This past weekend, Much Ado About Nothing opened in strong style – our first preview performance on Thursday was one of the tightest, best received “first” performances I’ve ever been a part of. And the official opening on Saturday was the most fun I’ve had in the two months since I came aboard. The crowd was boisterous and occasionally downright raunchy – in one scene where two of the soldiers appear in vintage 1930’s swimwear, one patron begged them not to leave the stage. It was about a step away from turning into Magic Mike out there.
Which is, honestly, a great audience to have for a Shakespeare comedy. It’s a good idea there’s a bar in the building.
Sunday was consumed with recovering from Saturday night’s post-opening champagne gala, as well as the Oscars. So yesterday was kind of my first day with my life belonging to myself again, with no theatre commitments until Friday. Nonetheless, Shakespeare found its way in.
I started the day with an e-mail from the Texas Shakespeare Festival. The artistic director reached out to inform me that, while they would not be offering me a contract, they had held me over in consideration until the final day of casting, and that it was ultimately a question of ensemble needs and not merit. He expressed hope that I would submit an audition for next season.
Now, who knows if that final day stuff is literally true (I’m confident that this e-mail was cut-and-pasted for a few actors, which is not a criticism at all), but my thoughts are: 1) They didn’t have to send anything, and most companies wouldn’t. 2) Since they held in-person auditions in Chicago, New York, and Memphis, as well as locally in Texas, that I made an impression in such a crowd with a YouTube video is a tremendous compliment. 3) There wouldn’t be any rational motivation to send me such a message if I weren’t good enough (or potentially good enough) on the merits. Actors who aren’t worth their time just take up slots.
That’s a wonderful boost, because while Texas Shakespeare is not Equity, they do offer salary, housing, meals, and travel assistance, which, despite the stipends I’ve occasionally received, would make me feel like an honest-to-Mergatroid Professional Shakespearean Actor. So I think I will audition again next year, just like I will with the other out-of-state festivals I queried.
And before I had a chance to wonder about my open calendar for the summer, I got officially offered a place in Shakespeare Orange County again, which I accepted. This will make my third consecutive summer with the company, and I’ll be playing Peter Quince in A Midsummer Night’s Dream as well as an ensemble role in George M. Cohan’s The Tavern (a non-Shakespeare taking a slot in the company’s newly-expanded season).
SOC’s final show of the season is Romeo & Juliet, and as it stands it appears I won’t be in that show. It’s only a small pity, because no one dies in Midsummer and I had some small hope of continuing my annual tradition of being murdered in an SOC production.
But it does open up a spot in September for me to pursue a production at the Long Beach Playhouse Studio – of Twelfth Night. Always have wanted that one on my resume…