A tale of a fateful trip,
That started out from Nashville, sport,
Aboard this acting ship….
You may have heard about them, these hideous things that directors require actors to do to get a part. They are called monologues. And they are a most cruel and unusual punishment. Unnatural. Torture.
You see, usually, when an actor takes the stage he is acting WITH someone else. He is talking to another character who shares the stage and he is afforded the luxury of directing his comments TO someone and making eye contact. Not so with a monologue. Here he takes the stage alone and must find a way to be personable to the wall behind the auditors’ heads.
Usually, when an actor takes the stage, he is performing before a friendly audience that expects to enjoy the diversion he presents them. Not so with a monologue. Here he is performing before a panel of judges looking for flaws. While he talks to a wall. Making no eye contact.
Most auditors know that this is a ridiculous system and a barometer of nothing. They are therefore, I believe, sadistic little creatures who love to watch us squirm.
Still, every so often one must poke the sharp stick into one’s eye for the privilege of telling one's personal Bea Arthur that one did, indeed, try to bullshit last week (it’s a History of the World reference, get over it). So, that’s what I did today.
Somebody shoot me.
Okay, this is the internet after all, so I feel the need to point out that I don’t mean that literally. However, if you have a tranquilizer gun, aim away.
With few days to prepare, I pulled the material I’d use for my two minutes of hell and began to memorize. No problems with that. Never any problems with that. I can memorize like nobody’s business. In fact, hand me a script and give me a day or two to learn lines and I’ll be a regular Kel-I-Am:
I do not flub them in the house
I do not flub them with a mouse
I do not flub them here or there
I do not flub them anywhere…
Except at the frickin’ audition.
Never in a performance, mind. It is only in auditions that I ever “go up,” becoming so nervous and involved in my own self-critique that I lose my place in the material. This looks unfocused, I need to look at somebody. I can't look at somebody, but this stinks, I need to look. Shit, I looked. Where was I? Like a deer in the headlights, my brain freezes, lost in the awkwardness of the situation. Much like Sam-I-Am convinces his rather Sneetch-like prey to love Green Eggs and Ham at the end of his story, I suffer a similar turnaround at the end of mine:
Auditor, if you will let me be,I hate monologues.
I will try one monologue and you will see…
I will flub them in a box
and I will flub them with a fox
and I will flub them in a house
and I will flub them with a mouse
and I will flub them here and there
Say! I will flub them anywhere!
Now, of course, hating them the way that I do, I have a rather biased view of them, but, that said… I’ve never understood how putting someone in this unnatural acting position with a script that they’ve chosen as their own personal showcase proves anything. They could quite possibly have spent years in preparation with professional coaches to turn that scene into the one and only perfect performance they’ll ever give and be utterly incapable of creating one watch-able scene in the script the auditor is offering in the limited rehearsal time available to them, sans coach. How would you know?
Meanwhile, someone who might do a bang-up job with the actual script is sacrificed on the monologue altar.
Baah.
Today I died so that others might live. Then I went home and set about something at which I excel: cooking. Mmmm, good chili!
Despite the audition, my midday excursion was a good thing. I may not have produced chicken salad, but at least I wasn’t chicken shit – I went. And I enjoyed a pre-audition conversation with the Company Secretary. And best, I had the opportunity to make a welcome suggestion for a new class the company might offer: How to Do a Monologue.
Tomorrow I’ll start rehearsals for my next show with a theatre across town. Thank God for cold reading auditions!
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