Rain or Shine or Glamorous Casting.

As an actor the work you do doesn’t always fit the season. I’ve been asked to shiver in South Africa’s January heat and I’ve done bikini castings in the dead of winter. I’ve run around in high heels and large feathery headpieces on sand dunes during extreme winds. I’ve performed dance shows in teeny-tiny costumes at 10 at night in a theatre so cold I could see the vapour of my breath as I danced on stage. It’s part of what we do. And timing is rarely great.

Last Thursday I had all my planning and timing done so as to leave on holiday for my father’s birthday at lunch. As usual just when I thought I had all my Ps and Qs in alphabetical order I got a late afternoon email for a casting in Thursday morning. The dress code: glamorous evening wear. The weather on Thursday morning: cold and pouring with rain.

The rain worked fantastically for my hair, but not so much for anything else. Not to mention that the dress I wanted to wear had already been packed into my suitcase. The first order of business was fishing it out of my suitcase. The second was protecting it from the weather. As I don’t have any rain coats with a hood, I grabbed one of my husband’s bulky jackets he often used for work which would cover my red dress and protect it from getting drops on it as I walked from my car to the venue. I ran into the audition venue heels in hand, flats shoes on and covered in a large black coat with water running off of me. In essence, I was ready to audition.

Post knee-op I only put on my high heeled shoes just before I had to audition. Even with a healthy knee I'm far from happy in heels. I won't mention the models on their high heels who all glide into castings already taller than myself without the help of their shoes. And as fate would have it, I was required to dance on my heels, exactly 5 weeks after my knee operation.

After my audition I walked out on my heels head held high and removed them as soon as I was out of the venue. Bundled up in my rain coat I headed home, this time not caring about the drops that could potentially wet my dress or flatten my hair.