How Failing My First Renaissance Festival Audition Made Me A Better Performer

Thank You Steve Denz for your advice way back in 1993

Ever since I was 10 years old I was obsessed with King Henry VIII. Or to be accurate, the portrayal of King Henry VIII by Keith Michell in the BBC television serial The Six Wives of Henry VIII. To quote Queen Katherine of Aragon in Six The Musical “If you had seen him in the summer of “09. Let me tell you he was okay!”

I spent so much of my teenage years heavily involved in the Hillsdale Community Theater and their Children’s Theater. I rarely had large roles, as I was what I felt was a terrible at auditioning. So even though I majored in drama at Interlochen Arts Academy and got a Bachelor of Arts in Dramatic Art from The George Washington University I rarely was cast in anything throughout the 80’s.

I used as an excuse that I was working a full-time job at Friends of the National Zoo which required me to work weekends, therefore I was unavailable for weekend matinees. Occasionally I did small roles and chorus parts at Little Theatre of Alexandria and in the Theatresports improvisation troupe.

To keep my foot in the theatrical door I started taking classes through DC’s Shakespeare Theatre Company. My favorite instructor was Floyd King who invited me to take his audition class. It was in this class that I learned to break bad habits. The first is apologizing if I flubbed a monologue, needed to start over or the pianist played my audition piece at the wrong tempo. The second was to get myself out in the world and just keep auditioning. I started doing 3 or 4 auditions a week and learned that not being cast, which happened often, was not the end of the world.

Then I got pregnant.

After the shock my first joyous reaction was this.

“OMG, I am going to be seven months pregnant at The Actors’ Center auditions! I will stand out!”

The Actors’ Center is an organization in Washington DC that provided a space for actors to gather, do readings, work on audition pieces and so forth. They also sponsored the largest mass audition for the professional theaters in the DC and Baltimore area. You go in and have 1-2 minutes to stand out. I chose to do Shakespeare’s 29^th sonnet,

“When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes

I all alone beweep my outcast state,…”

I got a lot of chuckles from the theater representatives saying that while heavily pregnant.

When my son was one I decided to start seriously auditioning again. Given my love of the court of Henry VIII I decided to audition for the professional acting company at the Maryland Renaissance Festival. I auditioned with Sonnet 29 as they wanted a classical piece, followed by a short improvisation.

I didn’t get cast.

The following weekend I went to a friends’ house for a backyard barbeque. Attending was their friend, Stephen Denz who had been one of the people behind the audition table for the Maryland Renaissance Festival. Steve was a long time cast member dating from the previous entertainment director who believed that the name of your village character reflected your profession or personality. Steve was the village doctor, Dr. Croaker. We struck up a conversation over barbeque and he gave me sage advice.

Part of the problem was my age. I was 31 at the time but looked younger. As is true for a lot of auditions the largest group of actors is younger women between 18-34. You have to find a way to stand out or you are just another interchangeable actor competing to play the ingenue roles. Steve told me to auditon again the next year specifically to be loud and over the top as performing in a venue with 20000 plus attendees means you have to be able to be heard over the crowds. You must be memorable, and not get mistaken as a paid customer dressed up to attend a renaissance fair.

Stephen also recommended I get a job working at the Festival. So, I did. I worked games, mostly a frog catapult game where children paid to launch frogs at targets mostly hitting me. More importantly two members of the acting company regularly interacted with me. One of them, Rick Amick had a side job handling the payroll for the games. The other Mary Ann Jung taught us to speak in “Renaissance” language. I made a point to cry out “God Save the King! God Bless the Queen!” and deeply curtsey whenever the royal court passed by my games. I took my breaks and saw the storyline shows that year, Queen Jane Seymour was heavily pregnant. Would she give birth to the longed-for Prince? Spoiler alert. Yes. It was a good education in what being an actor at the Maryland Renaissance Festival entailed.

The next year I had three people who knew me on the other side of the audition table. I chose to do a piece that a lot of younger women do for audition, Helena from A Midsummer Night’s Dream the “how happy some or other some can be..” The speech where Helena decides to betray her BFF Hermia and tell Demetrius that Hermia and Lysander are running away. A lot of actresses perform that soliloquy as a woe is me I am so lovesick I will betray my best friend who is facing life in a nunnery or execution. You may wonder how did I make myself stand out in the crowd of those auditioning?

I screamed.

I screamed and launched into the speech with hatred. How dare Hermia get her way, and I can’t get Demetrius to give me the time of day ever since “some heat from Hermia” was felt by her love! I ranted, I raved, I showed heartbreak and took my time deciding to betray the lovers.

I got the job.

My dear friend, Steve passed away this week. As the actor who once played King Henry VIII, the late Bill Huttel used to say a to say at the end of the performing day.

“Until we meet again in this life…or the next….Godspeed.”

Flights of Angels sing thee to thy rest, Steve.