Posts filed under 'Auditions'
The Prague Playhouse will be having auditions for True West, the dark comedy by Sam Sheppard, this coming Tuesday, November 10th, from 6-9pm at the Prague Film School, Pstrossova 15, Prague 1 (kind of across the street from the Globe Bookstore). We are asking for a 2 minute monologue for the audition.
The show will start rehearsals now and be performed at the end of January. Jeff Beck will direct the show. Actors will be paid 300 Kc per performance. We are planning 6-10 performances.
We are looking for the following roles (ages are approximate):
Austin – late twenties/early thirties – screenwriter
Lee – His older brother – late thirties/early forties
Saul Kimmer – Hollywood producer
Mom – mother of the boys.
Please write to brian@pragueplayhouse.com to schedule an audition.
Thanks!
Brian
608 577 012
November 5th, 2009
Hi everyone!
I’m Boris Wilke and member of the Prague Playhouse Meisner acting group. I blog about our class activities.
This entry is about how the Meisner technique can help you win auditions or at least make them a fun experience.
Click on the “CLASSES” button above and then choose “ACTING FOR PROFESSIONALS” to read more about the class itself and where we meet!
Brian just put up a new post here about auditions for a play. I won’t tell you what it is: It has too foolish a title. Anyway, they are looking for English-speaking actors of all ages and types and of both sexes. Click here to read for yourself!
Since there are very few opportunities for acting work for English-speakers in Prague in general, and this year, due to the financial crisis, in particular, all of a sudden, all of the Prague-based actors and actresses will swoop down on this like vultures – me included. They will most likely be way more experienced than you and me, of course more beautiful. And they will be ready to do almost anything to get on the ticket. After all it will be a paid job. They will probably even resort to showing off various body parts or bribe the jury with innuendo, cigarettes and/or Hašlerky (Czech cough drops).
Surely the roles really have already been distributed informally to hand-picked folk well-acquainted with the director. This audition might be just a must-do event to cover the scam.
So why should I go and make a complete fool of myself in the first place? I have no fuddling chance!
Or do I? This is, when Meisner comes in:
First of all, even in the most jaded of worlds there sometimes is a need for types that the pool of cronies a director has at their disposal just fails to cover. They might be deliberately hunting for someone ugly, lanky, overweight or sickly – in short: you – or me at that! Who knows?
Then you need to take into account that despite the fact that one always seems to see the same faces, over and over again, in productions in Prague, even the most pushy and well-connected actors and actresses don’t manage to get into everything. It is because even the most jaded of directors might actually want to grab hold of some new talent they can boss around and impose their will upon. Do you know for sure, if the game is really set already? Maybe the director is sick and tired of the same faces that make it into his or her plays. A cynic would say: “Maybe they want someone new to shag with.” No matter, how you look at it: Variety is a real option here and your chance to get in! Strut your stuff! Show you are different! That might get you the part!
Thirdly and most importantly one should go to auditions for the auditions’ sake. Meisner teaches to be in the moment. An audition is a string of very scary and exciting moments, moments one usually doesn’t have in one’s everyday tedious life of routines and rut. Auditions can be fun, if you choose to look at them that way. I, for my part, love them. I revel in the challenge they present. I love to put my courage to test. I love to see how I fare.
And while doing auditions, rare as they might be after all, one starts to progress, i.e. to get better.
Meisner wants us to take in everything, the environment as well as the partner in front of you. If your partner is the scary director him- or herself, who reads a part from the script with a yawn and a stutter – and you struggle to connect with them while reading your own part, it is very hard to take in the environment: the smell and the lights of the place and the people who share it with you. But how can you shine and thus wow the director when you are all concentrated on the text before you, a mere pent-up focal point rather than an amazing multi-dimensional fluid entity? I recognized that I free more and more resources for being in the moment and available to the director’s needs on the spot, the more I go to auditions. Many non-Meisner-trained actors resort to acting-routine such as shouting, miming and gesturing in exaggerated ways. If the director gets excited about these tricks, you are not his or her candidate, anyway. Then again, if you are exactly the type she or he is craving for, you might get the role despite your lack of mechanical stagecraft. And then it is up to you to incorporate as much Meisner-work into your role as possible. But that’s a different story…
As with Meisner exercises it’s the work you do before an audition that gets you into the target zone. Since it is part of the set-up that you very often just cannot prepare for an audition, it is all the more important to bring acting experience of all sorts. And that is, why more experienced actors and actresses have a better chance to get the role.
