The moustache went for nothing. I am pretty sure I won't get the part, unless I was SO good that I stunned everyone in the room into silence and they forgot how to lift their faces away from boredom and disappointment. With hindsight (now I know I am not going to get it) I wish I'd turned up with the moustache, just to see how they reacted. It might have injected some life into the room. But really I was glad to be without it as I walked through the streets of London. Any looks of disgust I got today were all fully deserved.
I would love to get a bit more acting work then I do - not too much, because it gets a bit boring after a while as it's mainly early mornings and lots of waiting around - but it's rare I even get auditions. So it was a positive step to be here.
But I also know from my experience on the other side of the table how most decisions about casting are made in the first ten seconds of the audition. Or even as the person is walking into the room. Many people are physically wrong for a part and then the minute you hear them speak you know if they're anywhere near cutting the mustard. Not that that's entirely fair because some people aren't all that good when reading off a script (I suspect myself included) but might be good once they're up and moving around and can do some acting, whilst some people are just brilliant at the audition process and injecting life and fun into a dead room and then not necessarily so great when they have to do it "for real".
I knew the people I was auditioning for had probably been in that room all day when I got there at 4.30pm and that they were bored and listless. There was also a good chance by now that they'd seen someone they liked and had more or less made up their minds. But certainly they'd be bored with the three bits of script they were reading out and I'd have to do something pretty amazing to jolt them out of their stupor.
I didn't do that.
Another bad sign was that they didn't really chat much before we got going and gave me no direction whatsoever. It's nice I think if there's a little bit of chat about what the actor has been up to or what they think of the script or just anything at all and it's useful to get some indication of what the relevant people are looking for from the character and maybe to know what the style of the script is. For me, this particular script would only really work if it was played realistically and straight down the line, but there were plenty of lines which could be played in exasperated sit-com style. I had no idea what they were aiming for - as an actor, you're just a meat puppet and you have to do whatever they tell you (with some licence obviously).
But no clues from the producer or writer and just a tiny bit of banter about how the water they gave me looked a bit iffy and the offer of a banana and a comment that the writer had eaten most of them. I tried to joke about how a writer had to get food whenever he could and that he should take the remaining banana home.
I was speaking as a writer here, but of course today I was an actor and thus my comments might have been seen as rude or inappropriate. I had no idea if they knew who I was, or why I had been invited in this time.
I read the first script and the writer then gave me a small piece of direction and we had another go at it. I thought I acted on his instructions quite well, but the only laugh that was had from the room was for a line delivered by the producer reading the other part - of course they'd heard this a dozen times today and were bored, but that wasn't a good sign. The writer said that that was great, but the look in his eye betrayed that it was not what he wanted and I had worked out by now that he was the one everyone was looking to for a verdict. Nothing against him at all. He looked like a nice bloke and was friendly enough and loved bananas, but I have sat in that chair and know the way you react to someone who has got what you want and someone who hasn't.
It would be cool at this point if the casting people could just say, "Look, you're not what we're after, let's not waste any more of each other's time," but that would be seen as rude - even though it's kind of ruder to use up people's time when you know you're not going to use them- and there is an outside chance that something might change and the actor might suddenly nail it (though that never happens). But all I got was some unconvincing "brilliant"s and was not asked to read again, nor given any more direction. Which could only mean I was perfect or shit. The writer was asked at the end if he needed anything else, but he said he didn't and from the look on his face all he wanted was a more suitable actor and another banana.
Still it's good for me to do auditions and a positive step to be asked. It also is useful to know what it's like from this side of the table for when I am one of the casting team (if that ever happens again) and to be reminded of what little one can do to put people at their ease. But I know by 4.30 of any afternoon I would be totally unable to hide my disappointment and boredom as well.
In better news I got the first draft of the book finished, even if the last couple of chapters need an awful lot of work (and the whole thing needs a proper sweep) and had a fun gig for the posh people of Teddington in the evening. So it was still a good day.
And when I was in Camden for the audition I saw a girl of about eight holding a gigantic guinea pig against her shoulder. Which you don't see every day on the street and which made me laugh.
And I don't have that stupid moustache anymore. But imagine how bad the audition would have been if I had!
