Susan Pevensie (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
quote_gentle_unquote) wrote2024-05-01 07:00 pm
quote_gentle_unquote) wrote2024-05-01 07:00 pm
[AUDITIONS Open Post]
The little stage in the cafe is bare, with a small table of generic props set by the steps leading up to it - some looseleaf papers, a small ball, a box, a few long-stemmed flowers. Susan and Nina have pulled a long, narrow table to the center of the room, parallel to the stage, and set up chairs for the two of them and Bacchus; Susan has added little notebooks and pens at each space. There's fresh coffee in the corner, and a kettle full of hot water next to an assortment of teabags. Copies of a little sign have been tacked up here and there, listing the order of operations: Tell us your preferred role. Auditions will include the following, in order. First: MONOLOGUE; Second: COLD READ; Third (optional) TALENT [swordfighting, singing, dancing, etc.]
The room is set up primarily for Susan, Nina, and Bacchus to observe the auditions, but since the cafe is a common space, they've not blocked it off - anyone can stop in to observe an audition or two, unless the person auditioning has requested an empty room.
Once everything is ready, Susan throws open the door for their first contender.
The room is set up primarily for Susan, Nina, and Bacchus to observe the auditions, but since the cafe is a common space, they've not blocked it off - anyone can stop in to observe an audition or two, unless the person auditioning has requested an empty room.
Once everything is ready, Susan throws open the door for their first contender.
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Regardless, he has chosen to don more modern clothes today -- trousers, a loose fitting tshirt, and an even looser fitting button up shirt over top of that one. "Hello," he says, as if he hasn't ever seen these two women before in his life, "I am Dionysus, god of Drama, and noted friend of Dorothy." He's reasonably convinced Nina will have no clue what that means, and he's honestly not sure if Susan will either; he can't remember when the phrase first started being used, but to be fair the joke is more for himself than anyone else anyway. "I will be auditioning for the role of the Cowardly Lion. Or, well, literally anyone. You both know that already."
He places a headshot and resume on their table. Again, completely unnecessary, he just felt like it. The resume is truly just as ridiculous as you'd expect coming from the guy theatre was invented for, covering a bizarre collection of professional and community theatre roles over the span of a few thousand years (to be fair, he DID abridge it down to just his favorites, but even still, the font is pretty small on the paper). The "headshot" is actually just a photo of some statue of Bacchus he ripped out of a book from the library. Looks nothing like him. It still counts.
For his monologue, he performs one of Jack's from The Importance of Being Earnest. Normally when speaking English, he sounds, for whatever reason, a bit like how you'd expect someone from New Jersey to speak. For the monologue he slips effortlessly into a perfectly posh British accent. His comedic timing is pretty spot on, and he moves around just the correct amount -- enough to command the space, but not so much as to be a distraction. It's a fairly similar story with his cold read. He's also off book somehow already for that. Hey, nobody said he didn't have a built in set of advantages for this process.
For his talent he sings If I Were The King of the Forest, and it's good. Not as great as his acting, but he's not the god of Music, okay, give him a break. Sheesh.
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He takes his seat at the table and pulls out a little notebook for his own notes, ready to continue on with the rest of the auditions.
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"Um, I'm fine playing whatever character," she says when she arrives. She's skimmed the story, since she's not super familiar with it. Before she does her audition, she chugs a full cup of coffee, trying to be as bubbly as possible. The result is a fairly passable performance, somewhat tempered by nerves. "Um. Okay. I'm learning swordfighting, but I'm not that good at it yet, so I don't really need to do that part."
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"I do not know the material well," he says with a slight shrug. "So I do not really have any preference for a role, but this sounded like it might be fun." He picks one of Puck's monologues from A Midsummer Night's Dream, again, a suggestion from Dionysus. He's got it mostly memorized, having taken the time to do so in lieu of wandering around the mansion looking for ways to harass people. He did need a slight explanation of the story, but his cold read is passable enough. For the talent portion, he of course chooses swordplay, and it is clearly evident that this is one thing at which he is very good. Perhaps not up to Laertes' standards, but he can certainly hold his own with a sword.
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Besides, it would be cruel to deprive the world of her hilariosity and geniosity. So she gets up on stage and delivers the only lines she can remember:
If pants be rough with you, be rough with pants;
Prick pants for pricking, and you beat pants down.
Give me a case to put my pants in:
A pants for my pants! what care I
What curious pants doth quote deformities?
Here are the beetle pants shall blush for me.¹
It's only too bad she couldn't include Romeo's lines, because when they'd done this scene in rehearsals and Miss Wilson intoned "I am too sore enpierced with his shaft" Rosie had muttered "Oo-er" and made them all fall over laughing like loons on loon tablets. But she does add the other Merc line she'd memorized straight off the bat, which does not need to be changed at all—even ol' Billy Shakes had his moments of comedy genius: "Alas, poor Romeo! He is already dead, stabbed with a... well, I can't remember all of this bit but it ends with the pin of his heart cleft with the blind bow-boy's butt shaft."
She bows, completely ignoring the cold reading section and continuing, "I will now perform my talent."
