Word: tryouts
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...remaining candidates were shunted into a private office, where Diane's assistant, Doris Hoffman, gave them a fast tryout for Haggis Baggis. "Give me an explorer who starts with M," snapped Doris at an unsuspecting male. "Give me an article in an office that starts with S," Doris said to a woman. The responses were slow and inept, and Doris blew up like a temperamental movie director. "Do it like this," she cried. "An explorer that starts with M?" She snapped her fingers, tore at her hair, looked agonized, then beamed and shouted: "Oh, that must...
...acting honors go to Miss Page for her portrayal of the divorcee and the spinster (which Margaret Leighton attempted so inadequately in the pre-Broadway tryout here two years ago). For some reason I had never seen her act before, and it is a pleasure to report that all the acclaim and awards she has received are well deserved indeed...
...then all at once the education fund ran out. Desperate, he went to see Gielgud, who got him a tryout-and another and another. No luck. Gielgud had nothing left to offer but a loan. Alec was close to starving. He had eaten nothing but a green apple, a bun and a glass of milk in 24 hours. His last pair of shoes were so far gone that he was walking the streets of London barefoot to save leather. But he refused the kindness and tottered out, weak with hunger...
...home, he passed a theater. Lightheaded and confused, he found himself asking for a tryout-at the box office. The stage manager happened to be there, and ten minutes later he had three parts: Chinese coolie, French pirate, British sailor. Salary: ?2 a week. "But isn't the Equity minimum ?3?" Alec shyly inquired. "None of that talk around here," the manager snarled. Alec said no more, but next day he quietly called Equity and got his ?3. He was worth every penny. He threw himself passionately into the role of the coolie, even shaved...
Good stagy stuff, and more to come. When the girl finally gets a tryout for a walk-on as a French peasant ("He's playing cards in the bar"), she flunks it spectacularly by scuffing onstage like a marked-down Magnani and declaring in a studied crescendo: "He is at the estaminet playing [pause] BEZIQUE!" And when a young playwright takes her to an opening-night party, she gets drunk, embarrasses him and bores everybody else by climbing on the nearest eminence to recite "0 Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo?" But suddenly nobody is bored. She is reading...