What's the best thing you can do for your audition?
Live your life.
That's right.
Live your life.
If your audition is on Tuesday afternoon at 3:00 PM, you make sure that you have four other appointments before or after.
These appointments don't have to be other auditions (which, of course, is nice, if they are). They can be meetings with
friends, phone calls to your agent, gift-shopping for Mom's birthday, or your dance class. Either way, the point is, you
must fill up your life every day, but especially on the days when you have an audition. If the audition is 9:00 AM, then
make sure you have just met with your best encouraging friend (and we all need those) at Starbucks at 7:30.
The worse thing you can do on the day you have your audition is to show your sweat to those for whom you are auditioning - or
to be overly-attached to the audition. You have to walk in there confident (but not cocky), carefree (but not careless), and
more than anything, being as pleasant as possible (but not sickeningly so).
Everything else is secondary. Uh, huh: secondary.
Knowing more about the character for whom you're auditioning is secondary. Who's directing the movie, TV-show, play is
secondary. How much the role pays is secondary. Secondary, defined here as
too many details.
Stop worrying about the details, be professional, and know your stuff, as you do for every audition. The latter is a given,
not even an option. One audition - and this audition in particular - may be more important than another. But you cannot and
you should never let anyone know that.
Just go to the audition prepared. Prepared with a full life, with something to talk about beyond your career.
In fact, nothing prepares you more for an audition or for any character you are to play than your life - for it is from
actual living your life (and not waiting for it to begin
after your career) that you gain the emotional and psychological
experience that you can then apply to not only the creative end of acting, but also to the professional end.
Now, go knock 'em dead.
Herbie J Pilato was born to Frances Mary Turri and Pompeii Pilato in
Rochester, New York, on Erie Street, in the historic High Falls
District across from where now stands Frontier Field. He graduated
with a B.A. Degree in Theatre Arts from Nazareth College of Rochester,
moved to Los Angeles, where he studied Television and Film at UCLA,
and served his Internship in Television at NBC-TV in Burbank. As an
actor, he's appeared on television shows such as "Highway to
Heaven" and "The Golden Girls," as well as daytime serials like
"The Bold and the Beautiful" and "General Hospital." As a
director, Herbie J has guided live stage productions of Leonard
Malfi's Birdbath, Christopher Frye's "A Phoenix Too Frequent," and
"Little Shop of Horrors." Herbie J is also the author of a number
of media tie-in books, including "The Bewitched Book," "The Kung Fu
Book of Caine," "The Kung Fu Book of Wisdom," "Bewitched
Forever," "The Bionic Book," "NBC & ME: My Life As A Page In A
Book," and "Life Story - The Book of Life Goes On: TV's First And
Best Family Show of Challenge." As a producer, he's worked on
Bravo's hit five-part series, "The 100 Greatest TV Characters,"
TLC's "Behind the Fame" specials (about "The Mary Tyler Moore
Show," "The Bob Newhart Show," "L.A. Law" and "Hill Street
Blues"), A&E's "Biography "(for segments on Elizabeth Montgomery
and Lee Majors), and the SyFy Channel's "Sciography" series (the
latter for which he also directed). Herbie J has also served as a
consultant and on-screen commentator for the classic TV DVD releases
of "Bewitched," "Kung Fu" and "CHiPs" - as well as an Editor for
numerous websites (including MediaVillage.com, TV-Now.com and the
family-oriented PAXTV.com). Also too, he's contributed to many
magazines, including Starlog, Sci-Fi Entertainment, Sci-Fi Universe,
Retro Vision, Classic TV and CinemaRetro. Herbie J presently has
several films and TV shows in development, and is is the Founder and
Executive Director of the Classic TV Preservation Society, a nonprofit
organization dedicated to closing the gap between positive popular TV
and education. For more information, log on to
www.ClassicTVPS.blogspot.com or
www.herbiejpilato.blogspot.com.
To contact Herbie J Pilato, email:
ClassicTVPS@gmail.com.
