So...I am actually about to be a working actress. Paid to act &travel. Complete bliss? Okay, not quite. 16 hours on a bus a day, 19 states in just over two months, a different city every week day, and not exactly doing a show that entails great acting ability ormoving plot (it's children's educational theatre). But hell - Icouldn't possibly be luckier. I went to FIVE auditions. That's it. In New York. The numbers in competition against me for each role are unfathomable, and more than anything I wanted a touring show, and -rock-star-to-be that I am - I got it!
Yeah, I'm a little high right now.
The timing couldn't be better. I've been going insane here, really struggling with moving back in with the psycho-drone parental units, floundering back and forth between the belief that I can suck it up long enough to save some money and spend time looking for some work in the city I might enjoy, and freaking out over the fact that I will go completely ballistic and get committed if I stay here indefinitely with no hope for future redemption.
I considered becoming a cop. Scary statement, non? There's always commercials for NYPD recruiting opportunities. Good pay, great benefits, unique experience, not 9 to 5 in an office, and would get me long sought for approval from the 'rents and out of their house. And now - it seems unnecessary to resort to such possible betrayal of ethics. (Though I do think it would be an amazingly interesting experience.)
The tour is through the National Theatre of Performing Arts & Dandelion Productions. The show is (please laugh with me)"Great Scientists Through the Ages".
Oh yes. Genious performances to be given, probably to elementary school kids.
A start, it is.
I am so psyched. I will be making more money than I did at the radio station (which of course, isn't saying shit, but nonetheless...) AND paying no rent at the same time. AND no taxes are taken out. Plus, the beautiful(hopefully) experience of spending 2 1/2 months embarking upon an incredibly bonding adventure, in very close quarters, with 9 strangers.
Crazy thought, non?
We spend two weeks rehearsing in Bridgeport, Connecticut. Cool factoid: several other touring shows all rehearse at the same time and are put up in the same hotel together, so for two weeks the hotel will be over run with at least a couple dozen actors. I anticipate great fun, great connections, and to learn much hearing of others experience of the biz. Then two months of 5 shows a week. My tour is east coast down to South Caronlina, west to Texas, up to Montana,Ohio, and most of those other places inbetween. Hey - I've always sucked at the geography of those seemingly irrelevant mid-west states (no offense to all those I just offended!) and now I'll finally get it down! No Arizona :(