Worst Audition of My LIFE
The Reason I Left Musical Theatre
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One night in 2011, while working at a restaurant in the East Village, where I cut my teeth waiting tables for the first four and half years of life in New York, I got a message from a friend, Heather. She was an alumnus of my alma mater and a theatre producer. In the note, she wanted me to come to an audition the next day: the invited dance call for the national tour The Wizard of Oz. She also asked two of my classmates, Elizabeth and Courtney.
If you’re not familiar, dance calls are the dance-portion of an audition, and as I’m sure you can imagine, when one arrives for a professional musical theatre dance call in New York City, the expectation is that they can...you know...dance. Don’t get me wrong, not every person at these things is Fred Astaire, but the assumption, and typical reality, is that attendees know what they're doing. This is New York City after all. It’s the land of Broadway, Rockettes, legendary ballroom, street dancing, voguing, music videos - you get it. It is a town so lush with talent that, on almost any given corner, you could ask, “Is someone a dancer?” and within two seconds, there would be three people with hands raised while a fourth person combusts into a triple pirouette.
I would not have been one of those people. At this point in my career, I must admit that I still harbored some childhood dreams of serenading audiences on Broadway, but I had bombed enough auditions while trying to keep up with the real musical theatre kids while in college to know that it just wasn’t my strongest suit. While I might have been adequate enough to turn out a lead or two in a no-competition high school drama program, I was not a singer. And, though I did win “Best Actor in a Musical” for playing the Scarecrow at the East Coast Central Florida regional Cappie awards in 2006, I was not a dancer.
I did fancy myself an Actor, though, and for the first few years post-grad, I would consider almost any job that had to do with performing. Almost. You see, I had just come out of a class of eight in Florida State University’s BFA Acting program, and I took myself pretty seriously. After all that training, I felt I’d earned the right to choose my work and auditions, so I had a couple of rules. I wouldn’t go out for anything that didn’t pay or anything with nudity. The nudity bit was because of my first meeting with an NYC modeling agent. He told me two things: 1) I was too old to be starting in the business (I was twenty-two), and 2) I had to be willing to get naked and “be friendly” with the photographers; I rejected the notion and put up a boundary for myself. I didn’t take myself to acting school so that I could casting-couch myself into jobs. I was determined to get hired on pure TALENT. Besides, I was primarily interested in being a theatre actor. Modeling jobs were fine and dandy if they came my way, but I had Broadway in mind.
As I looked at the invitation from Heather, I knew I had no business showing up to any dance call. I wouldn’t have looked twice at an audition like this if it hadn’t come directly from her. But I was still in my early twenties and hungry for work. Who the hell was I to be picky-choosey when a producer-friend was personally inviting me to audition? I had reservations, but how could I not say yes?
I shared my hesitation with Elizabeth and Courtney immediately. In addition to being my classmates from college, they were also my roommates in Astoria and co-workers at the restaurant. I wanted to know what they were thinking. For Elizabeth, this was a no-brainer. She was an actual musical theatre person. She’d been dancing and singing her whole life and was a 100% archetype-match for Dorothy. The Wizard of Oz tour was not only an opportunity for her to impress our alumni connections; it was a job she had a legitimate chance at getting. Courtney was, like me, more of an actor than anything else, but, having taken voice lessons for years, she could also really sing. She said she’d be going too and thought that, if nothing else, she wanted to see what would happen. “What’s the harm in trying?”
What’s the harm? Right. What’s the harm?
Hearing their optimism, I convinced myself that, because a producer asked me to attend, and because it ‘couldn’t hurt,’ I should go too. Yeah! I’d taken dance classes in college, so perhaps I’d even dance well enough for them to think, “He’d be a good Scarecrow!”
