Real Life
This actually happened:
Yesterday, I went to pick up my opera contract from their office and to meet the director who wanted to meet each member of the cast personally- which is really awesome.
Through a series of events, we informally met while we were both getting into the elevator with his assistant and the company’s general manager. He looked at me and said, “You are beautiful! What nationality are you?!” ”I’m filipina,” I said. ”Full on Filipina?” He asked. “Yep, 100%” I said. ”You’re so perfect for this production” (we’re doing the The King and I which isn’t an opera, but the company wanted to do a musical, too) he looks over at his assistant and says, “Who’s covering Tup Tim? *looks over at me* Because you’d be perfect….I mean, I don’t mean to put you on the spot, but you’re just beautiful….*looks back at his assistant* Let’s have her read.”
…..WHAT?! I was there to get my contract for a small part in the Chorus, this is something that only happens in my dreams. The guy directing this production has done some major stuff on Broadway, has directed the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade, a show with the Rocketts and a bunch of productions with different Opera companies across the country.
We get up to the office and he and his assistant go into a room with a big table and a bunch of papers and they start compiling a list of names as I sit in the waiting room. A few minutes later, they call me in and hand me 2 pages of script in Thai, they highlight a few lines and tell me to look over them. About 5 minutes later, they call me into the office and start going through the scene with me. I’ve never spoken Thai in my life and nobody else in the scene is speaking Thai so I couldn’t even really get a feel of how it’s supposed to sound, so I just went for it as best as I could remember from watching a bunch of episodes of Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations or whatever. We went over it a few times and at the end, they seemed to be very impressed. ”That’s the way to sight read! Can we take your picture?!” So they did and he kept talking about how much of a doll I am and etc etc. It was surreal.
So now, I’m just waiting to see. Of course, I’d only be COVERING a role and may not even get to perform it, but it’s still a pretty cool feeling. I have no clue what is going to happen, but that experience in itself is one that I thought only happened to those surprisingly good movie stars. Like you watch a movie with an up and coming actor, and then you watch the extras and the main actress is talking about how they ran into the casting director at Starbucks then threw together an audition or something. I just wanted to write this down so that I could remember that I had one of these experiences. The worst part is that I’m losing my voice for the first time in YEARS because I’ve been too busy to sleep. Seriously. I’ve given 3 concerts in one week, that “audition” was last night and my husband’s friend flew in today and is staying with us.
Indy has been a saint, I explained to him tonight that I may not be able to see him before he goes to bed tomorrow since my school’s Chorus concert is tomorrow night. He looked at me for a few minutes then said, “Can you lay down with me?” So I did. He smelled so good and sweet since I had just given him a bath.
More updates later.
