Audition PTSD

(Or, nothing like a squishy baby)

I hang up the phone. “Guess who that was?”

“I don’t know,” says hubby. (How would he?)

“I have an interview for a volunteer position as a Baby Cuddler at Swedish Hospital!” I say to hubby as I jump up and down with excitement and panic. I haven’t had an interview, for a paid or volunteer gig, in years. I was a SAHM, Stay At Home Mom, and a writer (which is rejection by mail).

“That’s great, honey,” says hubby.

“What do I say? What should I wear? Should I look cute and trendy? No, they probably want conservative and bland-- chinos, right?”

“No jeans would be my guess,” hubby says.

“I think I still have audition PTSD.”

(Back-in-time dissolve; Wayne’s World)

I remember auditioning for “The Point of No Return” starring Bridget Fonda. (Don’t bother. It was a flop at the box office for good reason.) I would speak one line in this movie. The casting director brought me in four times to read the one line. My agent said they wanted a “tough” girl. I went to the audition without makeup, messed my hair, wore torn jeans (back when they were naturally torn, unlike today where you can pay an extra $90 for ready to wear ripped jeans) and combat boots (always in fashion as far as I’m concerned). By the fourth call-back there were eight other girls vying for the same one-line part. Those girls donned tight jeans, stilettos, and red lipstick. Huh? It was then that I realized, tough wasn’t tough anymore. For a woman, tough meant sexy. It was 1990-ish the height of female exploitation. Nah, what am I saying. Every year is the height of female exploitation. Meanwhile, all nine of us were practicing that one line in the waiting area, mumbling over and over, “You can make anything into a weapon.” (I don’t recall the exact line, but the scene was in a class of young (sexy but tough) women learning how to fight. (Oh, and the scene was gone, kaput, in the final cut.) Imagine the nine of us, “You CAN make anything…” or, “You can make ANYTHING into a WEAPON.” Some tried accents, others did their best Marilyn impersonation. Any UPS guy stumbling into this room would have triple checked the address on the label. “Is this the right place?” I would have happily said, “Yes, you’re in the RIGHT place.”

There were some awful casting people in Hollywood. One kept me waiting for over an hour before he called me in. I was the last appointment. The assistant had left for the day. I even wondered if the casting guy was still in his office. Before you jump to conclusions, casting guy wasn’t a hetero-pervert he was gay. (Granted pervs come in all persuasions.) He just liked the power. A psychotherapist later told me she once had a casting director patient who admitted he enjoyed making actors wait. “Was it David Sax?” I said. (Not his real name.) She smiled. I knew that was the extent of her reveal; client-therapist confidentiality is a thing.

My favorite audition of all was a call back (probably for a sitcom.) The casting director said, “Read the scene again but this time try not to be so Jewish.”

Audition PTSD. I thought I was done with those years. That panic reared its ugly Hollywood head.

In my application to be a baby cuddler I wrote about my preemie twins and how much I adored the nurses in the NICU and wanted to give back, help the caregivers.

As nervous as I was in the interview, I got the job. No waiting. No call back. No issues with my chinos or my perceived religion. There weren’t nine other gals in the waiting room practicing lines. “I love babies… I LOVE babies…”

I return home from the interview.

“How’d it go?”

“You are looking at Swedish Hospital’s new star baby cuddler.”

I’m jumping up and down with pure joy. And, I have an inkling that my Audition PTSD is cured.

1.  What makes you nervous?

2. Do you have a wicked interview story? Please share.

3. Do you remember those 70s shows (The Brady Bunch) where a funky dissolve and goofy music indicated going back in time?