I know that is a paradox. You as a fledgling actor or actress can only work through that paradox by getting experience. Going to auditions – against all odds – is one way to gain it.
I can only say: Do it! And do it over and over again! It will pay off eventually!
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General stuff:
Our acting class consists of some fifteen new and not so new active members, who meet every Monday and Wednesday from 6.30 pm to about 8.30. We do Meisner. And the Meisner-technique really rocks!
If you want to connect with your inmost feelings, expressing them freely in an acting environment and thus getting to know yourself better and better, feel free to join us! If you do, be prepared for some serious thrills!
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About the author:
I am Boris Wilke, a German expat in Prague.
I am a writer at large and have been studying Meisner since January 2008. If any of you know of any kind of acting work that befits a laddish, tall 40-year-old, please leave a note!
November 3rd, 2009
The Black Snow theater company is overseeing a production in English of Dorta Maslowska’s play A Couple of Poor Polish-Speaking Romanians for Divadlo na Zabradli.
They are having auditions Sunday November 15 from 11am-5pm at the theater: Anenske namesti 5.
Callbacks are November 22nd. Rehearsals begin March 15, 2010. The show will run in repre3tory at Divadlo na Zabradli starting May 15, 2010.
This is a paid production commissioned and supported by the theater.
They are looking for male and female actors of all ages and types.
To schedule an audition, please contact Nicole Grisco at blacksnow.elt@gmail.com
November 2nd, 2009
The National Theater is having auditions for standins to work on the new production of Janaček’s opera KÁŤA KABANOVA with legendary American director Robert Wilson. Mr. Wilson is an avant guard director who places special emphasis on the movement in a piece, choreographing movement down to a minute level. Actors will learn to separate the movement “line” from the text “line” so that the two lines can be perceived separately and together make some different whole (read the wikipedia article for a better description of the way he works). The National Theater is looking for energetic individuals who have theatre experience and a strong knowledge of the English language to help Mr. Wilson create this movement mosaic.
As Mr. Wilson’s assistant director will be coming to Prague next week, they will be hosting auditions for the roles of “extras” or “figurants” (stand-ins, really). These individuals will work with Mr. Wilson this fall to prepare the basics of the entire performance before he begins to work with the soloists next Spring.
The audition will take place on Saturday, September 12, 2009 at 3 p.m. in the Administration Building of the National Theatre. For more information or to schedule an audition time, please email (with your headshots — include a full body length photo if you have one — and resume) Don Nixon at the National Theater: d.nixon@narodni-divadlo.cz.
September 6th, 2009
William Lee is directing a pseudo documentary for the Danish Embassy. He’s looking for a wide range of actors to come in to audition for the role, which will be paid. Actors who are interested should contact him directly with a picture and a resume and he will be setting up auditions.
The film will be between 6 to 10 days of shooting in the second half of October: 3-5 days in denmark, 3- 5 days in Czech. More information after the break:
William writes: “The documentary is for the Danish embassy here, they want an educational documentary that they can take around schools, explaining some of the ecological projects that the country is involved in.
“Because we have to make it fun and interesting for the “youth”, we’ve turned it on its head and the documentary is about a “fictitious” Dane who is applying for aslyum to the Czech Republic because he feels his ecological rights are being infringed in Denmark, where everything is so clean and ecological. The film is a mockumentary in that it’s a series of interviews with him where he explains why he has applied for asylum and in the process explains about the ecological projects the Danish Embassy wishes us to feature. And complains how life is unlivable in such a clean country. This is set against “home video” footage of his holiday in the Czech Republic where he hangs out in Most, and other polluted places.
Right now we’re trying to decide whether the film will be in English, or “broken” Czech and therefore whether we’ll cast a foreigner or a Czech. When I find an actor who fits the role, that’ll make the decision for me.
I’m not sure what type of actor I’m looking for. He might be a greasy biker, he might be a school teacher. I’d like to cast a whole bunch and see if someone stands out. I’m happy to look at non-actors as well as professionals.
If you could ask anyone who is interested in coming to a casting session to send me their email and contact number. I’ll forward this on to the producer and when we make a decision when and where, and how the casting will be organised we’ll do a mass mailing.
August 31st, 2009
The next Prague Playhouse production “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change”, one of the most successful musicals off-Broadway has ever seen, is having auditions!
We’re looking for 4 singer-actors (2 men, 2 women). The musical is a collection of 18 scenes detailing the whole life cycle of relationships from dating through getting married and having kids. It’s really fun music and a very funny text.
