I woke up today to find out That70’sScott had chimed in on my list of funny quotes to say he was a good Irish Catholic boy and did not actually do drugs in the 70’s.
All I can say to this is a shrug and “Welp, you made a loooooooot of jokes about it. Whether you actually did or not I certainly cannot say, but it was funny. Which I assumed is what you were going for in the first place.” Also, “whether or not you actually did, I cannot say, because I was occupied with not being alive for most of the 70’s and the other bit of it was being a baby, we can only go on your word.” Also, “whatever, dude.”

At work, I had a meeting with another department and two of the people over there gave me a box of presents--a token of appreciation, a thank you note pad and some candy. How sweet!

Now on to the auditions for As You Like It! (Same theater company as TnT, if I haven’t clarified that.)

Old friends returning from Tony N’ Tina:
(a) Jesse (Father Mark), who I think is...possibly doing something assistant-y in this? Unsure, said he was prepping for the play he’ll direct in the fall. Not sure on his Shakespeare expertise, he mentioned hanging out in Ashland but mostly just drinking with the actors.
(b) Germaine (costumes), who turns out to be a former Shakespeare teacher and adapted the script to cut out the dull bits and make some parts for women. Unclear if she’s going to be in it or not exactly?
(c) Cameron (Donna), who turns out to have a degree in Shakespeare Studies from Ashland (“that’s why I work in real estate”) and says it’s easy to learn, I shall go on what she says. She also was in All’s Well That Ends Well, as Diana, wearing a blonde wig. Apparently since Cameron is a short haired brunette IRL, nobody recognized her in that play, period.
(d) Brian (Joey), also seems to be doing well and has done Shakespeare before (12th Night), that surprised me.
(e) Laurel (Connie), whose mom died after the play. She seems to be doing pretty well, all things considered there--girl does seem to be naturally cheerful. Or like me in that you get used to the idea after long deterioration, perhaps, I dunno. I don’t think she has done Shakespeare before either. (Oh, and I got it clarified that the chick she humped in the play was HER sister, not Scott’s. That at least makes more sense.) Has also been to the Ashland festival a ton.
(f) Yarn Empire Scott (Dominic) who also like me turns out to have never done a lick of Shakespeare either AND ALSO NEVER READ THE PLAY BEFORE TONIGHT, EITHER. You would not have guessed. Dude just fucking knocked it out of the park on everything he read. Wowza. He and Cameron especially impressed the shit out of me today.

New folks I’ll get to mentioning (though I didn’t get everyone’s names so well, this may or may not come up later):
* Laure, the director, seems very fun and enthusiastic so far, has that kind of kooky energy you know I’m down with (reminds me of my therapist a bit?).
* Elizabeth, who saw TnT and liked it, seems very sweet. In my head I’d cast her as Celia, who the director said was one of the sweetest characters in Shakespeare.
* Phil, who is the third Shakespeare expert in the bunch. I guess he is doing the kids’ Shakespeare program in Winters too. I kinda want to dub him the Shakespearean equivalent of That70’sScott in this production (note: when we were discussing That70’sScott, Cameron and I were sort of horrified at the idea of him doing Shakespeare, or at least she quoted from a movie I forgot the title of “do you know all of your lines?” “yes” “in the right order?”) because he’s very big in his voice and acting and he actually talks very slowly-ish, which threw me off a bit because my brain is usually on hyperspeed, but I’m sure he talks the way everyone else wishes I would!
* Isadora, a little girl who wanted to audition. I think she’d probably get the role of a page, under the circumstances. Everyone thought she was very cute and she comes well recommended from I forget what other show (It’s A Wonderful Life?). I sort of wonder if her/her mom would have issues with play rehearsals running late since our former Joey had to leave early and he was like, 15. Oh well, not my problem to figure out.

I should probably mention that during the introductions, some folks mentioned their Shakespeare cred and others like me, uh...well, I was all “Hey, I bought this copy of No Fear Shakespeare and checked out some books from the library, so we’ll see how this goes!” Scott said he’d have to go get it too later.

Anyway, we just read through most of the play tonight, skipping a few scenes here and there, and she’d pick out various people to read various parts. So I did Le Beau (turned into a lady, I got to expound upon the joys of watching dudes wrestle), Rosalind, Adam the servant briefly (also being turned into a woman, let’s see how that goes with the name), Celia, and Phoebe. After it was over she asked if anyone wanted to read specific parts and I asked specifically to read Phoebe’s monologue about how she both finds Ganymede hot and yet super annoying. The Shakespeare books I got from the library over the past few days covered it and said it had a lot of antithesis stuff in in that was opposite from each other, so I thought that’d be fun to read. Or alternately do as an audition if I ever actually memorize a Shakespeare audition piece in my life.

Several people got to read Jaques (the one mopey dude in a pastoral comedy, does the “all the world's a stage” speech you always hear about with Shakespeare) and Cameron was SUPER into doing that. It may be a tossup as to whether or not she or Scott was the MOST into it between the two of them because they both rocked it. I was amused at Scott insisting on putting his legs up on the table to read it (and then I was all “he has a knee brace! damn!”), and later he was all “oh, I forgot about that.”

