Oh, it's time for a post.

Often, I run into the dilemma that arises when something that was originally cathartic and fun becomes something akin to a chore. Many things in my life are like this, and it might have something to do with how terrible I am at letting myself settle like sediment to the least common denominator.

That's a long way of saying I don't really want to post, but I'm forcing it for the writing practice.

I had an audition for a student film on Wednesday, at Cal State University Northridge (CSUN). It was nice for several reasons. 1) I was driving against traffic to get there, so the road was open. 2) I've been to CSUN before, so I didn't have to sweat about finding the place. 3) The audition itself was nice.

The audition wound up being in a hallway. I did a monologue for two guys and a girl. It was nice because it was all collegey, and I kind of miss that, but it was especially nice because I'm pretty sure I intimidated the hell out of them.

Not that I'm all giddy about scaring people. It was more like this: I'm 25, I'm a kind of a big guy, and they're all in their first couple of years of University. I think the intimidation factor kicked in because I was a little early, and they were making things up on the fly (which I totally understood, and made sure they knew I understood). I don't think they really knew what to expect when they posted their project on Casting Networks. Turns out, their first prospect of the night was a trained, professional actor. Yes, I can call myself a professional actor, I've been paid to do it...once.

They asked if I had a monologue, and I was like, "Yes, I do," which seemed to blow their minds a little bit. They asked me to do it, but I needed to pause because the director almost forgot to roll their video recorder. I think it was just one of those random situations where the auditioner has done more auditions than the auditors.

So I did the monologue. It went well.

When I finished, the director said, with this rhythm, "Thanks, that was...good!" The pause before the good almost made me laugh aloud, because I could totally tell that he'd prepared a canned response for everybody's monologue along the lines of, "Thanks, that was nice," or just "Thank you," and I got a genuine response out of him. It wasn't so much that he was surprised it was good...more like he was thankful that it was good.

There was more apologizing that followed for the location, and the drive relative to the brevity of the audition, and such, which I tried to gracefully deflect. They didn't need to apologize at all. I've driven farther for less. Plus, a 20 mile drive for a 3 minute read is standard fare 'round here.

Leaving the place, I couldn't help but giggle. Michael Shurtleff's book Audition goes to some small length to describe how auditors feel in auditions...the pressure of the decision making, the details, the distractions, the vague sense that (sometimes) they're wasting these poor actors' time...I believed it when I read it, but I'd just witnessed it first hand, and uncensored.

I've posted about how I like auditions before, but now I don't think I'll ever be intimidated by an auditor again.

Bonus to that is that they called me back.

Bonus to that is that the callback was great (though I might have used some profanity in the improv that the DP's younger brother had never heard before and will google as soon as he gets home).

Bonus to that is that they gave me the role. So I'm in a student film.

Hoo.Rah.