We’ve written about what we like you to do during your audition, but what should you do immediately before, and after?

When you arrive at the audition room take a moment to get the lay of the land. We tend to see people in the order in which they arrive and hopefully there won’t be too long a wait – enough time for you to catch your breath, get settled in, calm you nerves and start focussing on the task at hand.

Sometimes our timings do go amiss and when you arrive there may be several people already waiting. In that case consider letting someone know that you have arrived but then go and find a quiet corner on a stairwell or corridor to prepare.

If for whatever reason you don’t have a copy of your sides turn up early to collect some – we always have several copies for such an occasion. We don’t want you to walk into the audition room with excuses as to why you haven’t learnt your lines.

Try to stay loose, quietly going over your sides and reminding yourselves of the choices you have made for the character. Resist the temptation to talk and joke around with the other actors – it is distracting to you and to them, and more often than not we can hear you from the audition room. By all means make arrangements to meet them somewhere afterwards – not least because fellow actors can be a great source of information on what else is casting – but we like our audition waiting rooms to be serene and calm environments.

But most importantly in those few moments before the audition TRY TO RELAX. You are about to have an opportunity to do something you love – perform in front of a keen and receptive audience. We are willing you to blow us away with your talent – and if you do, you might even get a paid job out of it. At the very least you will be getting yourself noticed and building relationships with directors, producers and ourselves.

After the audition we would recommend that you hang around for a minute or two, at least until the next person has been called in – just gather your thoughts, take a breath. Like it or not as soon as you leave the room we’ll start talking about you – we might want you to read for another role, read with another actor, or just try it one more way that we didn’t think of while you were in front of us.

Let us have any other questions by leaving a reply below.