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Contact: Liz Carroll
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Media contact: Liz Carroll
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Release date: November 22, 2004

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Theater students find excitement, rejection at NYC audition

Eleven GCC theater students recently put their egos on the line in New York City as they participated in an audition sponsored by the entertainment network TNT. For the winner, it meant a car, a furnished apartment and acting lessons in Los Angeles. For everyone else, it meant a learning experience on the road to stardom.

"Some of these students had never been out of the state before, had definitely never been to New York,” says Kimberley Morin, Coordinator of the GCC Theater Department. "Because of the field that they're going into, I thought it would be a very good experience for them to get a taste of what to expect.”

"We waited for hours in huge lines,” says Eliza Greene-Smith, a 23-year-old GCC student from Turners Falls. "When we finally got in, it was 25 people per group. You had to stand on this line drawn on the floor in front of a panel of two or three people and deliver just one line. My line was ‘Shut up, just shut up. You had me at hello.' After your one line, they put you back in holding and they call however many people they want to from that group to perform a 30-second monologue.”

For Greene-Smith, the experience may have tipped her career aspirations in another direction. "I realized that if you're going to pursue a life of acting, you're probably going to wait for your big break. And it doesn't matter how good you are: if you're not what they're looking for, you're not going to get (the part). To be honest,” continued Greene-Smith, "before the trip to New York, I really wanted to go into film. Now I'm thinking I'm going to go into psychology.”

Jonathan Peters-Wolfe, a 25-year-old GCC student from Greenfield, also auditioned. His line was, "You make me want to be a better man.”

"People said I did good,” says Peters-Wolfe, "but I didn't get picked. It was my first time auditioning for anything, so it was a good experience for me. One day I would probably want to live there because there's a lot more opportunities in New York in acting, and that's what I want to do.”

"They got a taste of what it feels like to be in the middle of a large group of people knowing that everybody wants the same thing you want,” says Morin. "They got a look at the kinds of people they're auditioning against, and they were able to watch the auditions, and that was a learning experience in and of itself.”

Fun memories of the overnight trip included "bashing around the city together,” (Greene-Smith) and enjoying the Red Sox/Yankees Game 7 play-off. "Walking around town and hearing everybody boo the Red Sox, and knowing I'm from Massachusetts, that was kind of fun!” recalls Peters-Wolfe.

All of the students paid their own way, except for transportation, which Morin provided by driving the GCC van there and back again. "I would love to have the funding to take theater students on trips at least once a year,” says Morin. "It gives them a hint of what lays ahead if they continue in theater. I think some of them got a real sense of excitement from the experience, and that excitement is what keeps the actor or the actress going.”