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It's been constant grinding and trying to secure work that I care about, tireless auditions and meetings. I've been fortunate that a lot of cool doors have opened to me, chiefly meeting great people who were inspired by what I've done and what they feel I could bring to their projects.
One year you go in for auditions, and everybody thinks you're the queen of comedy, and the next year, you're so 'yesterday,' and it's not because you've done anything, or your ability has changed; you haven't been in work because you've been putting on weight and then trying to lose it.
I just saw dialogue, in the audition, and had no backstory. I was like, "I'm just going to be myself because I have no idea who this is or where he's coming from." The typical questions that actors have to ask themselves were very hard. I had to imagine, a little bit, and just made it work.
Have I done more business-related things to help my career grow? Yeah. I took the business end more seriously, hooked up with a manager, got some help, because at a certain point, you get frustrated when you go do auditions, and people say you did a great job, and then you don't get he part.
When I was starting out, I didn't know what the hell I was doing and my person who was helping me out, I didn't even have an agent, got me five or six big auditions for leads in movies in 1986 that I had no business auditioning for. I think I ran out of three of them before I'd even finished.
When you go to auditions, pretend you already have the job and you're just presenting - almost like you're at the table read. Don't go in with an air of, 'Please like me,' or, 'Please hire me.' You're like, 'Here's my take on it. Take it or leave it. I've got a lot of other things to do today.'
My grandmother was a huge influence on me. She allowed me to be my flamboyant self as a kid. She babysat me; auditions came later - by later, I mean six years old. She sang and played piano, and I'd sit beside her. I don't know how confident I am, but I think you need it to survive in this industry.
When I go to auditions, I try to always make sure I go in prepared. I always think to myself, 'I'm here to provide them with a service. They need me, and if they decide to hire me for this service, I'm going to give them the best they've ever paid for and if they don't, they're dumb.' That's on them.
I'm not in a position where I get to pick and choose roles. I usually go on auditions in long lines and embarrass myself in front of casting directors, and with a lump in my throat and my ears burning, I walk past reception and smirking actors as I go to the parking garage and go back on the highway.
I was thinking, with the TV exposure I had with WWE - and it's kind of hard to explain to people sometimes how many countless hours you are on television when you've been on the road with WWE - I was thinking that was going to open doors, get me auditions, and get me into a lot of high profile roles.
Every mistake that you make, or every thing that you might regret, you don't need to necessarily regret it, because it can be a step forward. You just move forward and let them go because there will be a lot of bad auditions, and there will be a lot of negative responses. But that won't last forever.
I got the call to play Tony Manero in 'Saturday Night Fever' in Madrid, a role I'd always wanted, as it's such a well-constructed show, and my background is in musical theatre. I'd been travelling back and forth between London and Spain for auditions and had been borrowing money from friends to do it.
I realized that the actors that I liked and admired all went to drama school and got an agent that way. So I started when I was about 16 in drama school, and then I knew I had to wait until I was 18 so I could go on auditions, and I tried to get into one of the ones that I liked and then go from there.
People get TV deals by doing something in their grandmother's basement. It is definitely the wave. Everybody is trying to do all that stuff. I mean, the Internet is the only reason that I've gotten work is because I've somehow created a line and people have seen it. And then I've been asked to auditions.
I did this class when I first moved to California. It was a 'Kids on Camera' class up in the Bay Area. That was good for just getting me excited in acting and everything. Then once I started working down L.A., I just stuck to my acting coach, and she helps me prepare with auditions and that sort of thing.
When you audition for things, there's pressure to go in there with a complete performance, and it's kind of unfair because, if you get it, you'll have rehearsal and talk about it, and you'll have plenty of time with the script. So, for me, I really do feel like an audition is a sketch of what you might do.
My father would take me to auditions and put me in the room right in the corner because he was watching me; he couldn't get a babysitter. He'd be at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe in the LES until four in the morning, trying to tell his story and using his craft, but because he had a kid that didn't let him stop.
For sure, one moment really defined the path that I was to take in the future, and that was when I won the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in New York in April of 1995. I had just turned 25 two days before the finals concert, and when I won, I had no idea how my life would change because of it.
I go to auditions even now and people say, 'Oh, she's too pretty,' or 'She doesn't look like a small-town girl or a girl in high school who would get bullied.' But that's the whole point of being an actress - you can look glamorous when you're on the red carpet, and then bring it all down and be raw onscreen.
There are so many ways to get involved with 'The Voice.' There is the open call, which tons of people are from. Of the people that you saw that made it past the Blinds, the majority are from open call auditions. They went through every round before you see the Blinds. But weirdly enough, I received a phone call.
My parents were really, really cool about supporting what I wanted to do at a really young age. I think I was about 10 when I caught the bug. They would drive me down to New York if there were auditions. When I was 12, I did this show on Broadway called 'High Society,' so we moved to New York for the run of that.
