In a very weird twist of fate I got to sing for this audition. I only went to it because I was auditioning for two other shows in the building for which I was NOT seen and I saw they WERE seeing people so I thought what the heck. They aren't looking for me - what do I have to lose.
So I'm waiting in the room and everyone is telling me I look like Maria - and my dress is so Maria - and blah blah blah. Alright- people tend to butter you up just before an audition - so I don't give it much thought. Then I walk into the room - and the two casting people behind the desk say that I look just like Maria. What? EXCUSE ME? You mean - I look like a 21 (currently 23) year old waifish Argentinian? (The girl currently playing it on Broadway.) Or - Hispanic - at all for that matter? Er ---- what?
Then they ask me to sing something from the show. Er.................I don't know the show - i can't even sing a single song from memory from the show - I offer up my other soprano options....end up singing can't help loving that man of mine. Not exactly ------- what they want. They then want me to converse with the pianist in Spanish. Er.......................... je parle francais? I leave feeling like a royal idiot.
How on EARTH have I gone my entire life never working, even in my living room, on a single song from West Side Story?
So - wow - I'm Hispanic?
I go to Mary and I tell her - and she immediately says - OH MY GOD! You're right! I have no idea why we havent touched a single song from West Side Story. You could totally play her. So we start working on the music - it's damn hard! The hardest thing Ive ever sung. Not necessarily because it's so high - but just - weird - and rhythmic and - Pianissimo --- very quiet --- normally you BLAST high notes - this needs to be all quiet and gentle. Freaking hard! I guess that's why they want songs from the score. It's unlike anything I have ever sung before.
I started researching the girl playing her now. I'm super lame. The hunt for one of the central characters in "West Side Story," which Mr. Laurents is restaging with parts of the book and lyrics translated into Spanish, began about a year ago. The show's producers wanted a particular combination for their Maria -- a Latina, a strong soprano and a skilled musical theater actress who didn't look too old for the part. They scoured New York, Chicago and Los Angeles. No luck. "It was impossible," says Jeffrey Seller, one of the producers."She has this incredible, ineffable something," the director says. "She's trained as an opera singer, she's trained as a ballet dancer and she's trained as an actress. It's unbelievable in somebody that young."
Wait --- they want a trained ballet dancer, who can play young,a dn sings soprano....who can pass for Hispanic... WHY ON EARTH HAVE I NEVER THOUGHT OF THAT! I'm so busy trying to become a redhead and skate around on heelies that I totally overlook the one that I might be right for ---without much effort?
she is described as: the willowy soprano, In the article in the Michigan Daily about me directing, the author wrote about my "willowy arms." It seemed such a strange choice of words I remember it.
Anyhow - the dance audition is tomorrow - I'm going to go - but I' not expecting too much. Everyone else has the choreography memorized - it's iconic. And I've never looked twice at it. But come the next 6 month required call - I will be able to converse in Spanish, I will know the choreography, and I will know the music.
How strange to see how the rest of the world perceives us... and how we perceive ourselves - and the opportunities missed because of it. A good lesson. A very very good lesson.
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