The Lips The Teeth The Tip Of The Tongue

Yesterday I had an audition. It was for Chicago Shakespeare Company. Very prestigious, very cool. I, however, am not equity, therefore I was only able to come in for the open call. The eight hour wait for the open call.
So here's how it went.
I went downtown to the equity office. Which is housed in the Chicago Public Schools building, I found that odd for some reason. I got there around noonish/noon 30 ish and was told to come back after lunch. K. I come back around 2:15ish with two decent monologues prepared. Comedic contemporary and dramatic classical. Contrasting, with levels and all that crap. So I re-check in and start waiting. And I waited. 3 o'clock, 4 o'clock, 4:30 o'clock. The line didn't seem to be getting any shorter. In the meanwhile I met some fellow non-equity, walk-in actors who seemed cool and just as eager as me to get in there.
Well it seemed as if we weren't getting in there. Around 4:35ish the moderator asked for all the non-equity headshots. After a bit, she comes out and announces 5 names that should stay and the rest should come back at the next open call in March.
I was asked to stay.
Woo hoo! right? My headshot was hot or interesting enough that they wanted to see me speak. Or my name was high enough on the check-in list that they felt guilty about making me wait around all day. But I'm gonna stick with my intriguing looks, it helps the self-esteem.
Next was more waiting because I was 4 on the list of 5. So, of course, I proceed to over pound my two monologues into my head and start the process of freaking out my nerves. Great.
My time has come. I walk into the freezing, but non-intimidating room where two people sit, awaiting my work. I have chosen a Posthumus monologue from Cymbeline. "Yea bloody cloth..." and such. So I have a hankerchief that I have cast as my bloody cloth and I begin to speak the speech, trippingly on the tongue. I begin fine but somewhere around the middle I go up. Wonderful. I concentrate on my bloody cloth, not dropping focus but silently "searching for the words on my prop." Oh, they weren't there. I tried to skip ahead in the speech but realized I wasn't making any sense. So I thanked them, they thanked me, I walked out, no apologies.
These things happen. Even to the best of us. Unfortunately, I would have liked to wow them with my contemporary monologue but given the late hour and my "biff" as it were, they did not need to hear it.
Well maybe me and Shakes will meet again next year. Here's hoping.

Struggling but forging.

Nate