With a truly terrible year past me, I was looking for some improvement in the fall of 1983. I actually got it, and it was a lot better than I expected.
I auditioned for "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and was cast as Tom Snout. At the time, I thought that it was a great way to start the season by producing a play with a huge cast. It got more new students involved and excited about being in the department, even if they were only cast as extras. The opening play my freshman year only had six characters in it. Compound that with the fact that no freshmen were in the initial cast of the second production made me wonder if anybody really paid any attention to the freshmen. Well, yes they did, but that spotlight never shined on me.
I thought I was on a pretty good roll with "Dream." But that came to a stop with "The Elephant Man." Both of the plays in the fall semester were directed by Dr. R. For the audition, we gathered around in a circle on the stage. He started with us doing movement improvisations. He gave us these pieces of paper, each with one word on them and we were supposed to embody the word each of us were given. He started with two actors. They slowly worked their way toward each other and performed this dazzling fluid piece in which their bodies swayed back and forth between each other. It turned out that their words were "salt" and "water," of which they were not aware of the other actor's word.
Because that took up so much time, Dr. R started putting us in groups of six. My word was "comforter." I don't know what I was supposed to do with that, so I just lied on the floor and moved from side to side. One of the actors crawled over me. That was the extent of my audition. (I should note that if I had been in Dr. R's Beginning Acting class the previous year, I would have known what to do to interact with everyone else.)
After that, he had us do cold readings from the script. He called each actor to come up, EXCEPT FOR ME! (Probably because I didn't do anything during the physical improv.) But I did blow a chance to read. At one point, one of the actors forgot who was supposed to play John Merrick and pulled me up off the floor. In an awkward moment, I pointed at the actor who was supposed to read. Now, if I'd known Dr. R wasn't going to call me up, I would had just gone ahead and started auditioning, even though I knew full well there was no way I was going to get to play John Merrick. In fact, I hadn't even prepared a voice to read for the part, so it was better for me that I didn't commandeer the audition. I would have looked like an even worse actor in front of Dr. R.
I honestly didn't know what I was supposed to do to be considered for the cast. Should I have gone up to him afterward and told him I didn't get to read? Should I have asked to be part of the call back so I would get a chance? Should I risk the chance of him telling me I just was not a good enough actor to even be considered? I just did nothing. Even if I had done something, I still doubt I would have been cast. Those two actors who did the "salt" and "water" piece didn't get cast, either, so it wasn't like I was the only one who came up short. I had hoped he would have realized what happened and invited me to the callbacks, but that didn't happen, either.
However, I did get to do the lighting design for the production. It was very challenging and a lot of fun to put together. Chud got to design the set, so this marked one of many occasions in which we were able to collaborate on projects.
But the whole issue of that audition left a bad taste in my mouth. I started thinking that maybe the problem was that I wasn't really committing myself to the department. I took a look at my degree plan and saw that I would have enough room to declare Theatre as a second major AND I would be able to graduate in December of 1985 instead of May 1986. I went down to the Adminstration building and made the change. I would discover a couple of years later that it didn't really make that much of a difference, except that I could put on a resume that I had a degree in Theatre.
The Evening of One Acts was a go that year. I was cast in "Asylum." I played Chuckles the Wonder Dog. I have to admit that this was the most perfect performance I have ever been a part of. Even Dr. R said he was blown away by our presentation. The only problem was that no one did any publicity for the show, so we only had 35 people show up. That means the Theatre fraternity only collected $35. However, one of the other directors complained that he paid money out of his own pocket to build his sets (which no one asked him to) and demanded that he be compensated. I should note that the director was married and already had a child, so this actually created a hardship for him. The fraternity wound up giving him the $35.
Even though I was one of the better singers in the Theatre Department, I was not initially cast in "The King and I." As I mentioned before, I asked Dr. W if I could play one of the priests. He let me. There were only two of us playing priests. I was glad to be cast in another show. However, I would like to point out that a couple of our A-listers who were up for the lead role were cast as guards. Both of them got mad about the outcome and quit the production. A couple of wimpy-looking guys filled in as guards. And on top of that, they had to run around on stage without their shirts on. They were NOT menacing. We shouldn't have even bothered with guards.
The final mainstage show of the season was "Deathtrap." Mr. H directed it. Even though there are only five characters in it, I got cast as Porter Milgrim. I was finally getting my chance in the spotlight. But it was hard to enjoy because there was another actor in the running for the part. We were both in the callbacks. He claimed there was a battle between Mr. H to have him in "Deathtrap" and Ms. C to have him in her children's theatre production. According to him, he was supposed to be in "Deathtrap," but Ms. C won. While I didn't believe it, it still didn't feel good to hear.
The only other thing about this production is that it set off a bizarre series of castings over the next two years in which my character didn't show up until the second act. The nice thing about this was that I didn't have to do my make up and costume at the same as everyone else. While I would show up at the same time, all I had to do was wait for everyone to clear out so I could do my stuff.
I ended yesterday's post with my ruminitions on my Beginning Acting class with Ms. C. During the fall semester, I took Intermediate Acting. Finally, I had a performance-based class with Dr. R. I was looking forward to playing some much-needed catch-up with my peers. However, on the first day, Dr. R announced that the class would not be like Beginning Acting, in which the participants got all touchy-feely. He said we would learn to work more with our bodies in this class. My first thought was, "No! I'm now going to be three steps behind everyone else." I really felt like I would never be able to reach the level of artistry that I desired. To be honest, I never really did.
But all and all, this was an otherwise great year for my involvement in Theatre. I felt like it more than made up for the cruddy freshman year I experienced. But that feeling wouldn't last forever.
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