This was my audition piece for the 2012 San Diego Actor's Alliance All City Auditions -- an annual unified, general audition for professional actors to appear before a large number of Southern California theater and film directors/producers/casting agents, as well as talent agents and managers. The monologue I chose to do was the role of Jeff Chase from the stage play "War Stories: A Chronology of a Crack Addict" by Alberto Finetti and is without a DOUBT -- one of THE most DIFFICULT monologues I have EVER had to perform. It is DECEPTIVELY simple-looking to watch it being performed; however, I challenge ANY actor to get the script and attempt doing it themselves before passing judgment on it, as they will QUICKLY learn of its MANY hardships and traps. First, I had to cut the monologue from the play from about 8 minutes down to under three minutes, as that is all the time an AEA actor is afforded for their entire audition at this event. Second, it has MANY levels to it: the sh! eepish panic of trying to remember the correct monologue while maintaining a pleasant, professional facade; the uncomfortable lengthy pauses while recreating temporary memory loss -- which feels like an ETERNITY while standing up there before a VERY critical audience of auditors -- some of whom have YET to figure out that it is JEFF CHASE who is blowing his introduction up there and not ME; the lack of inhibition it takes to look BELIEVABLY, UNINTENTIONALLY foolish while doing warm-ups onstage and ...
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