Audition: Everything an Actor Needs to Know to Get the Part

215 Pages·2003·1.35 MB·English

by  Michael Shurtleff

Audition
Audition
Everything an Actor Needs
to Know to Get the Part
Michael Shurtleff
Copyright © 1978 by Michael Shurtleff
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electric or mechanical, including
photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the Publisher.
First published in the United States of America in 1978 by the Walker
Publishing Company, Inc.
Published simultaneously in Canada by Thomas Allen & Son Canada,
Limited, Markham, Ontario
eISBN: 978-0-80271902-7
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 77-90134
Printed in the United States of America
30 29 28 27 26 25 24 23
to Onna and to Keith
Contents
Foreword by Bob Fosse
Prologue
1
Practical Aspects of the Audition
2
The Twelve Guideposts
Guidepost 1
Relationship
Guidepost 2
What are You Fighting For? Conflict
Guidepost 3
The Moment Before
Guidepost 4
Humor
Guidepost 5
Opposites
Guidepost 6
Discoveries
Guidepost 7
Communication and Competition
Guidepost 8
Importance
Guidepost 9
Find the Events
Guidepost 10
Place
Guidepost 11
Game Playing and Role Playing
Guidepost 12
Mystery and Secret
3
Consistency
4
Some Things an Actor Needs to Know
5
Monologues, Soliloquies, Style
6
Pace
7
Romance
8
Musical Theatre
9
Comedy
10
Simplicity
11
Observations from a Life in the Theatre
Epilogue
My thanks go to two remarkable Broadway producers, Stuart Ostrow and
David Merrick, for their belief in me and for the inimitable opportunities
they gave me to learn.
Foreword
I have never written a foreword before, so I have no knowledge of its
purpose. I called a few of my more literate friends and asked them: Exactly
what should a foreword accomplish? Their general consensus was that it
should predict in some way or other a little of what the reader might expect
to follow. That sounds reasonable enough, but I sensed it was incomplete. I
always tend to feel my friends are misleading me—or at least telling me
only part of what I should know. Of course, you can only expect that from
your closest friends.
Therefore, I read a few forewords to several "How To" books and even to
some novels. I didn't learn too much from them. On the contrary, I found
most of them too long, too academic, or, in some cases, as if the writer of
the foreword was in competition with the writer of the book and was trying
to out-write him—so to speak. It was a little like a five-round preliminary
writing bout. The foreword writer would swing a left obscure verb to the
jaw and shortly follow with a seven syllable adjective—one that would
immediately send me running to the nearest fat dictionary.
Feeling I wanted nothing to do with any of these approaches, I was
forced to do my own thinking (something I try to postpone as long as
possible) about what I would like to say about Michael Shurtleff and this
book.
First off, I would like to go on record as saying that I consider this book
to be absolutely indispensable to any aspiring, or even mildly ambitious,
actor. There is NO book of which I am aware that gives an actor such first-
rate, clear-cut, no-nonsense advice. God knows there have been a goodly
supply of books written about acting and the theatre, but none that I've read
are so usefully straightforward and practical as this one.
I have seen many talented actors not get hired simply because of a poor
audition. It happens all too frequently in the theatre and in films, too.
Michael explains to the reader all the possible situations and predicaments
an actor might expect. Most importantly, he explains clearly how to deal
with them. He even goes into such details as dress. Not important, you say?
Oh, no? Well, read on.
Although the book is directed to helping actors audition successfully (by
that I mean gain employment—get the part—something which is extremely
difficult in today's market; is it 80 or 90 percent of Actor's Equity who are
unemployed?), I began to think that with a little imagination, a little