Auditions For Dummies

Lest ye be misled by the title, this blog unfortunately isn't about how to succeed in auditions. This post is geared to Unscripted's non-actor readers and is an attempt to open a small window into what auditioning is like. It's a blog about auditioning for people who haven't experienced it and wonder why people who have hate it so much.

In short, auditioning is like a job interview. 

Even if you've never acted a day in your life, you've probably been on plenty of job interviews. If you're like 95 percent of people, job interviews make you want to throw up. There's lots of pressure, your career is at stake, you don't know what to expect, you wonder if you dressed appropriately, you are paranoid that you don't look the part, you don't know the people you're meeting, and you have no idea what they're looking for. It's the same with auditions.

Normally if you are going on the job interview circuit, it's a limited-time engagement. It's not something you do several times a week for months and years at a time (though unfortunately this has become more and more common during this recession). Eventually, you land a job and the agony of job interviews ends. Not so for actors.

Auditioning is a part of the actor's life. Only the top 1 percent or so of actors (the A-listers) no longer have to audition for roles.  The vast majority of actors must endure the auditioning process their entire careers. Just imagine going on job interviews several times a week for 5, 10, 20, or 40 years.

Sound fun?

Well, in case that's not appetizing enough, add to it the wrinkle that during this job interview, you are asked to perform one of the tasks required for the job. Your ability to perform that task determines whether you get the job or not. Now this may sound like a no-brainer. Of course you should be able to perform the task for the job for which you are applying! But let's put this in context.

Suppose you are a secretary applying for a job and they want to you to do a standard typing exercise that tabulates your words per minute and accuracy. You could normally do this in your sleep with one hand tied behind your back. But under the pressure of being in an interview setting with people watching your performance as it happens and judging you on it, all with the job hanging in the balance, most secretaries wouldn't be able to spell "flustered" without a dozen backspaces and a typo. Or suppose you're a carpenter and you're asked to nail one piece of wood to another. Under normal conditions, you could do this blindfolded in one powerful, facile swing. As an interview requirement, you'd probably leave with bloody fingers, having uttered several expletives. 

Now imagine that in this job interview, they not only ask you to perform the job under the intense pressure of them watching, they also film it so that they can review your work over and over again. This is what auditioning is like.

That is why actors hate auditioning. Some actors will say they love auditioning, that it's exciting and they look forward to it. If that were the case, then why is it that no actor in the history of acting has ever asked to audition for a role they didn't have to audition for? Ask any actor you know if they would prefer not to audition. I guarantee you the answers will be unanimous.

So what's the solution? How do we vet actors without making the process so debilitatingly nerve-racking? Winston Churchill said of government, "Democracy is the worst form of government except for all other forms that have been tried." I feel like the modern audition is the same. It's an egregious process, but the best option anyone's come up with to date.  

 

How do you feel about auditioning? Have you come up with any workable alternatives?

(photos courtesy of Getty Images)

-- Gabriel Voss

Comments

[Linda Fausnet]

I'm currently unemployed and can empathize! But you're right, to it's hopefully temporary for me...

[alfred]

i disagree.
Acting is the total opposite of a job interview.
a job interview requires a lot of unsure anxiety and a set of prepared answers.
auditioning is nothing like that.
at an audition you want to feel open and they cds' need you to be open and ready to take direction.
i've casted before for my own shorts and the last thing i need for actors to be is closed and nervous.
the more open an actor is the more easier it is for them to take direction.

[Gabriel Voss]

Linda - I know you're probably really anxious about it and I'm hoping you find something soon!

Alfred - I totally agree that in an audition the goal is to feel open and ready to take direction. My point is the audition process does not generally foster this but instead creates a stressful and intimidating atmosphere (and that's a generalization, not all auditions are like that). I completely agree that feeling closed and nervous is the antithesis to good performance. What sorts of things do you do in your auditions to put your actors at ease?

[Tim]

Uhm...I gotta interject. Michelle Williams was offered Marilyn Monroe, but she wanted to "audition" for the director. Granted, she had the part already, so all the other factors are non-existent.

[Gabriel Voss]

Tim - I did not know that about Michelle and kudos to her for doing that. However, I wouldn't call performing for a director when, as you point out, she already had the part, an audition. It seems like more of a rehearsal to me. The key part of something being an audition is the role being at stake. Great caveat to my overbroad and unsupported assertion though!

[Alex Wu]

Great post, auditions always make me feel almost physically sick sometimes. Channeling that nervousness into adrenaline helps a lot.

I'm taking classes over at AAU with their Acting program (http://www.academyart.edu/acting-school/index.html) to help me with controlling some of my pre-audition jitters though.

[Gabriel Voss]

Alex - I agree that channeling the nervousness helps, if you can do it. I've had only varying success at it. At the same time, just having to focus on channeling nervousness speaks to the difficulty with auditions in the first place. Hopefully your classes are working for you.