I have been a little depressed about all the auditions I have done, two for a director I have already worked with, etc. Bob Fraser had some comments in a resent email posted to the Atlanta Theatre Yahoo! Group. The email was titled “Audition With Authority”. Here is a small section on rejection:
DEAL. Every audition is just one of the many you will
have in your career. If you are a normal human being you
will “fail” 80% of the time. Not just at auditions either.
The best piece of advice about this failure business is
given by one of the richest men in the world, Bill Gates;
“If you want to be more successful, double your failure
rate.”The most difficult thing to ‘deal’ with in the entertainment
industry is the inevitable – “I didn’t get it” realization
You must understand that this is going to be the case much
more often than not. Rejection is not an easy thing to deal
with, but if you want to be a successful actor you must
learn to deal with it.It’s a central part of a professional acting career.
As I have pointed out, more than once, even successful
established actors are rejected a lot. Every time a part
is being cast (say, Batman or Scarlett O’Hara) there are
hundreds of professional, money-earning stars who are
dismissed as possibilities and dozens of others who meet
with the producers and find out later that ? “I didn’t
get it.”Dealing with rejection is crucial to your eventual success.
So, deal with it.