All Time London Low…Part 1

I think you realise your ‘small town girl goes to big city’ acting career has reached an all time low when your only possibility of an audition in the near future is for the part of ‘naked dead girl in Epping forest’ for which the advert buoyantly informs you you will be paid £60 and they will endeavour to keep you warm during the days filming.

So not only, after four years of actor training, did I have to audition to play a corpse, but also my only chance of working thus far in 2010 is to lay naked in a forest ‘titi a l’air’ covered with leaves for warmth. Joy.

The audition requirements were enough to put any sane human off. The producer (who is male) curtly informed me (a female) that I should wear ‘easy to slip off’ clothing so I could get down to my undies quick enough for their five-minute-slot audition time. Of course they wouldn’t want me to hold up the other desperate out-of-work corpses, queuing in the spotlight offices outside, by fumbling nervously with fabrics which impede the quick-flash.

‘Easy to slip off’ clothing it was then.

He then informed me that if I felt uncomfortable auditioning in this manner with two males in the room (the lead actor and the producer) then I could ask for a female to be present.

Did I feel uncomfortable?

After four years training and two years of rejection, followed by a brief two-month spell in Shakespeare playing to – at worst – five non-English speaking tourists, two Chinese toddlers and – at best – to the cast’s family and friends, did I feel uncomfortable walking into this room? Of walking up to two men in some ‘easy to slip off’ tracky bottoms, whipping them down and exposing my marginally overweight body, so that these strangers could assess if I was suitably corpse-like?

Did this idea make me feel uncomfortable?

Absolutely not.

Would I do it for £60 and the assurance of some dry leaves for warmth?

Absolutely not.

Image by Horia Varlan courtesy of Flickr