Chapter 9
Nine
THAT DECEMBER, I RECEIVED a text from Jolly.
Jolly
Ugh I miss you . . .
I replied saying I missed him too, that I was sorry for being a bitch at showcase and I hoped we could be friends again.
He said it was fine, that he regretted things he’d said in the past and that showcase had been a high-pressure situation for everyone.
I rang him then, and he gave me an update on his life.
He told me he’d moved out of Terrence’s place because the cheating bastard had been visiting saunas, that he was now living with a bunch of artists in a warehouse in Hoxton, working a bar job in the West End, and had bagged himself a walk-on role in a Vodafone advert (only ￡150 for the day though).
Then he launched into a tirade accusing me of wasting my talents and ordering me to stop being a fucking drama queen and get back out there again.
After the call, he sent me a link to a website where actors could sign up for workshops with casting directors.
He said he’d been to one recently and found it useful.
I clicked the link and scrolled down the page.
Recommend your friends and family for ￡25 off your next workshop.
It had been nearly six months since I’d made any attempt to interact with the industry. I didn’t know if I could face putting myself out there again. I was comfortable now, finally. I’d found a routine – a fairly boring one, yes, but one where I didn’t feel like a complete and utter fraud each day.
Also, the anniversary of Victoria’s death was fast approaching.
I had planned to retreat from the world, to live out a private vigil for her through December and January.
But then I heard Jolly’s voice in my head.It’s not like if things were the other way round she’d be fucking up her life for you.
And so I created a login, selected a workshop, entered my details and clicked Book now.
It wasn’t cheap – ￡61.50 for a two-hour class – but I figured it would be worth it to perform in front of a proper casting director.
I knew I shouldn’t get my hopes up, that the website made it clear this wasn’t an audition, but for the first time in a long while I felt that small blue spark come alive in my belly again. Tick, tick, tick.
THE WORKSHOP WAS IN a new-build theatre not far from Warren Street.
When I got off the bus, it was raining. Water gushed from the gutters, splashing pedestrians and washing the streets in grey sludge.
I took refuge beneath a Korean restaurant’s awning.
The door opened and a couple emerged. Hot, inviting smells wafted from inside.
I pulled out my makeshift map, but the directions had blurred together in my pocket.
I gave up and spent the next ten minutes walking in circles, until I eventually saw the theatre’s pink neon sign glowing from a side street.
I went to the front desk. ‘Hi, my name’s Shannon Bell. I’m here for the Pamela Swift workshop.’
The young receptionist – blotchy black eyeliner and a spiral of piercings snaking up her ear – paused the contemporary dance video she was watching on her phone and glowered at me through her spiky fringe. She glanced at the sheet in front of her. ‘You’re in Omega. First floor.’
Inside there were eight people, already sitting in a circle.
I found a chair and draped my dripping coat across the back of it.
The girl opposite flashed me a nervous grin.
She had shoulder-length hair and grey-blue eyes.
Like me. I returned the smile but decided not to speak to or make eye contact with anyone else.
I wasn’t like these people. These people were desperate.
I pulled out my notebook and wrote Pamela Swift CD Workshop at the top of the page.
I looked up. It was only then that I noticed a middle-aged woman with long silvery hair sitting hunched in the corner and scrolling through her phone.
She was wearing an expensive-looking camel trouser suit with a pair of tortoiseshell glasses perched on the end of her nose.
The woman gnawed at the skin around her manicured finger. She looked tired, and bored.
The ceiling light flickered; rain battered the window. A few more girls my age and a handful of men in their early twenties entered. Apart from one guy in his forties, nearly everyone there seemed to be a new graduate. I wondered if coming here had been a mistake.
After another five minutes – ten after the posted start time – the woman in the corner got up and dragged her chair over to join the circle. She pulled out a buttery tan leather notebook and, not looking up, delivered a tepid introduction to the session.
‘Hello everyone, and thank you all for coming today.’ She was Australian.
‘My name is Pamela Swift. I’m a member of the Casting Directors’ Guild of Great Britain, and I’ve been working in the UK and Australia for over sixteen years.
