Where's the bar?

Somewhere around 5:15 this morning I let go of it enough to get some good sleep. For a whole hour and a half before my alarm went off.  Woke up and started to gnaw on it again. So I gotta blog about it, both for posterity and to get it out of my head so I can SLEEP.

I auditioned for The Drowsy Chaperone last night. I wasn't stressed at all. It was a learning audition. I'd heard whispers that the director already had people in mind for parts, so I had no expectations. None. There are only five named female characters, of which I have the vocal range for four, the age-range-ish for three. Lots of other talented ladies auditioned who've previously worked with this director. So while I went in to the audition intending to do my best, I had zero expectations.  I'd love to do the play, but I also wouldn't mind a bit of a breather, perhaps audition for Millionaire after all.  Most importantly, I had fun stapling feathers to my sweater and putting together a 1920's Hollywood hostess-style outfit, found some glam necklace bits to turn into clip-on earrings, did the finger wave thing with my hair.  I even sported my false eyelashes and exaggerated the big freckle on my cheek to look like a beauty mole. 

For two weeks I've been singing, singing, singing "As We Stumble Along" without music. I know the song so well I can sing it without thinking about it. I could sing it in my sleep if I'd been even a little bit stressed about remembering the words.

And all of that non-stress...evaporated...as soon as I walked through the door to the audition room.  Suddenly I was a goofy, gawky ball of nerves.  The piano player was reasonably okay; he'd never played the song before, and I'd never sung it with piano aside from my two-finger note-plucking on my phone app.  Okay, that right there, that previous sentence?  The part about NEVER singing it with piano? That. Was. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. In retrospect, hearing the music and trying to make sure I was putting the right words with the right piano notes totally threw me off.  I messed up the lyrics not once, but twice.  And THIS is what I'm gnawing on. The zero expectations, no-stress approach meant I didn't really think it through. As a result, I feel like I let myself down. I didn't do my best, which was really my only goal.

Interestingly, while I was singing, a Fiddler castmate's 6- or 7-year old daughter popped up in the window (she was standing on tippy tippy toe on the other side) and flashed her beautiful smile at me. I grinned back and continued singing. Then there in the window was the top of her head and a stuffed cow hopping along the bottom of the window. I think I suppressed that chuckle. In Annie, we had many moments of unscripted audience participation--it didn't rattle me at all, and cutie-pie E hamming it up in the window didn't rattle me, either. It was WAAAAY less of a distraction for me than the coordinating-words-with-piano-notes thing.

So all of the following thoughts and stresses were crowding my head all night:

~ I'm afraid I came across as a diva because I don't want an ensemble role. The director doesn't know me, so what he sees is that I don't have anywhere near the experience to even consider being a diva.  But it's a 35 minute drive (which is paltry compared to some, but gas does get expensive), and I do have two kids at home.  And I'd likely have to rearrange my Fiddler performances to accommodate Drowsy rehearsals. A principal role in Drowsy would be well worth the adjustments needed.  But as tempting as an ensemble role is simply because I love this show, I really would rather watch it from the audience half a dozen times (which I will!) than commit the time and money to making the drive to rehearsals and rearrange my Fiddler schedule.

~The producer kept FROWNING AT ME! Logically I know it was probably her listening face, and I totally shouldn't have let it unnerve me.  But I've had the pleasure of hanging with her outside of an audition room, and that crinkly-foreheaded frown had yet to be directed at me. So what was running through my head during the entire audition (and throughout the night)?  "Milette is frowning. She thinks I suck. Is she looking at my getup and thinking it's too much?  No, she thinks I suck."

~I was auditioning for a comedic role.  Train wrecks aren't funny, dangit!

~I should have sung Miss Otis Regrets. I have the CD accompaniment for that, and I've sung it with piano before. Or Adelaide. Should have sung Adelaide. Or [insert name of practically any other tune here].

~I CAN DO THIS!!  WHY DO AUDITIONS FREAK ME OUT?!

So.

Another learning experience. Which is always a good thing. Another audition under my belt.  The director said he'd email, but my zero expectations are even less than zero now. Hopefully blogging this will allow me to LET IT GO. Learn from the experience, make better decisions, and do better next time.