The audition will be Wednesday and Thursday (August 5 and 6) from 18:30 to 20:00 at FAMU (Smetanovo nábřeží 2). Please prepare a song (there is a possibility that it will need to be a capella) email brian@pragueplayhouse.com or call 608 577 012 back to schedule an audition.
The performances will be in last September/early October (details coming soon!). Rehearsals will be starting in early August.
The show will be directed by Mary Angiolillo, who directed Shepard’s True West, Henley’s Crimes of the Heart, the musical The Fantasticks, Gurney’s The Dining Room, Metcalf’s Strange Snow, O’Casey’s The Bedtime Story in Paris. She was also involved in the musical You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown and taught American Drama at Filosoficka Fakulta as a Fulbright scholar in the mid 90s. Mary is currently teaching Acting, Theater and Directing for FAMU.
Hope to see you there!
August 1st, 2009
Hi everyone!
I’m Boris Wilke and member of the Prague Playhouse Meisner acting group. I blog about our class activities.
Yesterday Monday, June 15th, was a truly astonishing class, as some members did “Home Alone” activities, a thing I had never seen before. I’ll talk about that after Wednesday’s class, though… 
Besides, yesterday’s class made me think about motivation. And that is, what I will write about today.
Click on the “ACTING CLASS” button above to read more about the class itself and where we meet!
Click the “(more…)”-button below to read about motivation!
I was gone on vacation for a week. Before that I had a couple of classes, that I failed to find interesting enough to blog about. And last week, I suffered from “Acting Fatigue”, which is a euphemism for “lack of interest”.
Now, what is it, that keeps me from going to class sometimes?
The answer lies in the nature of the course. Friends of mine have asked me about it, time and again. And their questions all ran like this:
“So you go to this acting group. What play do you work on?”
“None.”
“None? Are there at least skits or scenes, you are doing?”
“Scenes, from time to time. But they are used merely as exercises, as the rest of the time in class.”
“What? You only exercise? What is the use of that? Why don’t you create something? When can we see you on stage?”
“When I make an audition, I mean, IF I make one. Then we rehearse and then we perform. But that has nothing to do with the Meisner acting class.”
“I don’t get, what you are doing there…”
And so on…
Yeah, I sometimes also don’t “get”, what I am doing in class. Activities and doors take hours to prepare. They involve you emotionally. Otherwise they tank. You are supposed to rehearse with them as well. I am a writer and have time. But I still cannot get myself to do enough for class. How do people fare, who actually WORK all day?
And that is the thing about the Meisner technique: It is really cruel. It throws you back on yourself, over and over again. You are supposed to delve deeper and deeper into your inmost feelings and baring them in this stupid space in front of these near-strangers called class-mates, who gawk at the awkwardness and geeky situations of embarrassment, that you present them with; until it is their turn, that is. And it so shows, when you come badly prepared. It also hurts, when you see people, who have been in class way shorter than you, pass you on their way to become “Meisner trained”, just because they rehearse more.
When you put on a show in class and try to remain chief of the situation, you are reprimanded by your teacher, and rightly so, for being fake and not letting out your true opinions, thus failing to transport your true feelings. When you become defensive, because you have become really vulnerable and fear getting hurt emotionally during an exercise, you get flared for not letting go, for being too polite, for focussing on other things than your partner alone.
Meisner is harsh and takes a lot of dedication.
How can one motivate oneself to muster the energy to come up with the necessary level of dedication?
Many of us did make an audition and did get to perform in real plays, TV-series and films. They have had a certain reward for their suffering in and around class.
I have only been in student films thus far and am really sick and tired of just going to class.
But I need this high level of dedication as well. Otherwise I can quit, right here, right now. But I will do ANYTHING than that!
How do I motivate myself for just going to class, then?
I go to class despite it and because of it. I try to love it, to just go for its own sake. Meisner class, to me, is a little laboratory of life itself. I might have mentioned this idea already before. But it is all the more important to stress it:
In class people laugh, cry, despair, fight, scream, cuddle, smile and sing, just like in real life, or better even, just like they SHOULD in real life but fail to, because of political correctness and other mechanisms, that inhibit them.
I test myself every time I do an exercise. I put myself forward and see what I am like. That is absolutely worth all the pain and strain and despair and lack of energy and humiliation, that go along with it.