The next morning we all woke up early, and I dragged myself into a shower. Shaking off the late night at work, I spent time trilling my lips and stretching my tongue. Huh. Huh Huh. Huh Hummm Ma. I packed a bag with all of the requisite “musical theatre” things that I thought I would need for the day: athletic pants, a jewel-toned button-down shirt, water bottle, my songbook (which was just two songs in a three-ring binder), and an entirely unnecessary pair of jazz sneakers I’d bought in college.
Arriving at Ripley-Grier, the famous rehearsal studio and audition hotspot, all of the optimism and open-mindedness I’d invented began to waver. Even sitting in the hallway with the other performers, it became apparent that I was out of my depth. Everyone there had gorgeous leotards and stretchy pants. They had joyful headshots and binders overflowing with song options. As they casually stretched their legs to near inversion, I snuck a peek at one woman’s resume, and it showed a dozen musicals all from regional theatres around the country. The first credits on my resume were my college production of Waiting for Godot and a promotional commercial for MTV’s The Jersey Shore in which I played a blown-out newscaster. In these hallways, I was used to being grouped with other over-serious nerds auditioning for bootleg guerilla Shakespeare in the (Prospect) park, not this. This was a horse of a different color.
There were probably thirty-five of us in the hallway when the audition-monitor invited the entire group of us into the room. As we filed in, I could see the producers and casting people sitting together at a long folding table across the room. The distance between the producers and us might as well have been miles, but I noticed right away that my friend Heather was not among them. “Perhaps that’s for the best,” I thought. She’d gotten me in, and it was up to me to do the rest. We lined the edges of the room with our nervous bodies, and, eventually, someone gave us a rundown of how the day would shake out. It went something like, “We’ll teach you the combo, and then you’ll dance.”
Dance.
Dance...
That was the moment that I realized I was going to be dancing. Obviously, I was aware of the concept before that moment, but it wasn’t until that very second that I understood what was expected of me. I was to bring my gangly body onto the floor in front of all these people, learn a pre-meditated number, and dance.
The choreographer split everyone into two groups. Elizabeth, Courtney, and I were all in the second, so we watched as group one learned the routine. Well, everyone else watched; I pretty much went numb inside and blacked out. In The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy finds the Tin Man in the forest. He is conscious, but suffering. He is calling out for help through a locked jaw with fear in his eyes. He is entirely unable to move his body. In this audition room, I became just like that...except in reverse. My body was mobile, but my brain had gone rigid. It was as if everything around me was moving at light speed, but I was frozen in the middle of it all.
Group two was summoned to the floor, and Elizabeth positioned herself near the front. She was in a perfect place to be seen by both the choreographer and producing teams. If she wasn’t my friend, I would have been rattled by her confidence. Courtney and I kept toward the back, energetically hiding as much as possible. And then it began. The choreographer started outlining the routine. One, two, three, four…Step after step was thrown at us, and when I tell you that I only caught one of them, I am not exaggerating. Around me, dancers were getting “One, Two, Down-Up, Sidestep, Back-Front.” but all I heard was “FUUUUUUUUUUUUCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK.”
My brain rusted shut, and there was no mental oil-can to help.
Elizabeth was in the front of the room shining like a beautiful diamond. Courtney was not dancing “well” by traditional standards but having fun with it. I was in the back, coagulating from head to toe in real-time. Fuck the Tin Man - I looked more like one of those inflatable guys at car dealerships whose feet don’t move while their bodies writhe about uncontrollably. Then I got pissed off. Under the weight of objective failure, my fear mutated. I got frustrated. The small sense of gratitude I’d felt for the audition had disappeared, and in its place came rage and burden. I was angry that I was there, I was angry for being asked to attend, I was angry for looking stupid in front of all those people. My mind became self-preservation central. This is stupid. I don’t even care. They’re not that good. I’m not even trying. I am an ACTOR, for crying out loud! They should have known this and not asked me to come.
Mess.
