that I could never afford to attend in person. An actor is learning his craft constantly.  But you can spend hundreds – no, thousands – of dollars on local workshops and classes given by far lesser lights than Royal Shakespeare who take those same few lines above and stretch them into 6 weeks of pure muddle.

So why do we do that when there is such a rich trove of resources on DVD and in books?  I have begun to question that. 

Another film, another role

Going over my script today at La Tomate on Connecticut Avenue in DC, preparing for a meeting with the writer/director of a short film that starts shooting the 9th.  It appears I got the role, playing a corrupt Senator.  It's a meaty part.  Two days of rehearsals and three days of filming.

I also have an open call stage audition on Monday in front of 50 or so area stage directors, so this weekend will be spent practicing my monologue for that.  Then full attention to the film.

Now if I can just stop eating the leftover Halloween candy. (sigh) I am so bad.

I'm in two entries in the New York Television Festival!

The play just wrapped and I'm back to my first love, film.   I just found out that I'm in two entries in the New York Television Festival, October 22-27.  One is The Louder the Better, written and directed by Michael Toscano, about a radio talk show host succumbing to the greed and immorality of a national network (I play the network executive, natch.) TLTB took Faculty Honors at the Columbia University Film Festival back in May and has been accepted in the Independent Pilot Competition at NYTVF. The other entry is Capitol South, written and directed by my friend Rob Raffety, which is a comedy about the underpaid twenty-somethings who work in congressional offices and political action committees and do much of the work in Washington. Capitol South is in the Samsung "Second Screen Storytellers" Contest at NYTVF and in it I play a foul-mouthed and frequently tipsy Southern Belle who's president of a conservative PAC called "Americans for America."  It's very funny.  In fact, all of Rob's videos are very funny.

As Delilah Jones in Capitol South

The Independent Pilot Competition has yielded a good number of successes apparently, both in shows being sold to networks and studios for further development as well as individual talent deals for artists to develop future projects at the network, production company and studio levels.  (It's certainly a good sign when it gets on the radar among those at Columbia University.)

The winner of Second Screen Storytellers gets a guaranteed production budget of $300,000 to create an original short series with accompanying second screen material. The winning selection and subsequent series will debut at the Consumer Electronics Show in 2013 and will then be exclusively distributed via Samsung Smart TVs and Galaxy devices.

Michael and Rob are great guys and I have my fingers crossed for them both. We'll know the outcome in a few weeks.  In the meantime, a few shots from the two productions.

With Charles Blatz in Capitol South

With Elliott Kashner and James Brady in The Louder the Better

The reviews are in!

"J.B." for American Century Theater is a confirmed success! Nice reviews at DCMetroTheaterArts and TalkinBroadway/DC.   Special thanks to the wildly perceptive drama blogger John Glass (DramaUrge) for noticing I was a standout in the ensemble. (Hah!)  Actually, over all of the reviews, I think everyone in cast got a plug, even the dog, Bela, a Mi-Ki who will soon need his own website.  Never appear with kids and dogs?  I'm appearing with both.  They're adorable.   More reviews are expected in the next few days.  

John Tweel, Loren Bray, and Kathryn Browning

Joshua Aaron Rosenblum, Joshua Dick, and Bela