Auditions are tricky. The dread you feel at the inevitable heartbreak is balanced with the joy of seeing all the possibilities for your show and students. With over 80 students auditioning for our shows, we’ve learned a lot of lessons and streamlined our approach. Our goal is for students to have fun with auditions while still showcasing their abilities.
At our annual end-of-the-year banquet, we announce the shows of the upcoming season. The next day, we make scripts available to our company members for each show. Our students eagerly devour the material, often reading a script that very same weekend. For most students, they will read the scripts over the summer when they aren’t as pressed for time. Reading through the script in advance puts actors a step ahead of other actors who have no idea what the play is about. (Making scripts available is also essential for students who are interested in applying for design positions.)
For each show, we put together an audition packet. Our auditions for the musical happen right as school starts, and providing the audition packet early allows students to prepare effectively. The audition packet contains need-to-know information like:
- Name of the show to be cast
- Brief description and/or tagline of the show
- Names and descriptions of characters to be cast
- Date, time, and place of auditions
- When the production is slated to rehearse and run so that those with unavoidable scheduling conflicts won’t waste their (or your) time
- Contact information where they can ask questions
- Attire for the audition. If there’s going to be some dance, let the performers know so that they can dress accordingly
In the audition packet, we explain what students should prepare for their audition. For our musical, we have from songs of the show. If actors are auditioning for a specific role, we ask them to prepare that character’s song. If actors are auditioning for ensemble, they can audition with any song in the packet. We do not have students prepare for our musical because we believe performers should be able to act the song. I encourage our actors to treat this song as they would a in their preparation. HERE is a sample audition packet.
We typically supply our students’ audition materials to create a more even playing field. Asking students to select their own audition material is often quite stressful. Typically students do not know many plays or musicals and so we often see imitations of musical soundtrack or film performances. If a student selects poor material, we have no way to find out if the student can do something else better. For example, we asked students to prepare a for a contemporary comedy, and we had three students perform dramatic Shakespeare . Because our students are not professionals, they didn’t have other material in their back pocket.
We ask for our students to memorize their audition for a variety of reasons. One, it helps us see who has prepared effectively. There is a big difference in an audition where a student is focusing on recall and a student who is acting. Two, students have a tendency to hold their audition material in front of their face and with nerves, the paper is often trembling. Students become so invested in reading the material that they aren’t able to act fully, and we can’t really see them!
In the audition packet, we also include scenes that may be used in the call back process. In high school, you have students with varying levels of ability both as actors and readers. If a particular student struggles with reading, this allows them time to familiarize themselves with the material.
Once the audition packet is released, we hold audition workshops. The workshop walks students through how the audition works, and we teach the songs from the packet. This provides a more even playing field for our auditionees and helps students who are interested in trying for the first time feel comfortable entering this process. If you are starting or growing a program, I highly recommend you run audition workshops.
To ease the transition between our middle school and high school program, we often run a separate workshop for incoming freshmen. We found that our incoming freshmen were often intimidated by our current company members and this separate workshop provided a safe and comfortable environment that would encourage them to actually audition.
Finally, it’s time for students to sign-up for the auditions. We use a Google form to manage our sign-up process. We actually consider our audition sign-ups the first phase of auditions. Check out our musical form HERE. On the form, we gather basic information from the actors, and also information that helps in the casting process. Many directors like to interview their actors, and this is the time we ask our actors those questions.
One of the first questions we ask our actors is what level of responsibility they would like. of responsibility typically reflects time students will have to invest in the production through things like rehearsal and line memorization. Leads are often your large responsibility, and roles like cameos are small responsibility. For students juggling many things in their life, this is very important and you should honor their requests. If we feel a student is perfect for a role that would require more responsibility, we ask them if they would consider a larger responsibility. Most often they say unless they are not comfortable or they know they will not be able to invest the time.
If we know we are going to have a very large audition pool for a small number of roles, we will often ask questions like “What does hard work mean to you?” It then becomes very clear who is investing the time and energy into the audition, and this can be tremendously helpful in the casting process.
As students sign up, we make a list of the most important roles to be cast, along with their genders, and other potentially helpful information. But don't let yourself be boxed in here creatively. Don't just be color-blind when casting, but where possible, be gender-blind as well (if your contract allows it! Always read the fine print.). Get rid of your pre-set ideas about character and see what you get in the audition process -- you may be pleasantly surprised!
Once you've listed out the roles to cast, you'll want to rank them according to importance. The tougher the role is to cast, the higher it should be on your list. Make supplemental lists of supporting characters that can be easily cast from those who do not make the cut for the leads.