In my last year of drama school, I was Abigail in 'The Crucible' and Nina in 'The Seagull,' and I did some Shakespeare with the RSC. That's what casting directors saw me in, and I got put up for a lot of period drama auditions. I always get told I suit the costumes. I don't think I have a very modern-looking face.
You can count on one hand the white rappers that have made it. So I just wanted to show the point of view of an actor in Hollywood, because what could be more soft than that. Rapping about auditions and acting and stuff. I thought it was just uncharted territory to clown on, so that pushed through with Dirt Nasty.
To be an actor, it's really tough to find your own voice because you're always tied to other characters and going to auditions and trying to get a job, hoping they'll pick you. And I think it's just so important for an actor to have something else that's creative, something that's creative and you're in charge of.
I grew up in a house where my father went on auditions, and he got some and he lost some, and there were good years and lean years. I didn't expect anything from the business, and that's often a danger in Hollywood, the notion that if you're pretty and have white teeth and just show up for the game then you'll win.
I was like, 'I'm only going to do musical theater for the rest of my life. I'm never going to do TV.' And whenever I'd get auditions for TV, I'd be like, 'Okay, whatever. I've got a lisp, so they're not going to take me.' And then I started doing this, and I guess it was my sister that got me into the acting thing.
I moved right to L.A., and I had a year of active unemployment. I had 50-something auditions for 50-something different projects, testing and doing callbacks, and could not get hired. And then, almost a year to the day of being out in L.A., I booked my first job, and then I started booking something every other month.
When I was a model at 15, I was eating one red pepper a day, and if I had a big day of castings, I would survive off a bag of Haribo, which gave me the 500 calories a day that would keep me alive. I was congratulated daily on my appearance - the more vertebrae upon my back you could count, the better my auditions went.
I got a manager, and I thought, since I was going out on auditions, I should do this for a living. Then there was this moment on set when I realized I was having a lot of fun, and I really wanted to do this forever. I want to do different stuff, but I want it all to be just as good as this film. I want to be consistent.
I started as a child, in this PBS series 'Voyage of the Mimi,' which led to driving down to New York for 'Afterschool Special' auditions, which led to moving to Los Angeles. I wanted to be an actor. But in L.A., I got into film technology, and I was building cheap editing systems and would edit my friend's acting reels.
I don't see myself as competing with other actresses. I mean, I went through a time when I was in New York, and I was going to lots of auditions and trying to get parts, but even then, you're not really competing with the other actresses. There is a competition going on, but it's not like something you can win in that way.
I've grown up seeing the pros and cons but I love it and I've always wanted to act. Throughout all the rejections at auditions, and especially when I finally did get something, both my parents have been so supportive and always told me it is all about passion and, if I was doing it because I love it, there's no wrong choice.
I was on holiday in Ibiza, having a lovely time, writing a book and looking at the stars every night and generally not having a care in the world. Then I got sent the script for 'Death in Paradise.' I couldn't get back to England in time for the auditions, so my girlfriend filmed me on her camera, and I sent it off via email.
If the script's good, everything you need is in there. I just try and feel it, and do it honestly. I also don't learn things for auditions, because I feel like it's just a test of memorizing rather than being real. Maybe every other actor would think that was terrible, I don't know. But it seems to have worked for me, so far.
When I was about 6, my cousin was very active in a Filipino repertory company, doing musicals and plays. Her aunt was one of the founders of the company, and she told my mom that there were these auditions for 'The King and I,' and that they needed kids. I auditioned, got in and the love affair started from there and just kept going.
I did so many interviews and auditions for films, and it was just zilch. Nothing I did impressed anybody! I could just feel it. It was always, 'Okay, thank you, Mr. Lloyd.' Then, out of the blue, 'Cuckoo's Nest' came to cast. A casting director who sent me up for different things over the years sent me up for that, and it just clicked.
Some of the best auditions I've ever had have been when my agent called and said, 'They want you 20 minutes ago, in an office in Century City, to see you for something.' I'm not sitting there thinking for a week and a half, before I'm supposed to go in front of a network president to do something. That just gives you time to be nervous.
I had two jobs coming out of school: I did a play, 'The Great White Hope.' I played the boxer Jack Johnson. And I was the lead in this indie film. Then I moved to Los Angeles because New York was cold and it was really too quiet for me at that time. I was out of school; I was hungry. The auditions were trickling in, and I was antsy and ready to go.
I never studied. I was too afraid. I thought that if an acting teacher had said to me, "You know what, you're not good," I would not have gone any further. It was easier for me to justify going to an audition and getting rejected, maybe because they wanted somebody blonde, maybe because I wasn't experienced enough. I could live with that more easily.
There was recently a story out that I turned down a role in a major franchise. That's not true. I refused to audition for it. I didn't get the part. I didn't even go in because I thought that the part was just a repackaged version of the parts I played before in these young adult films - sort of moody, masculine, but sensitive and all this kind of thing. It was just a repackaged, rather dull thing.