Something To Do on a Sunday.

So...

My agent rings me the other day and says the following... "Amy, i have a great audition for you, its for a one off gig in Edinburgh, great money, singing the hits of the west end... take in two contrasting songs and a monologue, they are really excited to see you! It's gonna be great!"

Sounds great right? Well dear friends let me tell you that in big bad London, things are not always what they seem.... you need to learn how to spot the warning signs...

Firstly, the audition is on a sunday... which although is not completely unheard of, but is a little odd...

Secondly, there was no accompianist... i had to bring two backing tracks... which are officially aginst my religion... not being a snob, but i HATE them!!!

Thirdly.... Steph couldnt tell me too much more about the gig... what styles to sing what the money was, where in Edinburgh the gig was...I had a strange feeling about it all, but went in anyway...

So.... picture me Sunday morning, full make up, hair done, all tizzed up, all ready to sing the hits of broadway.... i find the address and it looks all a bit residential.... not really like a hall or theatre or studio...

I press the buzzer... a young twenty something waif answers the door... the conversation was as follows

"can i help you?"

"um yeah... i am amy... here to audition...."

long silence and stare

"yeah... sure.... whatever... come in... you can wait in the kitchen"

I sat on a stool, next to the fridge looking at family photos all around the room... i could hear the some guy belting out the hits of dirty dancing in the next room and to my horror i realised...

THIS WAS SOMEBODY'S HOUSE.... I WAS ABOUT TO AUDITION IN A LOUNGE ROOM!!!!!

Yes folks... in i went to meet a panel (can you call it s panel when theya re sitting on their COUCH???) of three who were sitting there killing themselves laughing at something hilarious i was not privvy to, with a full spread of pizza, bottles of red wine, desserts and a cd player...

"Amy... nice to meet you we are looking for someone to sing the hits of phantom of the opera, have you prepared that for us?"

"Um... no... i was not told to bring any particular kind of show.... so i have some uptempo belty numbers for you...."

"oh... we we've already cast those roles so can you just make up something from phantom for us? do you know it? you can just hum it if you like.... just sing something opera-y that sounds like the phantom."

um... what... the .... hell.. is.... this???? the bloody ballarat light opera company are more professional than this....

the sad truth is that my resume here seriously needs some padding with uk based work... no one will look at me twice in town until i have dome SOME kind of work over here in something... anything... so i sucked it up stood there.... in some random persons lounge room and made up the lyrics to wishing you were somehow here again from the god awful phantom of the god awful opera

my lyrics went something like this....

wishing you were somehow here again

wishing you were somehow near

i love to sing, that is the thing

help me to sing and fly

no more memories, no more silent tears

no more skating across the icy years.....

where i ever concoted such rediculous and painful lyrics i will never know... all i could wish by this point was that i could smack myself in the head with their wine bottles to make this unbelievable pain stop....

but they applauded at the end... which of couse always makes me feel better.

and that was it.... no monologue.... no more songs.... no backing tracks... just some applause and more swigs of their red wine...

my question is... are these people actually casting a show... or did their television break down and they felt like somelive entertainment for the day! Did they find some undying need to subject themselves to made up phatom of the opera songs and old queens singing dirty dancing??? what could have posessed these people to waste my time!?!??!

What would you all do in the same situation???

DISCUSS.

Welcome to the Next Year

I have sat here about five times now trying to write my christmas/NYE blog... laughing at 2006, plans for 2007... but for some reason its just not happening.

I have no "Best of 2006" quibs and jibes.... there isn't a "now here is the list of things that I am gonna do this year" infact.... for the first time ever I can stand here and say

I have no idea what i am doing or what is going to happen in this, the 27th year of my life. (dear god am i nearly 27???)

I think this is actually a good thing... i think this means i have finally come to terms with the fact that every time i make any plans they never happen anyway and that in this rediculous world we have all created, the path of our lives is not really that dependant on us. Yes we make the decisions that shape said life, but the choices that are offered up to us are rarely the ones we design.

Four months ago i spent my life planning dates, drinks, dinners and days out, busying myself around my work and was always running somewhere to do something. To be out and be busy and be seen. I was always thinking, whats going to happen next, where am I going next, where is this going, how can i make this work and this happen and keep juggling all these balls in the air?

But suddenly at the end of the year, for no concious reason, mearely by a result of circumstanes, i just stopped doing it. Stopped the running and the planning, to just sit and exist. I wake up each day and really have no idea what is going to happen or where I am going to go. And for now... thats enough for me. I sit here and find an overwhelming need to just be. To just shut up live in and enjoy today with out any judgement of where it will lead me and what it can "do" for me. Is this my Oprah moment? perhaps. Is it career suicide? Perhaps!

In all honesty I find myself faced with a few choices right now and am really not sure which way to go or which path to take... so I'm just going to sit here at the cross roads for a while until I work out what I'm going to do.

I guess you could say I am easing my way into 2007... instead of kicking the door of each year in and marching in singing "Hey world here i am" this time... i am opening the door, walking in and taking a look around the room before I burst back into song.

Dear god I'm getting old.....

For the record... xmas was spent eating myself into a food coma in southampton and meeting Craig Mcglaughlin and the last few seconds of 2006 was spent on the roof of a theatre with the man I love watching fireworks bursting all over London. Not a bad end to a transforming year