’ She had an irritating way of hesitating before she began each sentence.
‘Err, I’ve cast for theatre, TV and film, although most of you will probably be more aware of my TV credits.
I’ve assembled casts for shows including Gary and Sally, By Blood, Southend’s Finest and Another One Bites the Dust.’ She looked up from her notes and smiled.
She had a poppy seed wedged between her two front teeth.
‘Today I’m going to give you a brief introduction to the casting process, what you might face in the room and, if we’ve got time, I’ll take a look at your monologues. ’
If we’ve got time? I slid down in my chair. The chance to perform a monologue for her was the only reason I’d come here today. I looked around and noted the looks of disappointment on other people’s faces. They’d obviously thought the same thing.
The woman rattled through her notes – some casting basics, how actors were sourced on Spotlight, how agents were contacted, how to present your idents and profiles to camera, how getting pencilled for a role worked, and then, eventually, job offers.
I looked around at the others as she spoke.
People were starting to fidget, their eyes beginning to glaze over.
The woman had barely acknowledged anyone, barely looked up from her notebook, and most of the information she’d delivered was, so far, blindingly obvious or, at the very least, easy to find online.
A girl two seats to my right put her hand up.
‘There’ll be time for questions at the end of the session. Just make a note until then, please,’ the woman said. ‘Oh Jesus, I’ve lost my train of thought now.’
The girl lowered her hand. Her lip trembled, and I saw her eyes fill with fear. Have I fucked up? Have I upset the great and powerful casting director? Is my career over?
The woman flipped through her notes. ‘Where was I? Err . . . Oh yes, hmm.’ She paused.
‘We can probably skip that.’ She looked up.
‘So, now there’s something I’d like to ask you all to do.
This is something I often ask actors to go through when I’m casting for a role.
Not all casting directors will do this, but I find it’s a good way of getting to know people.
I’d like you all to think of a memory from childhood or maybe even just from your life now, something significant, and we’ll go around the circle and, err, you can tell me that memory. ’
The girl raised her hand again. A shot at redemption.
‘Yes?’
‘What sort of memory would you prefer, Pamela? Like happy, sad, funny, traumatic?’
The woman shrugged. ‘I don’t care. Whatever you want. It doesn’t matter. It’s just a way of getting to see the real you a little better.’ She coughed into her elbow. ‘Err, you’ – she pointed at the girl to my left – ‘we’ll start with you then go clockwise around the circle.’
Meaning I was last.
The girl next to me told the story of how her dog, Bailey, got run over by a car when she was nine years old, explaining in great detail how sad she’d been, how she felt like she’d lost her best friend and how, even after all this time, she still felt she hadn’t really got over it.
Then she burst into tears. The girl beside her put a consoling hand on her knee.
The casting director’s pen hovered above the leather notepad. She stifled a yawn.
Unfortunately, Bailey’s death set the tone for the rest of the session.
The next girl told us about her grandad dying at the tragic age of ninety-two.
The one after her shared a story about losing her rabbit.
The man after her, the one in his forties, told us about his wife miscarrying and how the pain of that, along with his newfound desire to pursue an acting career, had torn them apart.
‘She just didn’t understand that acting was something I had to do. It was a calling, the same as being called to the priesthood or to be a doctor. But she was all like, what about me, what about my needs, our baby? She just didn’t get it.’
Pamela nodded wearily and pushed her spectacles up her nose. She still hadn’t made a single note.
As the man droned on, I glanced around the circle.
An air of panic was building in the room.
How was anyone going to top divorce and a miscarriage?
Most of the people here were barely out of their teens.
They’d lived safe, comfortable lives, bouncing from crib to school to uni before eventually finding themselves washed up here. They hadn’t lived at all.
I looked at the clock. We were already two thirds of the way through the workshop and we still hadn’t got through half the people.
It was starting to look unlikely I’d get to say my memory, let alone perform my monologue, the monologue I’d been to the library for, then five different bookstores, then ordered for ￡16 off because they didn’t have it anywhere else, then spent hours going over, recording myself back, watching myself in the mirror, actioning and learning every beat of the damn thing.