Paradoxically enough, all that is my motivation: Even during those times, when I give in to NOT going to class – because it wears me out, it unnerves me, I hate its participants too much, I cannot muster the energy to come up with yet ANOTHER door and activity, I feel above or below it, I don’t see the point of it… – I dedicate myself to the process of the Meisner way.
If he didn’t say it, I am sure, he placed it between the lines somewhere: “As life is not about happiness but fullness, so is Meisner training.”
There is no easy way to it. And that’s what I love about it. Easy is boring.
Meisner is exiting!
And that is that.
**********************
General stuff:
Our acting class consists of some ten active members, who meet every Monday and Wednesday from 6.30 pm to about 8.30. We do Meisner. And the Meisner-technique really rocks!
If you want to connect with your inmost feelings, expressing them freely in an acting environment and thus getting to know yourself better and better, feel free to join us! But beware, this quarter is going to end in about two weeks! Check this site for details as to when the summer break will end!
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About the author:
I am Boris Wilke, a German expat in Prague. I am a writer at large and have been studying Meisner since January 2008. If any of you know of any kind of acting work, that befits a laddish, tall 40-year-old, please leave a note!
June 16th, 2009
Frank Martinez is looking for four people (2 men, 2 women) who will dress up in ’70s clothes and pass out flyers in Old Town on June 14 for about 5 hours (with pay, of course).
If you are interested in making a little pocket money and have some fun in the meantime, you can contact him at laluna@lalunacy.com.
June 10th, 2009
Two FAMU students (a director and his production manager) are looking for a male actor for their film “Doctor Break”.
Requirements: 25 – 35 years old, fluent in English
Shooting: Early July
If you would like to find out more about the script and the filmmakers, please contact Martina on +420 602 632 129
June 9th, 2009
The Prague Shakespeare Festival, Guy Roberts Artistic Director, will be holding open call auditions for its 2009 Artistic Company, Tuesday May 19th at the Globe Bookstore and Café’s new outdoor stage area from 3pm – 6pm.
All actors should bring a photo and resume and prepare one memorized Shakespeare monologue not exceeding 2 minutes. Callbacks will be held Wednesday May 20th from 10am – 6pm at the Old Burgrave’s Residence, Vysehrad. Sides will be provided for actors invited to callbacks.
Actors who have previously worked with PSF or Guy Roberts and who are interested in casting opportunities may contact Guy Roberts, bypassing the general audition and directly schedule a callback. All others must come to the general audition and then be invited to callbacks.
PSF is currently casting for the following projects:
HAMLET – (understudies and replacements only)
Performances:
Tuesday June 2 @ 19:30 – Open Final Dress Rehearsal
Wednesday June 3 @ 19:30
Thursday June 4 @ 19:30
Monday June 15 @ 10:30
Venue: Old Burgrave’s Residence, Vysehrad
AS YOU LIKE IT (All roles available)
Performances:
Wednesday June 10 @ 19:30
Monday June 15 @ 19:30
Friday June 19 @ 19:30
Venue: Old Burgrave’s Residence, Vysehrad
All actors are paid 1000cz per performance. Note: Actors performing in June 15 Student Matinee of HAMLET receive 500cz for this performance.
Actors may contact PSF via email at act@pragueshakespeare.cz to arrange a specific audition time. All actors will be seen on a first-come, first-serve basis. Directors, Designers and Stage Managers may also come to the open call to submit resumes and portfolios.
All actors, directors, designers and stage managers who work with PSF are members of the PSF seasonal artistic company. The seasonal artistic company, under the guidance of the Artistic Director, work constantly together to explore a cohesive classical style. The Festival provides an ensemble atmosphere for extended theatrical exploration wherein company members work as a group to develop skills and to perfect their craft through the continuity of several productions and ongoing training workshops. The quality of commitment demanded of the company members fosters a cohesiveness and intensity of approach to the Festival’s classical repertoire. In addition to performing, training and educational activities all company members work behind-the-scenes and assist in the day-to-day administration of PSF.
ABOUT THE PRAGUE SHAKESPEARE FESTIVAL
The Prague Shakespeare Festival presents professional theatre productions, workshops, classes, lectures and other theatrical events, of the highest quality, conducted primarily in English by a multinational ensemble of professional theatre artists, with an emphasis on the plays of William Shakespeare, bringing to the Czech Republic, European and World audiences English-language based performances that are fresh, bold, imaginative, thought-provoking, and eminently accessible, connecting the truths of the past with the challenges and possibilities of today.
May 13th, 2009
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