Blowing an audition

This poignant post by Wil Wheaton reminded me of every time I've failed at an audition. In general I'm pretty good about not fretting when I don't get a role. As long as I've done my best I know the rest is out of my hands. But I have badly blown an audition and a couple of times I've been a little distracted and not done as well as I wanted to.

Years ago I went to an audition at Ford's theater. It was for the Christmas Carol I think. I knew someone who got in for an audition and I called and was told they were only seeing people who had agents or were union or something that I wasn't or didn't have at the time. I told them I knew they were seeing those people because a friend was auditioning and had the same credentials I did. So they said I had a lot of balls and gave me an audition time.

And when I got to the building I started thinking about how Lincoln had been killed in the theater and I felt this weight of the history and I couldn't stop thinking about how horrible it must have been for his wife and all of the theatergoers and the other actors and that's all I could think about. Then when I went in to do my monologue and I blanked. It's the only time I've ever blanked.

They let me start over and the same thing happened, at the same spot in the monologue. So I made up a crazy story about how my kid had vanished from day care and had been found a block away and I was still shaken from worry and I burst into tears and I turned down the chance to try again and I left and they never knew that I did some real acting in my panic over screwing up.

The other problem I've had is when I'm trying out for something and the writing is bad. I auditioned for a film a few years ago that went on to be very, very big but the part I was reading was just awful, all as you know Bob and I couldn't give it my all because I kept mentally rewriting the lines. As I told someone at a different audition, if I were a worse writer I'd be a better actress.

I'm not sure if there's a moral to this story. If you think of one do let me know.