Auditions are not what you think

I'll often have a music director or assistant director work with me, in auditions. We work with a group of actors as an ensemble, in a 2-hour workshop. Sometimes we work as one big group, sometimes we'll break into two rooms and work separately. It's more fun and more stimulating. It also gives the actors a way to bow out, if they don't like this way of working.

I have them do their monologues, but give them other actors to flesh out the scene. This removes that weird competitive vibe. It stops being "your" monologue, and becomes "our" scene. Everyone works. And the chances increase that the work itself will catch fire.

THAT's why we do this -- to ignite, transubstantiate, burn to ash.

I gave a Titus two dead bodies of his sons, a beautiful daughter with her mouth bound and hands clasped behind her back, a jar, and a black leather glove. In these fertile surroundings, the giant 6'6" actor had, finally, a vessel capable of channeling Titus-sized force.

I had a Portia from Merchant of Venice stand on a silky teak Swedish dresser. Below her to the left, stood a statuesque blonde Danish woman holding a sheaf of tall pink gladiolas (Mercy). On the other side stood a tiny indomitable Irish redhead raising an iron sword (Justice). I had Mercy and Justice be living statues. When they heard text that affected them, they were to morph to a new statue position. Portia could use the statues however she wanted, and to go anywhere on her small dresser-top stage. "The quality of mercy is not strained," she began, and the gladiolas rustled.

I cast the Mercy actor from this scene, not from anything she did in her own monologue.

I glimpsed, in the Titus actor, a Viking berserker capable of razing Rome, and cast him as Octavius. Not the usual flaccid Octavius, but a force greater than the conspirators had reckoned with, a chthonic Caesar. On his own, Octavius began to paint his face and arms, growing more motley by the night.

Auditions are not what you think. They are an immersion in the divine, a chaotic glimpse of your unborn play, and possibly some of the most beautiful acting you'll ever see.