Scott and I were also laughing our heads off during a lot of the reading, I felt like we’d somehow turned into the Giggle Twins. Either that or we just like the dirty jokes. I also cracked up when at random points he started doing a Scottish accent (“it just comes out”) and at one point started talking like Dominic and then tried to choke himself to stop. I wanted to be all, "I miss Dominic, he can stay!" even if, y'know, it was not so appropriate so much to this show. Would amuse me though to see him doing Shakespeare in all the different accents.

About the parts: I wrote down on my form that I’d take anything but preferred “something small” like maybe Phoebe (note: girl who’s being bothered by a guy who’s in love with her and that she doesn’t love back, BEEN THERE, falls in love with Rosalind while she’s disguised as a boy named Ganymede even though Rosalind straight up tells her she’s not very hot and needs to take what she can get. It ends badly) or Audrey (marries Touchstone the fool, even smaller part there, tends to go on about how she’s an ugly virgin). Or one of the dudes that are converted into ladies, I guess.

About the one part I straight up would not want would be Rosalind because ain’t no way I can play a dude (other than in improv shows, but the standard is way lower there) or pass for one. At one point in childhood I was forced to play one of the New Kids On The Block (which one? I think it was Donnie but it’s not like I know the fucking difference...) and jeebus, it was terrible. I do not quite think that would be the role for me or that anyone else would think so so I am not super concerned on this, but I am kinda wondering now on Celia because I got people laughing when I was reading the part where she found Orlando’s letters all over the forest and was teasing Rosalind about who left them. I like Celia (she deserves better than Oliver, dammit) but that’s more lines so I kinda hope not there. God only knows how I’m gonna memorize this stuff in the first place, though Cameron is very reassuring about that.

Anyway, just for shits n’ giggles, here are my guesses on who gets cast as what. I’d probably pick Cameron for Rosalind (physically fits the profile, tall, already has short hair, would rock it), though Cameron would probably also prefer Jacques, but that is more likely to go to a dude. I’d definitely go with Elizabeth for Celia because she seems so sweet. I’d pick myself for Phoebe but I’m biased. I’d probably say Laurel for Audrey--she never got to read that part but I can kinda see her as more cheerful innocent country lass than the other parts. (Unsure if Audrey is going to stay a young woman though, as at least one older lady, Carol, read for her at the director’s instruction. Who knows.) Brian...I dunno, maybe Orlando or Silvius, I’m not sure where she’d want to go with that particular part. He seems like he’d be on the more innocent side? Scott doesn’t know what part he’d want (not that he knows all the parts--Cameron explained more of them afterwards) and I’m not sure what he’d get but I am sure he’d rock whatever. He did a very passionate Orlando and Silvius, and somehow I think he could also pull off the evil Oliver even though nobody ever got to read that part, so who knows. I think he could do better than Oliver but I’m not sure who they’d cast for it other than him? Tossup there. I can’t even make guesses about the older dudes and their roles since they all did well at whatever they read. Isadora will be the page, I think that’s a slam dunk.

I am pleased to report that (a) everyone in general was really good at this, which is surprising, and (b) I wrote down what the director said to me about it, “For someone who hasn’t done Shakespeare, you do it very well!” SCORE, Y’ALL!!!!

I asked about callbacks, being called, etc. and that was kind of hard to get an answer out of her for that one but she said she had written down a lot of notes about casting but still had some blanks, she was going to see who came tomorrow (others of our TnT cohort/from other Shakespeare shows were emailed but I guess not doing it--Manny, Heidi, Valentin, Ana, Greg are out of town, I guess a lot of people are all out at the same out of state wedding!) and then figure it out from there. She said she wouldn’t do callbacks and would just cast people but wanted to think it out for a week. Rehearsal doesn’t start until June 13 so I guess I have until then to wait and wonder. I sort of wonder if this is gonna be another “just don’t contact you if you don’t get in” situation or not, but Cameron seemed pretty sure a call would happen and she has worked with this lady before. I think the TnT crew in general is pretty sure they are all getting in for something and we were reassured that there are lots of parts.

The TnT folks all hung out for a bit afterwards and had a great time talking about Ashland, the parts, hitting various animals with cars (it’s a theme today, swear to god), how Laurel is doing and the whole “yes, that was her sister and not Scott’s that she humped” thing, and everyone was very happy to be reunited again. And assuming we will reunite again. :) There does seem to be a certain bond between us all that everyone else thinks is unusual in theater. This isn't common? I dunno. Kind of reminds me of when I was in a coven back in the day because folks said that too then.

I am seriously wondering if everybody who auditions for this one is going to get in. I kind of wonder how many don't get in, actually? I think almost everyone I was in with for TnT got in...ish, I can think of one lady who was around the first few times and then wasn't. I looked at the theater website and it sounded a lot like everyone does. If so, huzzah, eh?

I am bouncing off walls right now and it’s 11 and I’m supposed to be tired enough to go to bed. Argh, y’all!

Okay, time to focus on something else tomorrow, like my storytelling event on Friday.

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