Auditions suck. Fact. Two weeks ago I had the worst one of the year. I still haven’t got over it. But let’s rewind to the day before. It was a Tuesday. Tuesday 20th July 2011. I awoke fairly early as I had to return the company van to Crewe as the bosses were away in Blackpool for a jolly weekend on our final day. That didn’t bother me, it meant I didn’t have to haul my suitcase and other luggage across various train stations late on a Friday night.
The sun hit my face as my alarm went off and I grabbed my phone to turn off the hideous racket and saw the symbol that informs me that I have a new email. How exciting! It came through one of the casting websites that I am on, and those type of emails signify one of two things- either you have an audition, or it’s a ‘sorry, but you were rubbish’. But on this occasion it was the former! It was for a job I had applied for about a month before, my online profile/CV had been viewed by the company 4 times but I had heard nothing. Not even a sniff of an audition. Grrr. But it turned out that the actor playing the part that I had applied for had dropped out, one of the cast had suggested me, and was I still interested? Yes please! I emailed straight back to say I was, climbed in the van, and off I went to Crewe. That was a fairly pleasant journey; I listened to a Torchwood audio book and sang along to the cheesiest of Glee songs and thought about the happy times I would be having over the summer not being in a van!
Van delivered and I sat at Crewe train station for an hour waiting for the transport home again. My BlackBerry made the familiar ‘bong’ sound that meant another email had arrived. Success, I had an audition. Tomorrow. In Wolverhampton at 2pm. Two Shakespeare monologues required. Easy. I’d just done 2 Shakespeare plays on tour. The role I was going for I had played twice already, I knew it inside out. Surely this was in the bag!
And so came Wednesday. Despite my audition not being til 2pm, and the fact that it took an hour and a half to drive to Wolverhampton, I didn’t trust my car to get me there and so hopped back on a train. At 10.30am. The train would get me to Wolves at just before 1pm, giving me an hour to make the 10 minute drive (according to Google directions) to the venue. I’d planned my bus route, I just needed to find where to get off the bus. Simple.
My first train got me to Leicester on time, ready to change for the train to Birmingham New Street. I sat on the platform minding my own business when a very loud young woman was pacing up and down in front of me talking in an unidentifiable accent down her phone looking lost. She finally got the man next to me to understand her and she snapped her mobile shut and a quiet lull drifted over the platform once more. Our train arrived, on I hopped, and who should be sitting on the row behind me opposite? Loud lady! All I wanted was to go over my speeches in my head, prepare myself for any questions that might be thrown my way or that I might want to ask, but all I got was the weird accent bellowing all through the carriage. I couldn’t even swap seats because it would look too obvious due to the lack of passengers! The ticket inspector’s arrival came as a relief until he took one look at foreign loud lady, clearly fancying her and stopped to chat to her for about 15 minutes. Obviously for character observations I listened in, not that they were being quiet about it! It turned out she was going to Birmingham to present some sort of music video chart thingy for MTV and she was very late. I also discovered that I couldn’t place her accent because she was half Northern Irish and half Portuguese! After he had flirted shamelessly with her and ‘helped’ her, he was off and we were in Birmingham. I quickly exited the train to find the next platform I needed for Wolverhampton when a flash of blue streaked past me and the ticket inspector from our train had dashed to carry Irish/Portuguese lady’s suitcase up the stairs! It was only tiny! Creep! I boarded my final train and ended up opposite some boys with very loud music. It seemed I would not be going over my speeches in peace on this journey either. I finally saw familiar surroundings and realised I was in Wolverhampton. My body shuddered at the remembrance of the hideous times I had had here before. The tour that nearly made me go insane two years ago, and only a couple of months ago, the hideous Travelodge room that myself and Adam had to encounter one fateful night. I pushed the memories to one side and tried to focus on the excitement that might lie ahead!
I had received instructions of which bus to get, which would take me to Wightwick Manor, the location of the audition. I had done my research, and pulled up a map of Wolverhampton town centre on Google so that I could locate the appropriate bus stop. I had carefully written down instructions to get me there, followed them well, and before I knew it, I was at the bus stop with the bus just pulling in. Time: 1.05pm. Perfect.
As I stepped on the bus I double-checked with the bus driver that this was the bus I needed to get to Wightwick Manor, and that I needed to get off at the Mermaid pub. All correct. Unfortunately the bus drivers would be swapping over at the next stop but he assured me that he would tell the next driver where I was going and that he would inform me of where to get off the bus. So far, so good. Wolverhampton was redeeming itself! Maybe it realised how upset it had made me in the past and was trying to do better!
The bus went around the corner, and pulled into the next stop. There was no new driver waiting to hop on, so the current driver just got off the bus, shut the door and walked down the street! Interesting. A couple of minutes later, the new driver arrived and we set off. Of course I wasn’t going to just rely on the this new driver to tell me where to go, I was looking out of the window for myself too. The first driver had told me that that stop that I needed was the last stop of the route and that I couldn’t miss it. Well, we were driving along, I couldn’t see any sign of the Mermaid pub or Wightwick Manor, but the bus driver knew what he was doing, and was going to tell me!
