This week I had the misfortune of staying in what I must deem to be The Worst Hostel in Britain. For £5 a night in central London I had little right to complain, but for my £5 I would like to feel safer and warmer than I would on the streets of London, and preferably a little cleaner too. I must stress at this point that this was by no means my first hostel experience, nor am I fussy about cleanliness, noise, or who I share a room with… But when it’s a bring-your-own-toilet-roll affair and you are forced to escape to your ice box of a room (with mushrooms growing on the walls) in order to escape from the drug addict down the hall, I tend to begin to reconsider choosing to repeat the booking on my next visit!
Yet despite these serious causes for concern, I had a fantastic (cheap!) week in London…
During my stay, I met a French playwright who was staying the night in my room. She was incredibly interesting to talk to, especially in terms of her background. Having spent a great deal of time lecturing in universities, she had chosen the under-privileged life of a playwright. She said that after working in universities, many people she knew would be too proud to spend a proportion of their life in hostels. But not her, she said. You must love what you are doing, and it is because of her love of playwriting that she lives her life this way. And, she added, look at the interesting people you get to meet! The same applies to actors - you have to have a complete love of acting in order to continue working in retail/factories/call centres to make ends meet as you prepare for auditions and are often, it seems, endlessly rejected. It helps if you love the lifestyle - and although I could not claim to “love” my current retail job, I do get a healthy sense of enjoyment from making up new excuses for getting out of work to attend auditions, and even find myself enjoying staying in hostels with unexpected surprises behind their doors.
While I was in London, I spent whenever possible on the tube simply to provide relief from the cold. Each morning, I was travelling to a church in Highbury to complete a course with the London School of Puppetry. The course was thoroughly enjoyable, and as we were given the opportunity to watch rehearsals and performances by the current diploma students, we could see how the marionette techniques we were being taught translated into polished performances. My main impetus for completing the course was as a contribution towards my research for my thesis; however, with many devising and children’s theatre companies asking for actors with puppetry skills, the course has, I hope, been an asset to my CV!
During my stay, I was offered an audition the following week. When the company discovered I was in London, they kindly offered to squeeze me in the day after I was due to return home. And so I re-booked my coach ticket home, bravely handed over my £5 for another night’s stay in the hostel (…actually it was £9 but that’s another story!), and prepared myself to ring work the next day to tell tales about how I was “stranded” in London and was unable to organise return transport until the following day. Then I set to work preparing for the extensive audition brief… With my portfolio at home (containing copies of my audition monologues, songs and so forth) this was quite a task! The moment my puppetry course finished, I rushed back to my 8-bed dorm in the hope that I would have the room to myself, and started preparing.
The following morning, I warmed my voice up as quietly as I could (it was a musical theatre audition!), wishing I was in my own room at home to allow my voice a more thorough warm-up. Next, I hopped on the tube, fell down an escalator, and finally arrived battered, bruised and mildly humiliated at my audition.
The audition itself went well. After my first monologue, one member of the panel said “wow”. If only that could happen at every audition! I did wish however, when they asked me to sing a third piece with criteria that my other two songs had not fulfilled, that something other than “Different” from “Honk!” had popped into my head. But I confidently told the panel, “No problem, I can sing ‘Different’ from ‘Honk!’ for you”, stood up, gave them my best “hooooooonk!” and proceeded to make up the words. Saying this, the panel didn’t seem to mind and the performance served its purpose. As I was leaving, I was assured that I had done “a really good audition”, which left me feeling somewhat pleased with myself. Like most actors I know, I will never be entirely content with a performance as I will always be striving to improve - but following a couple of auditions in which I strongly felt I had not done myself justice, it was great to leave an audition feeling that I had delivered a good performance and knowing that if I am not offered the part, it was down to elements outside of my control.
One of the great things about being an actor is its unpredictability - just as you’re beginning to fall into a mind-numbing routine of bookselling and wondering if you will ever be offered another audition again, everything seems to be thrown at you at once. And luckily, I get a kick out of it - otherwise, I may not be an actor!
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