She takes out some items she's got from the Mansion now that it's behaving again—a horned Viking hat, earmuffs to go on top, and two little hand paddles—and performs the Viking hornpipe disco inferno extravaganza dance. Viking salute with both paddles pointed at the horns. A cry of "Thor!!" and jump turn to the right. Then paddle paddle paddle to the right, to the left, yell "Thor!!" again and jump turn to the left to repeat. Face forward and high hornpipe skipping eight times. Then a bit of quick one-two paddling to either side while looking for land to the left and right with a concerned expression. Then open eyes wide, yell "LAND AHOYYY!!", fall to knees and throw paddles in the air.
"It's better in a group," she explains as she gets up.
¹Romeo and Juliet, Act I, Scene 4. Approximately.
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Still though, that was a lot to have (more or less) memorized without being able to look any of it up beforehand, so despite whatever else he thinks about any of it, he has to admit this Georgia must be good at remembering lines. He claps politely and thanks her for the audition.
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He asked Shen Yuan for help preparing a monologue, and Shen Yuan's response was, "What about the speech you gave to the Lord of the Western Desert before beheading him? That was"—and then a flustered silence while he apparently struggled to think of a word besides hot—"effective."
Luo Binghe did not remember it, exactly. He's given so many speeches before slaying a foe. But Shen Yuan remembered it word for word, and wrote it down for him to study. (He also greatly appreciated Luo Binghe's private recreation of the scene, in his blushing, protesting way.) So Luo Binghe continues, "This monologue is from Chapter 1678 of Proud Immortal Demon Way."
Up until this point, his demeanor has been pleasant enough, but as soon as he begins the monologue he transforms. His face grows cold, his head held high with menacing confidence. The red of his eyes glints in a way that can't fully be explained by the lighting. His voice is soft in the way of a knife wrapped in silk, promising bloodshed. He paces leisurely, throwing the occasional bored look toward the front, until he reaches the climax of the speech, at which point he stops dead and his mouth twists in a chilling smile.
The cold reading section goes well, as Luo Binghe is quite a good actor, although he approaches everything with equally searing intensity. For his talent, though, he is hesitant to demonstrate his skill with a sword. Xin Mo has been unnervingly restless lately, and using it feels eerily as though he is wasting borrowed time. Swordsmanship is a sore point, anyway; no one could argue that Luo Binghe isn't effective with a sword, but thanks to the incompetence of his teacher, his techniques are not the ones favored by orthodox cultivators. He considered cooking for the casting panel, but concluded it might be seen as bribery. Instead, he shows off some simple cultivation tricks.
First, he ignites a small flame in his palm. As he demonstrated to Magnus in the dream realm, he switches between using his demonic and human qi pathways, causing its color to flicker from red to black. "For theatrical effects," he adds. Then he takes a small bowl of water, demonstrating how he can heat it to boiling in just a few moments, and evaporate it to steam in a few moments more. Finally, he uses qi to levitate some small items around the room, including the pen in Dionysus' hand, which floats up to the level of his forehead before dropping back to the table. He finishes with a sweeping bow that carries more than a hint of self-satisfaction.
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He's also very interested in the possibilities opened up by Luo Binghe's magic effects. Normally Dionysus is the only person in a production with magical abilities, and the amount of shows that are benefited by having a bunch of vines grow suddenly is smaller than you'd think. Fire and steam and levitation are much more useful, especially for Oz. He isn't directing, but he can't help imagining what he might use and where if he were. He picks his pen back up and makes a few notes in his notebook.
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Her monologue is from the Komedie Brute, an extremely popular play put on by Kerch players in Ketterdam on a yearly basis. It's perfect for Nina because the majority of the play stays the same every single year but various bits and pieces change from year to year. She plays Mister Crimson in a scene where he's convincing the townspeople to trust him and she easily turns her natural charisma on, also shaping her body and her movement so that the way she moves and gestures is more masculine and pronounced. There's one part of the play that always requires audience participation, so she steps into the audience for a second and in an entirely different voice calls "Mother, Father, pay the rent!" -- then with a swift hop back onto the stage, as Master Crimson, she replies "I can't, my dear, the money's spent!" and in a surprise twist, throws gold coins in a small shower over Susan and Dionysus, as called for in this scene. She's a very skilled and charismatic actress and the small amount of improvisation she's doing is boosting her performance. As such, her cold read is great and still rather impressive, but not as thrilling as her monologue.
Finally, her talent. She rustles around for a moment and shuffles back onto the stage with something hidden behind my back. "I had to read the summary of The Wizard of Oz because I wasn't familiar with it, but if we can't find any flying monkeys..." She's cobbled together a small bone skeleton with articulated wings attached and with a wave of her hand, it's ominously and gracefully flying around the room, flapping its wings. It's rather creepy, since it looks almost alive with the way it's flying and looking around the room -- but she seems thrilled by it, a small flush developing on her face from using her Grisha abilities in such a coordinated, intense way. The flying monkey lands and takes a bow. She drops into a deep curtsy this time and solemnly tells them, "Thank you for your time and consideration."
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