Sunday, September 14, 2008

Pointing toes, holding breath

The Nutcracker. Love it or hate it, it's a holiday tradition for ballet companies everywhere and a rite of passage for dancers.

Saturday our local professional company held auditions for the child roles for the Nutcracker. Jungle Boy and Drama Girl both went, and I spent hours with other parents in the next room, filling out forms and waiting.

Oh how I wanted to be a fly on the wall and see how they were doing!

After a while the tiniest kids came out and met their moms. Then some of the 7-10 year olds. I waited. And waited. No sign of my kids. Finally there were only a few of us in the room. And then our kids came in. I was so greedy for information I nearly burst.

"How did it go? Did they cast the kids to play Fritz and Clara [the leads]? What did you have to do? How did the other kids do? Was it hard? Could you do it? What did the choreographer say?"

I'm sure my kids wanted me to just shut up, but they were pretty good about the whole thing.

Jungle Boy; "They asked me a lot of questions, and asked me to do cartwheels."

Drama Girl; "I was one of the tallest, so they made me stay later and work on a special dance with three other girls."

Jungle Boy; "The boy was there who usually plays Fritz, but he was really goofing off the whole time and not paying attention."

Drama Girl; "Jungle Boy was better than that boy."


Believe me, I am trying not to get too excited. But really, it sounds like they held their own. We'll know in a week or so.

OK, I'm lying. I'm excited.

12 people stopped folding laundry to write:

Laura said...

How could you NOT be excited?
Rat King...
Snow King...
Sugar Plum Fairy...
IT'S THE NUTCRACKER!!!

What A Card said...

Oh, that's totally exciting! My nephew was cast in a professional production of A Christmas Carol. He played a number of minor roles, and was the understudy for Tiny Tim (and got to perform as Tiny Tim in a few of the shows). It was really exciting! He still breaks out with a cockney accent from time to time, a few years later.

Good luck to them!

Anonymous said...

Oh I hope they get it! Fingers crossed for you!

Coloradolady said...

How exciting. What mom would not be excited. Best of luck. What a great way to go into the holiday season.....The Nutcracker!!

Nancy said...

Keeping my toes, er fingers crossed for you!

Lidian said...

Oh, that is SO exciting! Good luck to them!

Also- I am also waiting to find out if eldest DD made it into her arts HS dance company. Even dreamed about it last night.

Amy said...

That's so cool! Keep us updated :-)

debi9kids said...

OH wow! How exciting! That would be just wonderful! Can't wait to hear....

Cheryl Lage said...

Oh how I hope they both get big roles...and I LOVE that Jungle Boy sees the import in paying attention and non-laurel-resting...

What else do I love? Drama Girl's brother love declaration "Jungle Boy was better." Family support rocks.

(Now let me go separate our warring factions...)

Anissa Mayhew said...

Nutcracker! The start of a Broadway career.

Burbank Babe said...

Okay. YOU CANNOT DO THIS!


You can't start out a blog with an audtion and not end it with who won which part.

We have to wait? If I can't wait, how can you?!?!?!?!??!?!

And of course your son was better. I knew this before even reading there was such another fellow who always gets that part.

WIDNEY WOMAN said...

I read the post where they got in to the play. I can hardly wait until their parts are cast. The suspense is too much - how can you stand it?!!! You deserve to be very proud of your kids. You are doing such an amazing job with them!!

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