Winners Make Their Own Luck

March 16, 2010

Note to auditioning actors: Get crutches.

Casting people are SO MUCH NICER!!!

So I get to my audition today for “Tommy” in Asbury Park, New Jersey. I arrive at the church where the auditions are being held, and I hear someone belting out “Proud Mary” from what seems to be directly below me. In fact, about seventeen stairs below me. I am told to wait until she is done before I make my belabored and noisy descent at the end of which I am greeted by a table containing most likely the director, producer and choreographer of the show. I hobble into the nearby holding room as quickly as possible. An auspicious beginning you may (and I did) think, but not for long.

By the time I was called, I was ready to hobble to the accompanist and hop center stage. I began singing “Toucha Toucha Touch Me.”

“I was feeling done in. Couldn’t win. I’d only ever kissed before...”

I guess something about seeing a very young-looking girl sing about being touched for the very first time whilst balanced on one foot and running her hands through her hair suggestively is pretty entertaining. The three men behind the table were cracking up. I would say it went well. After I finished, they asked if my parents knew where I was and would I please sing another song. See??!! I think the crutches help people see my talent in a completely new (and hopefully marketable!) light.

Now the stairs of Trinity Church in Asbury Park, New Jersey, were not the only stairs which I battled and conquered today. I also mounted the fifteen steep and generously spaced stairs leading to my fancy West Village gym.

Here’s my technique:

Hold onto the railing.
LOOK at the next stair and maintain eye contact (should have heeded that one last week).
Hop onto it.

It’s a fantastic cardiovascular warm-up! At the gym, I did a really neat balancing glute exercise where I stand on one leg (obviously), take a cable in one hand, a few feet away from the machine, and reach it down to my toe while extending my other leg back. It’s great until you realize one side of your bum is going to be quite sore in the morning. But for all you two-legged folk, just alternate.

Delicious Chinese in NJ with mi madre. Golden East Garden, you know how to make a one-legged girl smile. My fortune: “Winners make their own luck.” I like that.