10 am
Uta Hagen has a book An Actor Prepares. I have a blog An Actor Neurotics. I read the script again, first time in thirty years. Watched the movie again. Again, was grumpy at how different the two are. There are no men in the play except to be discussed and alluded to. I have never loved this script, I feel like the women are stereotypes and they speak in platitudes. It was written by a man, and I don't like any man's female characters except Edward Albee. His women I understand. Steel Magnolias seems to be an extended stereotype intended to make women cry for monetary gain (ticket sales). It works, don't get me wrong, but it's transparent. And I'm judgy.
The men in the play are referred to as couch potatoes and neanderthals. Largely useless, beer drinking entities who do not help out at all. But when they made the movie they cast Tom Skerritt and Sam Shepard and well....they aren't going to play that now, are they? So the movie skews away from the man bashing in the original script quite a bit, allowing these sympathetic, and hard working husbands to emerge---albeit quietly. They aren't given a lot of lines. And that softens the blow a bit, and frankly gives the story a bit more balance.
Just my opinion.
The stereotype, however, is part of what makes it fun. Ouiser is a bitter old southern woman, the end. No need to dig too deeply. Truvy is pretty. Clairee is dignified. M'lynn is a mom. Shelby is an ornery child trying to live her own life but is ultimately a moron. Annelle is a "survivor", pulling herself up after the criminal husband leaves her. And Scene. They all hang out in a beauty shop and gossip about the town. Because that's what women do, apparently. It's really a play about drag queens, let's be honest. I volunteer to direct that version!
I used to feel the same way about Crimes of the Heart, until recently. I looped it into my Acting 1 class and got some really nice work out of the girls. Turns out there's more there than meets the eye when you work on it. Maybe that's my problem with Steel Magnolias, I just don't understand it.
I don't need to understand it or even like it to want to be in it. I can't explain why, it'd just be fun to act again.
So I had to drag out a monologue. Everything I have no longer works for anyone over 30, except for Aunt Maddy which is 10 minutes long. Not an audition monologue. So I pulled an old one from Soap Dish, as it can work with a southern dialect and it's short, and "ageless". It'll be fine.
I looked up the map, the theatre is 28 minutes from my house. Armed with this information I will still arrive 30 minutes early and end up sitting in the parking lot, texting Eric.
If callbacks are tomorrow or Monday, I can't go, I have auditions for Willy Wonka. There is no callback time listed on the audition notice.
I had a terrible nightmare last night, in it the person they hired to replace me as director took over my entire office and let choir kids hang out all the time. It was awful. So I didn't get a great night of sleep, which is good. I look older.
My lower back/hip has been seizing for a week, I overdid it last Saturday at the gym, so I walk with one hand on my back. I also tore up my pinkie toe breaking in shoes, so I limp. Again: good for age. :)
I look down at my hands. I have 4 remaining long fake nails from my last manicure adventure with Harper, three weeks ago. The other 6 have been broken off and hacked at. Another mess that is so me. So I clip two of the nails down and leave the longer thumb nails for balance. If they notice my nails, I've failed anyway, dunno why I bother. It's something to do I suppose.
I have nothing to wear. I coach "Don't dress for a role, dress nicely. Not prom nice, just church nice." I stand in my closet looking at the hodge podge of hand me downs and funky pants and maxi skirts and realize I don't have "church clothes". So do I go for it as me, since I already am Ouiser, or try to find neutral pieces to cobble together, that may look worse than just committing to poor taste. Or Nathan Lane? I can do Nathan Lane pretty easily. Dear God I cannot even dress myself.
Just messaged Eric, he recommends the heart ruffle shirt my mother in law gave me. I always get compliments from older women when I wear it, good call.
Jim made breakfast, I guess I'll go shower?
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In the shower I realize it's a rant, not a monologue. I can alter my Carrie Fischer Postcards From the Edge in a way that it still works. I'll do that.
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I arrive 30 minutes early. I text Eric about the tattooed young lady having a cigarette outside the theatre--which is in a strip mall that also contains other businesses. We decide she's the stage manager. An orange mini arrives, and a disheveled man carrying a pile of papers (clearly scripts), a brown to go bag, what looks like mike stands and his car keys in his mouth, stumbles to the theatre. He returns moments later, moves his car around the block, returns and parks in the same spot, emerges with more papers. He returns to his car a third time to retrieve something I cannot identify before it's time for me to go in.
I have identified the director!
The young lady, however, turns out to be an employee at another shop in the strip mall.
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I have been the wrong age my entire career.
In my 20's I read older, and rarely was considered because actors who were actually 30 were better than me. Then I took a decade plus off to be a mom and a teacher. Landing me here, a young looking 50, and still the wrong age.
The callback went well. Again, Nice People! And I nailed reading for both Ouiser and Clairee. He has a definite type in mind for the other roles that I do not fit, and that's fine. I would have liked to read for M'lynn but it was clear he had a specific type in mind.
It was a joy to sit there as an actor and watch the proceedings without my judgey director hat.
I had the best time! I got to be an old southern grumpy and he read enough scenes for me to be funny physically, create a character, nail the meter in the text,and cry! I got to CRY I never get to cry! He was auditioning M'lynn's, you know "My daughter can't run to Texas....why is she dead..." and all I had to do was control my crying until Clairree shoved me down front "Hit her!"
IT WAS THE BEST ABSOLUTELY THE BEST MOMENT!!!
'cause I was actually crying, so I had to say "are you high" through tears and anger and surprise and WHO EVER GETS TO DO THAT?
Dang I MISS ACTING!
They have more auditions tomorrow, and I'm confident that I am too young to get cast. But I had such a great time, I'm going to look up more auditions tonight and go to another one.
I get it now! 20 years too late but still, I GET IT!
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