Bloberts Ramblings

Well, today I had a rather lovely audition for a theatre company. To say it was my first experience of a professional audition besides drama schools and a couple of parent-accompanied film jobbies when I was twelve- it was probably the most relaxed and lovely experience I could have had!

There were about fifteen or so girls there, and immediately I have to say I was clearly a bit of an underdog. They were all at least 21+ (not to mention I look a lot younger than 18), drama school trained, pretty, prepared… I literally walked into a room, with just my phone on me, to see these fifteen trained actresses reading exactly the same piece of script in their own little worlds- something which I hadn’t even thought to print out seeing as I assumed we were just supposed to learn it. The next thing I know, this lovely theatrical man comes bounding in the room, and asks- ‘Has anyone got their CV for us? Not essential but…’ and these girls all flip out their CV as if they already knew what he was going to ask. There’s me like… shittttt..

But then we went into the audition room, and everything was just fine from there. I think once we’d learnt the song & dance, which I picked up rather easily- thank god- everyone just eased up a bit and we were all very chatty. We got called in, in pairs, to perform the song & dance section- then a piece of script we’d been given prior to the audition- then to have an interview. Mine all went absolutely fine. I already knew the song we were given rather well, so I went ahead and extemporized like hell on my solo verse. My script section was a bit flat, but the interview was all very relaxed and light and positive. I don’t really expect to get anything, some of those girls were like…opera singers, but fingers crossed and we’ll hear in two weeks!

XX

Isn’t getting your Equity card a funny thing? Well, I just had to get mine for public liability insurance and whatnot seeing as i’m attempting to actually act as a job from summer onwards. I’ve alwaysconsideredwhat my stage name would be, because Sophie Roberts has to be the most boring name on the planet- and inevitably someone already had that name on the database.

Now I always planned to be Sophie Rose, because roses are my favourite flowers, reds my favourite colour, I famously drink a lot of Rose wine and ‘ro’ are the first two letters of my real surname anyway. All fits, well thought out, right? NO BECAUSE SOMEONES ALREADY CALLED THEMSELVES SOPHIE ROSE.

So y’know, after further consideration I came up with ‘Sophie Thornton’. Which I quite like, but my mothers initial reaction was laughter, then ‘you sound like a box of chocolates’.

This does not bode well for the future, does it?

So it’s been almost a month since I played Alice in Alice By Heart, and I’m missing it SO much. This is seriously just the most innovative, beautiful, exciting production I’ve ever been a part of- and Alice is just such a dream for an actress to work with!

Trying to find another room in my head, in the words of white rabbit, and getting ready to cope with major Alice-withdrawal after our final performance on May 11th at the West Yorkshire Playhouse.

Steven Sater & Duncan Shiek sure know how to write a bloody good musical.

Elissa Franceschi is amazing and your opinion is irrelevant.

Well Friday was shit. Basically I got rejected from Rose Bruford in the morning (hardly suprising, due to my insane illness), and then had a seemingly smooth Drama Centre audition but got nowhere with it. Obviously this was a bit too much for one day, so I went down to Kings Cross, and just had a bit of a cry as the climax of an entire week of insane depression.

To be honest, I don’t think I would have taken it so badly if I hadn’t been in that mindset the whole week. I have this thing where I seem to have random weeks where I just want to kill myself. Like I knew it was coming. It’s really strange. I said to my friend on Tuesday- ‘I can feel myself going into a low.’ And voila, by wednesday night I hated myself again.

I can’t really explain the way I feel when I go into those moments. Like, I start to hate everything about myself. By Friday night there was literally not a thing I could think of that I liked about myself. I hated the way I looked, the people I knew, the place I lived in, the fact I feel so lonely a lot of time and the fact I constantly feel inadequate.

But now I’m cheering up a bit. Well, not cheering up, but I’m getting better. As someone wise said to me, these kinds of experiences either make you stronger or safer.

One thing I never want to be is safe.

:)

So basically it’s late, I have another audition tomorrow and i’m therefore thinking a lot about the performing arts. For my audition for Drama Centre tomorrow we had to write 300 words about why we want to study there. My 300 words focused mainly on my love of London, how I want to develop myself as an individual and how I have a deep passion for the performing arts.

Then I started thinking, how many people really love the performing arts? Because I mean, I’ve been in and out of theatre classes all my life and i’ve seen a lot of people who want to be actors singers and dancers. I swear half the population wants to do performing arts. It’s some seriously daunting shit.

However, I believe that only a third or so of that number love performing arts for the right reasons. I’ve come to the conclusion that there are two types of performers. People who love performing and people who want other people to love them performing. A good amount of people in this game are in it because it’s a seemingly ‘glamourous’ industry. They want to be famous, they want to do something where people constantly tell them they’re wonderful and special and talented. They dont really care about what they’re doing for themselves or have any kind of intellectual appreciation for the art form itself. I don’t want to be famous. I love performing and that’s why I do this. I hate people who only get into it for the shallow exterior.

I’ve met so many people who rile me because they are so blinded to what acting is really about. People who think they’re fucking ace because they’ve got a fake agent and they wear a scarf that they throw over their shoulder in a dramatic way because thats what actors do darling. Fuck off. Real actors are fucked up people, because we appreciate that the fundamentals of this art are looking into the darkest corners of people’s minds and recreating it within ourselves. Every actor has a niche into their characters, and therefore most of us have bigass personal problems too. We aren’t glamorous and we aren’t shallow minded, we just love bloody acting.

I love acting because I enjoy being someone i’m not. I enjoy being able to experience emotions that I might not have felt before. I enjoy being able to put myself into situations that I might not get into in my real life. I like exploring the mind and how other people think. I’m fascinated by human relationships and I love exploring the different ways in which people communicate with eachother, and feel about eachother. I love performing in something that opens an audiences minds to issues they might have not thought about before, to characters they might not have seen before. Yes, it’s nice to have someone tell you they think you’re amazing, god knows it’s lovely, but I think it’s more wonderful to have someone tell you that you really made them feel something.

So there we go. A lovely over passionate rant on why I love acting and hate fame grabbers for you all. Enjoy yourselves.