After we finished learning the routine, group two was dismissed back to the sidelines, and it was time for the actual dance-call. That’s right. My mental gymnastics had all come in to play and we still hadn’t even auditioned yet. The coordinators broke everyone up into small groups so they could watch each person dance more closely. It would have been the perfect moment for me to excuse myself because, in theory, I had just “learned” the entire routine but in reality, I had retained next to nothing. Not to mention the fact that my physical body was not prepared to execute what I did retain. There was absolutely no point in my trying to do this dance because there was no way in hell that they would want to hire me to do this professionally. Yes! The producer’s ultimate goal was to exchange money for clean, consistent and choreographed dancing. Up to this point, I had given them bulky jazz shoes and a resting bitch face that could rival DMV employees worldwide, but here was no dancing.
I considered leaving. It would have been the kind thing to do. The only reason I’d shown up was because of my producer-friend Heather, and she still wasn’t actually in the room. At that point, I could have snuck out fairly unscathed. But then, of course, Heather walked in. Perfect timing! I smiled and gave her a little wave—time to do dancing.
We were broken up into batches of four. Quad after quad would step out and then run the routine two times. Eventually, it was down to the final seven people. I quietly and selfishly prayed that I’d get to stick with my friends, but Elizabeth was put into a group with three people we didn’t know. It should not be a surprise to anyone that she danced like a damn star. Even amidst a room full of dancers, she stood out in an objectively positive way. The song was being played on the piano, and she was all bam bam hit hit boop boop - star. She was so good that I was even momentarily able to come out of my terrified state to watch her work with appreciation. She made it look effortless and possible.
The final group was made up of Courtney, myself, and someone we didn’t know. When the pianist started to play, I took a deep breath, then nervously attempted the first step in the combination - step-forward on the right foot. To my complete surprise, I nailed it. I did the step! A rush of joy came over me. Maybe this was possible after all! So I went boldly for the second step, but that little fucker was nowhere to be found. I looked around the room. Step two? Step two?! Where are you? Step two had gone to Oz or Neverland or Narnia or something and left me back in Kansas. My body was the town in Footloose and dancing was non-existent. I looked around for someone to follow. Courtney was just a little less lost than I was - albeit smiling and stunning - so she wasn’t much of a help. The third person of our batch turned out to be just as much of a dud as the two of us. We were floundering, so the choreographer’s assistant jumped in to help our group. It was a nice gesture, but no matter how good of a leader they were, I might as well have been head-banging at a fuckin’ Metallica concert or something. This jaunty little jazz combo was not happening.
You know how people are always like, “No matter what happens, don’t give up!” or “Fake it ‘til you make it!” and shit like that? Yeah, I didn’t do that. I didn’t have “fun” with it. I suffered it. I murdered it. I poisoned it. I looked like a tortured gangly skeleton stuck in a garbage disposal.
To say that I was mortified is not a strong enough statement. Mortification, at least in the emotional sense, requires some embarrassment. But I wasn’t exactly embarrassed. I was bruised. When I started “failing” at the choreography, my ego got involved and effectively turned me into a petulant little asshole. At that point, I would have done anything to save face. So when the choreographer said, “If you can tumble, we’d love to see what you can do,” there really was only one option.
I heard Elizabeth next to me whispering, “no, no, no.”
You see, they wanted tumbling. Like - actual gymnastics. Like - Simone Biles, Dominique Dawes, Nastia Liukin-style flippery, and things of the sort. Elizabeth knew that I couldn’t tumble in the way they meant and she was quietly begging me to keep silent. She’d seen me almost kill myself dozens of times in college when I was trying to throw backflips on cement. But I, taken over by the power of a fragile male ego, and lacking any semblance of self-awareness, was desperate to find some way to redeem myself. I raised my hand to say yes, I could tumble! I had to tumble.
