Auditions 13 & 14

Having recently reached out with a mass email to all my friends and family about possible auditions, two remarkable people offered themselves up as guinea pigs and/or auditors. These two remarkable people happen to be my siblings (I'm only slightly biased in my opinion of them.) My brother Ronnie lives 3,000 miles away in California and currently freelances as PA on commercial and film productions in LA and my sister is an ever busy PhD candidate at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx in bio-medical research. Now, given the distance and their crazy schedules we bring in technology and voila! Today I auditioned for each of them separately over video chat!

It was a very interesting experience, I had never video chatted before and performing via video...it was great! It was exciting to share my work with two wonderful people whom I love and deeply respect.

Project Title: Audition 13

Location(s): My home in Queens & my childhood home in Santa Cruz, CA

Date: Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Time: 2:13pm EST/ 11:13am PST

Submitted by: Self

Medium: Video

Role: n/a

People in Audition

Room: Ronnie Silva

Project Title: Audition 14

Location(s): My home in Queens & my sister's apartment in the Bronx

Date: Tuesday, October 14, 2009

Time: 8:00pm EST

Submitted by: Self

Medium: Video

Role: n/a

People in Audition

Room: Andrea Silva

Audition 11 & 12

Auditon 11

I was visiting a friend on the UWS whose neighbor, John McNally, is a filmmaker. She knocked on his door and asked him if he could spare a few minutes for my project. He said, "sure," and I briefly explained the project and then performed a monologue from Face Divided by Edward Allan Baker. Afterwards, his response was, "I didn't expect it to be that good," and my friend said she got chills. It is a very powerful piece. I like it very much.

Project Title: Audition 11

Location: UWS apartment

Date: Monday, October 12, 2009

Time: 5:50pm

Submitted by: a friend

Medium: n/a

Role: n/a

People in

Audition Room: John McNally, my friend

Audition 12

Right after leaving that audition, I checked my phone, and had a message from Actor, Director, and Vocal Coach Joanne Pattavina, whom I have studied with and who I deeply respect as an artist. I had left her a voicemail and asked if she'd be available for an "audition opportunity." She had 15 minutes to spare and luckily was in the same neighborhood. Now, I did the same monologue, but somehow, perhaps because of our history, because I wanted to do well, I felt I was watching myself, I also felt outside of myself and I knew it wasn't going as good as I would have liked it to go. Joanne was great, because unlike most of my auditions she could give me feedback, and really useful feedback. She picked up on exactly what I felt was going on. She said I was telegraphing, that there was distance between "me", Lara and the "character". I was also playing around with a bit of an accent because the monologue is about a poor/working class couple from Providence Rhode Island. It was a great note, either really work on the accent OR drop it. Great advice. Really grateful for both the auditions, really great experiences.

Project Title: Audition 12

Location : UWS apartment

Date: Monday, October 12, 2009

Time: 6:20pm

Submitted by: Self

Medium: n/a

Role: n/a

People in

Audition Room: Joanne Pattavina

Audition 10

Sunday night. It was another open call, this time for Looking Glass Theater's festival of short plays. Matt Cody met up with me there and we were seen in the first group. 1 minute brief contemporary monologues. 8 down 7 more to go!

Project Title: Winter 2009/Director Forum

Location: Looking Glass Theater, 422 W. 57 Street, NYC

Date: Sunday, October 11, 2009

Time: 6:15pm

Submitted by: Self

Role: Various roles in short plays

People in Audition Room: 10 or so women, names were not provided

Audition 8

Today at 12:30pm I went to Judy Henderson Casting to audition with commercial copy for a Wal-Mart commercial en espanol. We did 2 rehearsals with the copy and 3 times on tape. I realize that my pronunciation and the accent I use when speaking Spanish could be improved. At one point she said, "Great attitude, now with the better Spanish, I can hear some American in there." Funny, but all in all a great experience. I would love to be going out for commercials all the time. This is audition 7 out of 15! Almost half-way there!

Project Title: Wal Mart Commercial

Location: Judy Henderson Casting 330 W. 89th Street

Date: October 9, 2009

Time: 12:30pm

Submitted by: Avanti Talent

Medium: Commercial

Role: Young Mom

People in Audition Room: Judy Henderson

Audition 7

Yesterday I woke up around 5 am to make the line outside the Equity building by 7:55 am for an EPA for Ground-Up Productions. They were looking for actors for a reading series. I was #5 on the non-union list. As I sat there, Meagan Barno walks in. We met at the Ward Studio and had performed together in I Wish You A Boat 3 years ago. Which was great. We got to wait on line together! Then, my friend Stephanye, an Equity member, said the list was looking good for us to get seen, at that point, they only had people signed up until 10:10am.

