Hear Me Roar

I leave the Actors Centre for an early lunch to walk up to Grape Street for my next audition, one of the many student films that do not pay but which keep players on their acting toes. Despite the fact the last time I had to prepare a monologue the presentation I gave was abysmal (when I gave a weak Malvolio - and the wrong speech - to a sceptical director), I'm optimistic about this one. Instead of telling myself I have no need to go over my lines because I remember them so well, I walk up Shaftesbury Avenue insistently muttering "I'm not good-looking. I'm not good-looking", presuming that the passers-by will take me for one of the harmless homeless who loiter in the area.

The assertion (whether or not true, is not for me to say) is the opening line to Berenger's final speech in Ionesco's Rhinoceros, when everyone else in the town has turned into the eponymous animal and he's regretting the fact that he has been unable to do the same. He goes on to compare, unfavourably, his smooth brow with the horns that those magnificent animals have and his white, hairy body to their wonderful dull green skin. Then he wishes he could trumpet in the same way they do. But it's too late. He will never become a rhinoceros now.

I came into the audition room where director, scriptwriter and cameraman were smiling and waiting. After the introductory pleasantries, I got up to give my speech. With an imagined mirror on one side of the room and, supposedly, rhinoceroses rampaging through the town on the other side of the opposite wall, I began my lament and built up to an almighty roar as I tried to imitate the pachyderms' sound. In the end, however, I accepted my fate as the world's last human, I swore that I would fight the lot of them to the very end.

It was good. It felt good and I could see from the audience's eyes that I impressed. From there it was three short scenes improvising, wordlessly, on the scenario of a stationmaster at work in a deserted office. The feedback there was good too. I left walking on air, pleased with myself and my abilities. Of course, I may never get a callback - they may see a dozen actors better than me - but it's a still a good feeling, knowing that I stretched myself, knowing that I can give a good audition and will not always perform as disastrously as I once did.