Okay, so where was I? Oh, right, I was contemplating hustling my way through the picket sign folks to ask the abortion clinic if I could use their phone to call a cab to get me to my audition on time.
So I didn't do it. Just as I was about to, a bus came around the corner. Hallelujah! I thought. I am saved!
Only I wasn't, not yet. This bus, being a milk run bus at the best of times, had to stop at every. single. stop. on its way to downtown. I was losing it, checking my watch every 3 seconds and wishing I had left earlier, wishing the iron hadn't barfed up cat hair on my skirt, wishing I'd stayed at a hotel instead. I just about lost my shit on the guy who got on the bus and proceeded to have a 4-minute argument about why are bus fares in Calgary so high, and maybe he didn't want to ride the bus today after all.
But finally, we made it. As we were turning into the downtown core, I felt the bus... slowing down. Stopping. Stopping in front of an A&W. And then the bus driver got off and slowly meandered into the restaurant.
I couldn't take it any more. I still had 4 minutes to get there on time, and I was Going To Get There On Time. I grabbed my stuff, and leapt off the bus, my docs pounding the pavement through downtown.
Now, I'm not that familiar with Calgary. Calgary is confusing. It's on a grid system, meaning that it's set up on a Cartesian plane kind of dealie. So there's Centre Street and Centre Avenue, which is (0,0) on the grid. And then the streets and avenues go north, south, east and west. So there's 1st street SE, 1st street SW, 1st street NE, 1st street NW. The grid system does give you the advantage of being able to figure out roughly where one place is in relation to another, but it just looks like so many numbers to me... I get the math panic. You know how it goes.
In any case, the place I was headed for was near the Calgary Tower, a pretty easy landmark to find. And so I, a non-runner (and I stress this heartily) ran about 15 blocks to the stage door entrance. I must have looked like a hot mess when I got there, barely managing to gasp out "Where are the auditions?" Wordlessly, the security guard pointed up a looooonnnng flight of stairs.
Crap. I dragged my sweating, gasping self up those stairs, sprinting the last couple of steps and around the corner to find... another actress, waiting for her audition.
"They're running late," she said.
Thank God! This time, I truly had been saved! I sat down and tried to catch my breath while simultaneously going over my monologues. I was going to be charming, calm, composed and confident. I was going to nail it.
And here's where I do great, get cast and become the toast of Calgary, right? Credits roll as I accept an award, or take a bow at a sold-out show, right?
Right?
Wrong. I had it pretty together when they called me in, had some nice chat with the two artistic directors about my resume, and then they said "What are you going to do for us today?" And I told them. And got ready to show them my stuff.
Now, I still don't know what happened. My best guess is that all the adrenaline from freaking out and running suddenly kicked in. Or, conversely, completely left my body in a mass exodus. But I started my monologue, and...
I started shaking.
And it wasn't the fine tremor of nerves that "no one will notice but you". It was a full on body shaking. Like, the kind of shaking that makes you wonder if the person is going through some kind of withdrawal, or has a brain tumor or something shakes.
Curious, I thought. And I decided to muscle it out. At the time I assumed it was just nerves, and that it would subside as I continued my monologue.
Nope. Just kept on sh-sh-sh-aking through the whole thing. And the two people behind the table were staring at me in horrified fascination, looking at me, looking at my resume, looking at me again. You know we know this resume is totally fake, right? You realize that no one could possibly have hired you to do anything in front of people, right? This is what they were thinking. I could tell. It's what I would have been thinking on the other side of the table.
I finished. The shaking stopped. Completely. I was myself again, apparently. And the people behind the table paused for a moment, and then kindly asked "Do you have anything else?"
Did I? Boy howdy, now that this shaking thing was over with, I was going to blow them away with my serious, touching monologue. And I began.
And so did the shakes. Again, full body shaking. Start acting-- start shaking. Stop acting-- stop shaking.
I recall wanting the floor to open up and swallow me, or for a meteor to hit the building, anything to stop me from having to finish this mon-n-n-n-ologue. Of course, it didn't. And I finished. And stopped shaking. And they graciously said "Thank you" and asked "Do you have any questions?"
And I've always been of the mindset that you should have questions in those situations. Job interviews, auditions-- questions make you seem interested, give you the opportunity to make an impression. And so I asked the only question that sprang to mind.
"Will you be having callbacks?"
I know. As if I, of all people, needed to know that information. Oh, honey, their eyes seemed to say. Don't you worry your pretty little head about that.
And so, I left. I still had a few hours to kill before the bus home. And I went back to my friend's house and ate ice cream and m&m's while watching soap operas. And cried.
Actually, I didn't go out for auditions for quite a while after that. Fortunately, the theatre company in question has changed artistic directors since then, and I'll be mailing my stuff to them asking for a general this week.
And this time I will definitely be staying in a hotel. A hotel within a 6-block radius of the theatre.
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