While in line, I get this call from a manager who hasn't called me in over a year, for a commercial for Wal-Mart in Spanish at Judy Henderson Casting for tomorrow!!!

Lunch hits, we haven't been seen.

Now it's 3:45pm. None of us had been seen and no updates. Then Katia Hoerning and Matt Cody arrive at the building at about the same time. It's a bit of a reunion. Matt has EMC points, goes into the lounge and speaks the monitor who tells him she's not going to get to any of us. So we leave, a bit saddened and disappointed.

Luckily, all is not lost. Matt told us about an open call for The Milk Can Theater Company at Ripley-Grier. We get there early and are seen in the first 1/2 hour. Audition 7 for our 30 and Audition 6 of my 15...I want to break the halfway mark this week!!! Thanks to Meagan for spending an entire day with me and Matt for the heads up on the audition... and also to the lovely girls who were waiting on line with us.

Project Title: The River- a play
Location: Ripley-Grier Studios-520 Eighth Avenue, 10th floor
Date: Thursday, October 8th, 2009
Time: 6-9pm
Submitted by: SELF
Medium: Theater
Role: Jennifer
People in the Audition Room: Lorraine Cink, Bethany Larsen,

1 other woman whose name I couldn't find out

Audition 4

Yesterday, thanks to my wonderful friend Joel, I auditioned for Leslie Zaslower, Director of Talent and Casting for Nickelodeon. (Danielle, who also casts for Nickelodeon was also in the room.) It was a "general," so I auditioned for them, but not for a role that they are casting. It was more of a meet and greet. For my audition, I was given copy ahead of time for the role of "HOST" for a show where I'd be talking to parents about doing activities with their preschoolers. It was actually really great to work on the copy and I'd like to thank Matt Cody for giving me absolutely wonderful feedback on my read..I'd also like to an extend a thank you to Kevin who lent me his camera so I could work on my own.

Leslie and Danielle were great. Leslie thought the idea for the project was wonderful and suggested that I definitely get on Twitter to publicize. They gave me great feedback, had some wonderful suggestions and answered all my questions! All in all, a great experience.

Project Title: A General
Location:1515 Broadway, 38th Floor
Date: Wednesday, September 30th, 2009
Time: 2pm
Submitted by: Joel Fisher
Medium: TV
Role: Host
People in the Audition Room: Leslie & Danielle

Audition 3

Yesterday, Friday September 25th, was my third audition. It was for legit agent Holly Vegter of Hartig Hilepo Agency, Ltd, at One on One. I auditioned with a monologue by Theresa Rebeck, from Katie and Frank, I went in a little earlier then I wanted to, (I guess they were running ahead of schedule. ) The audition was...I don't know. I feel like my ability to be fully in the here and now, to be relaxed, and to really let myself, my true humanity, come through the monologue, is still a work in progress. In class I feel great, in auditions, nerves and self-consciousness still abide. But I guess that's the purpose of the project, to begin to master the art of auditioning. I wish I would have remembered or taken a moment before my audition to think of some good questions. I would have asked Holly what she saw my age range as and what types of roles she'd think I could be cast for. Holly was a pleasure to audition for and very sweet.

Project Title: Audition for representation
Location: One on One NYC, 34 West 27th Street, New York, NY 10001
Date: Friday, September 25, 2009
Time: 6:50pm
Submitted by: Self
Medium: Legit (Film, TV, Theater)
People In the Audition Room: Holly Vegter, Agent, Hartig Hilepo Agency, Ltd.

Auditon 2

So, just this morning I completed my second audition. I was at JFK, had just finished applying for my computer loan, and had 1/2 hour to kill before my shuttle ride back home. I was in the JetBlue Inflight Crew Lounge and decided to create an audition opportunity. I gathered up three co-workers who had a few minutes to spare and were willing and able to participate: Michelle Hendrie, CindyAnn Williams and Dean Burns. We went into an open conference room, I briefly explained the project and then I performed a two-minute contemporary monologue from Katie and Frank by Theresa Rebeck. I think they had fun and I was so grateful to them for jumping on board and supporting my project. Thanks again guys! Now onto number 3!