Whenever a cast list goes up, you will invariably be accused of favoritism, bias, or prejudice against actors– no matter what choices you make. Be proactive in preventing this, by using an audition panel to defend your choices. We prefer our audition panel to be 3 adults. For our musical, our audition panel is composed of the music director, the choreographer, me (the director). If you do not have a separate adult in each of these positions, reach out to other teachers to ask if they would sit on your panel (I ask two teachers to help me for our play auditions). Not only does using an audition panel prevent the casting decision as being seen as your opinion, this panel is helpful to the casting process because they will help you see things you did not initially and serve as a sounding board for your ideas.
Because we have so many students auditioning for a musical, we split the audition into four groups over two days. We call each audition session a round. At the beginning of each round, we bring the entire group into the audition space. We begin by introducing the audition panel, followed by a five-minute warm-up routine and short mental meditation. The mental meditation models healthy ways of thinking about auditions and gets performers in the headspace you would like them to be in. An actor that feels comfortable will be more likely to give you a better performance that reveals their skills.
As a group, we begin with a technique we call “cold singing.” The music director teaches the entire group the melody of a very easy chorus from a show song. Once they've learned the easy melody, we ask the group to go on stage and perform this song as various characters (think similar to character walks). This part of the audition is not about singing or musical ability, but about students’ ability to play, follow direction, and take risks onstage. The characters we ask for are sometimes show related but can also range from cats to military generals to opera singers. I encourage them to make strong physical choices, and to have fun with it! By making them go for it right away and being silly, it allows students to see that the audition is not so terrible and that everyone else is doing it. Their friends encourage them, you encourage them, and they are having fun.
After the cold singing, it’s time for the individual auditions. To prepare for this, I have printed out each student’s audition form and placed it in a binder in order. I make a binder for each member of the audition panel, so we all have access to the same information. If we want to use any rubric or scoring methods, we print that on the back of the audition form. Always take notes. Write down the first things that attract you in an actor's performance and any roles that immediately jump to mind.
Say something positive and final at the end of each audition. Remember, these actors are the ones sticking their necks out for you, and it takes a lot of courage. Always, always, always thank them! Again, this is not an acting class, so do not give notes on their performance. It’s helpful to start by saying “Thank you so much for coming, I’ve seen everything I need right now.” Then follow up with information or directions. Things like, “Please wait in the lobby for your dance audition” or “You are free to go home. The callback list will be sent out via email by Thursday night,” work great because they communicate what the actor should do next.
After everyone has sung individually in Round 1, we begin the dance auditions. We combine two rounds together for one dance audition. The schedule often looks like this: Round 1 auditions from 2:30 PM to 4:00 PM; Dance auditions from 4:00 PM to 5:00 PM for Rounds 1 and 2; Round 2 auditions from 5:30 PM to 7:00 PM. We repeat this process for Rounds 3 and 4 the next day.
We finish our auditions with and immediately sit down to determine the cast list. We always post our cast list on a Friday after school so that students have the weekend to process and recover if needed. We list the roles alphabetical by character name so as not to create any emphasis on a particular role because all roles are important. We also email the cast list to each auditionee so that they can open it and react in privacy (and not publicly in school).
The best way to gain and keep parental approval is to keep them informed. We send out a letter to all guardians of students who have been cast letting them know about the rehearsal schedule, expectations, and our “Meet the Company” night. “Meet the Company” night is where we explain our organization, how it works, and ask parents to volunteer. We have all company members and their guardians attend this event.
We allow audition feedback ONE WEEK after auditions. This allows for parents and students to remove the emotions from the situation. It is important that this policy is publicly placed prior to auditions. I also only give feedback to the student who auditioned, not their parent. At each audition feedback session, I start with two questions. What were you proud of in your audition? What do you wish you could have improved on?
I find that theater teaches students (and parents) how to deal with rejection, but for the most part, we put out a cast list and the kids have to figure out how to handle the rejection for themselves. We as teachers often miss the crucial step of modeling or explaining how they should handle the "rejection." I write a letter that accompanies our cast list to help students (and parents) through this process. I also always try to humanize myself in the process (helpful to remind others that we are, in fact, humans!). The last letter I wrote sounded like this:
"When I am not cast after what I feel is a great , my first reaction is a mix of anger and self-doubt. I prepared the material, I cried on cue, my tactics were unique—so why wasn't I chosen? I inevitably turn inward and start to rip apart my performance and consequently, myself.
These feelings are pretty normal and natural, but they’re also not very helpful. So, take a breath and remember, many casting decisions are not about how talented you are, but who is the right fit. As much as we love Will Ferrell, he would never be cast as James or Amy Poehler as Katniss.
When I am not cast, I take the time to review my audition and write down what I did well, and what I can work on. I turn my 'rejected' feeling into motivation. Download the music from 'Rocky' and start focusing on your next move. Get pumped. Set goals. Use that energy to make changes and improvements for your next audition."
While this is what we’ve found for our program, we are constantly evolving. How you create and run your auditions is up to you, but the idea “directing is 65% casting” really holds water. What audition practices do you use to create great audition experiences?