When I was a kid pre-pubescent kid with no fear, I really could do a few a tricks. I could cartwheel, backflip, front flip, all that. While some of the kids at recess were playing kickball, I was in the outfield with Caitlin O doing back walk-overs. But that was when I was a child and, as it turns out, those skills are not in the “riding a bike” category of accessibility. I took the floor and attempted a round-off back handspring. The round-off went fine, but I didn't get enough air when I went in for the handspring. Or, maybe I got too much air? Ya know how, around Halloween, you can DIY a ghost by placing a ball into a piece of white fabric? Then, you throw the ball up, and the ghost's flimsy fabric-body follows. Then it comes down headfirst. This was that. My body was that ghost-ball thing. Zoop up and plunk down. The point is, my body never should have been put into that circumstance. While I was in the air, I could feel the entire room clench their fists, grind their teeth, and kegel their assholes. There was an audible gasp, and it wasn’t awe. It was fear.
Fortunately, I didn’t literally land on my head. It was not smooth in any way, shape, or form, but, with the grace of an overgrown elephant in her first pair of stilettos, I landed on my feet. Honestly, that is a generous way to put it, but technically and legally, I survived. One more person did a flip, and, after following me, he looked like Kohei fuckin’ Uchimura.
I wanted to be cut from this audition more than anything I’ve ever wanted in my entire life. I wanted it more than a career in the theatre. I wanted it more than world peace or money. I wanted it more than the opportunity to meet Sarah Michelle Gellar in 1998. There was nothing I would have appreciated more than to have been diplomatically thanked for my time and asked to leave. But, instead of taking me out to the pasture and mercifully shooting me, the audition monitor asked everyone to stay and sing. Everyone. Including me.
WHY?
We were released to the hallway so we could freshen up, and I started to spiral. Should I leave? Of course, I should go! The entire day up to that point had been nothing short of an unglamorous trainwreck. But, alas, I was young, triggered, and stupid. For reasons that remain unknown, I pressed forward, ready to abuse myself and the producers with another round of white mediocrity.
I walked back into the audition room of death and, for a moment, I almost thought I might be able to show these people I wasn’t a complete waste of human life. I approached the pianist and gave him my song - a cut of “Brotherhood of Man” from How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying - and took my spot to sing. The piano started, and I…did not. Great. Cool. As if it wasn’t already enough of a mess, I had to be the one who asked for a do-over. For the second time, I was able to get my mouth moving and sounds sounding, but I was utterly defeated. I had nothing left for these people. I didn’t want to be singing. I didn’t want to be acting. The only thing I wanted to do was apologize for wasting their time. So, while half-heartedly singing my little song, I made eye contact with every person at the producer’s table - starting with Heather- and apologized...with my eyes. I’d find their gaze and nod to them in a way that said, “Girl, I know. I’m sorry for putting you through this nightmare. I’ve been acting like a douche and I am just so sorry.”
After that, I considered becoming a mole person and living off rats in the subway system. I was tortured by what a fool I’d made of myself. My roommates were more than gracious in their attempts to tell me it wasn’t that bad, but I knew better. It was a mess. I was a mess, and, more than anything, I felt like I’d let down my producer-friend. She’d thrown me a bone by opening the door to that audition and I’d not only done poorly but my “fuck you for making me do this”-energy was not the lewk.
As soon as I got home, I sent Heather a note with an effusive apology. When she invited me to the dance call, I should have just said, “thanks but no thanks.” I told her that I knew I was out of my depth and knew my heart wasn’t in it. The only reason I went was that I felt like I should go. I asked her to forgive me.
But then came the real twist. Heather responded by saying I booked the tour! Apparently, all of my embarrassment and fear was just my imagination. I was actually slaying the audition the entire time. She even went as far as to say that I was a star, and all of the producers could see it from the minute I walked into the room.
Okay, that is a total lie. I absolutely did not book that job, I just wanted to add a twist in the story for dramatic effect.
Heather did respond with a tremendous amount of kindness, though. She accepted my apology and told me not to worry about it. “Let it go, and move on to the next,” she said. And that is precisely what I did. I focused my sights forward you and promptly added “no choreographed dancing” to my list of audition requirements.
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