Auditions, Take Two
We held auditions for "Once On This Island" last Monday and Tuesday. I had anticipated starting rehearsal tomorrow for my very first musical as a director. We had a grand total of four guys show up for auditions, none of whom were particularly amazing vocally. We postponed callbacks, and decided to hold another round of auditions tomorrow. A very large part of me cries, Please, God, don't let any boys show up! I've been ambivalent about doing a musical since we (the Fine Arts faculty) began discussing it in December. I would really like to get another play under my belt before tackling the immensely more challenging musical. As much as I love musical theatre, I firmly believe that I am not ready for it. I don't think my students are ready for it.
I want to do a play the right way before I try to do something else, and let's face it, musicals are a different animal. "A Christmas Carol" was fun in a flying-by-the-seat-of-my-pants-hoping-to-God-they-don't-rip kind of way. As glad as I am that we did it (and even more that we pulled it off), I don't want to do it again, and I believe doing a musical at this point would be a similar experience. I think I've had enough of that type of stress for the school year. I'd love to have the luxury of putting on a play which I've read before the night before auditions, and having a set that I've actually thought about and designed, rather than threw together from whatever we had around the shop and what we could find at Goodwill, and that Dad and I built over Thanksgiving break.
I've been looking toward this week with dread; a sensation akin to the feeling I used to get when I had a paper due, or a big assignment for which I had not prepared. Adding to my anxiety is the fact that I need to design the show (which I've decided to put off in case we aren't actually doing the show), fix the lights (the 4th electric doesn't work for some unknown reason, I blame it on the baffling stupidity of my predecessors...6 electrics, honestly, why would that stage possibly need that many?), figure out if I can use the backdrop as a cyclorama, and try to get some much needed maintenance done on the fly system.
2 comments:
Wow. Did you know this job was going to be so stressful when you signed on? If not, it's probably a good thing. I know I would never have joined grad. school if I knew in advance how hard it would be, but I'm still glad I did. Hopefully you're glad you did too. . . or at least will be when the year's over.
In short, no. I'm still glad I'm doing it, because it is a lot of fun much of the time. But other days, days like today, or even some last week, it's really tough. I don't know what I'm doing most of the time, and that really starts wearing on me after a while.
I'll definitely be glad when the year is over.
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