Finally, after what seemed like forever, I saw something that I recognised, and realised too late that I was heading back towards Wolverhampton town centre! I grabbed my BlackBerry and after 11 months of having it, attempted to use the maps for the very first time. After a few manic minutes, I found my location and where I was supposed to be, and I was right, I was going the wrong way. The driver hadn’t said a word. I was sitting right behind him!!! He could see me in his mirror! I saw a bus stop just ahead, and thankfully there was a taxi rank opposite. I ran off the bus and over the road, narrowly missing the oncoming traffic, googled the postcode of the manor and told the driver to go! I explained my situation and he promised me that he would get me there on time. Time: 1.53. Time of audition; 2pm. Of course with me being in a rush, we were stuck behind every slow-moving vehicle and got trapped at every red traffic light on the way. Tears were rolling down my face at this time, I was highly emotional, late and I wasn’t sure how far I would actually get in the taxi due to the small amount of money that I had in my purse. I logged into my email account to try and find a phone number for the man who was to be auditioning me, but there wasn’t one on the emails! Typical! I knew someone in the cast who might have his number but I didn’t have a number for them! I turned to the only tool I could think of, Facebook. One swift message sent, and I was focussed on the road once more. Thankfully, I began to see signs for the manor and began to calm down. I grabbed handfuls of change from my purse and thrust them at the taxi driver. He was very sweet and offered to pick me up again after the audition but he had taken all of my money for the fare and I couldn’t afford that again! I ran up the ‘No Entry’ road to the house and found the hut where I was to meet the audition man. Time: 2.07pm. Arse.
I ran into the hut and breathlessly tried to ask who I was looking for, and was told that he was running over with the last auditionee. I was sent up to the house where someone would meet me and point me in the right direction. I don’t know who she was but I blurted out my story to her and she found me a nice table to sit on outside to compose myself while I waited. I think she thought I was mental! After a few minutes, I was greeted by the man and I was slightly shocked. I had been emailing someone called Tony, and had expected middle-aged, possibly greying man, but instead I got a very charming, young, handsome man! I stopped and stared at him for a moment, then realised what a fool I must look at, I probably had make-up down my face, my hair was definitely dishevelled, and my cheeks were bright red from running and stress! Not a good start.
We walked into the audition room and I tried to explain why I was in such a state. He was very understanding and lovely and my heart rate slowed down ever so slightly. I sat down, filled in some details on a form, and then it was speech time. Speech one went really well, I was confident, remembered everything, threw everything into it. Lovely. Then came speech two. I got about half way through and forgot my line. I started again and stopped in the same place. It was about this time that I started to wonder if I was in some sort of nightmare, but no, this was happening. I had both speeches written down in my notebook so had a quick look before having a third attempt. I stood up, took a deep breath in, and promptly one of my buttons fell off my shorts. We just both looked at it for a second before he said “Do you want to get that?”. I wanted to go home. After a third cock-up on the speech front, it was time to read for the part I was actually going for. And that part went really well! I was really pleased with myself, and thought I had redeemed myself. After that, I was asked to try my second speech one final time if I had calmed down enough, but yet again it was an epic fail, resulting in me practically reading the whole thing from my notebook. He walked with ,e back down to the meeting point for his next auditionee, we shook hands, and I began to walk in what I hoped was the right direction of a bus.
I seemed to be making my way down a country lane but I saw a few bus stops so I carried on in hope. After about half an hour I came upon some civilisation and saw two elderly gentlemen at a bus stop, so I asked if it was the right stop to get into town to get to the railway station. Thankfully it was, and one of the gentlemen was kind enough to give me very specific instructions of where to get off the bus and which roads to walk along to find the station. I sat with my face slumped against the window looking out at the town that I despised so much, and updated my Facebook status with a rant. Well, it made me feel better! I dragged my heels along the streets to the station, stopped in the shop and bought myself a bug chocolate muffin, a Twix and some pickled onion flavour Monster Munch. Well, if I was having a bad day, then I was going to stink out the train with my crisps and I didn’t care! Sadly I didn’t get the chance as the train was delayed so I had to eat them on the platform! I was heavy hearted as I’d set my sights on being in the play over the summer, for a split second thought about jumping on the tracks to cause a commotion in the horrid town, but the beautiful sounds of ‘DJ’ by H&Claire informed me that my phone was ringing. A huge smile burst over my face as I realised it was the lovely Adam who had seen my Facebook and wanted to see if I was ok. I was cheered up immensely from chatting with him, said goodbye as the train began to pull away, and stuffed my face with chocolate muffin as the immortal words “I’ll be in touch” were ringing in my ears.
Do you know what? Rehearsals began a few days ago... I still haven’t heard! Typical.
Nxxx
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