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[0:00] Justin Guarini: Hello, and welcome back to another episode of Audition Secrets. I'm your host, Justin Guarini. Thank you very much for being here. I'm excited about this one because I get to tell a really fun story that you've seen the results of, but you might not know the backstory of, and that is my journey from being Justin Guarini to Lil Sweet. If you don't know who Lil Sweet is, then give it a goog. It is a small character who lives a very large life as the spokesperson for Diet Dr. Pepper. Anyway, I won't go into it. Check it out, but if you have seen the television commercials, you know that they're hilarious and quirky and just wonderfully strange, but what you might not know is that I almost didn't get that job because I almost didn't show up for it, and when I did go into the room, I learned one valuable lesson that has completely changed how I audition for things and how I show up, even on the stage, and has saved me so much stress and so much drama in my own life, and that is I stopped caring.

Now, let me say that with a caveat. I care about going into the audition room and doing a good job, right? I have a reputation to protect and uphold. I care about going on to the stage and serving the story, like I say, and really delivering an amazing performance for the people who spend a small fortune to come see me and the things that I'm in. However, the lesson that I want to impart to you that I had to learn the hard way is this. Stop caring so much about the outcome of your audition. Stop caring so much before you set foot in the room about what the people on the other side of the table are going to think about you. Stop caring so much before you set out on the stage and go down, you know, the friend of mine likes to call it the wheel of cheese moment.

I don't know if you've ever seen in Ireland, they have this race where they roll a wheel of cheese down a hill, and everybody chases it and falls head over heels and breaks shit on the way down the hill. It's like that. When you start a show, you can't stop it, right? And it's that thing. You're just running down the hill, and maybe you're gonna trip and fall, but you're gonna end up going, and you just gotta keep going, right? Before you begin that process, stop caring so much about the outcome that you allow it to define you. Stop caring about what the people think on the other side of the table so much that you allow them, these people who are more often than not strangers, to define who you are, to tell you whether or not you're good enough to be doing this.

Allow them to have control over your life and your view of yourself. Look, auditioning is barbaric. Anybody who has ever been in an audition, whether you're on the other side of the table and you are choosing the actors or performers, or you're on my side of the table, which is you're the one who is praying to be chosen, it's a terrible process. Yet it is what we have to go through at this point until somebody finds a better way in order to get jobs, in order for the people on the other side of the table to sift through the talent and to find the ones. However, as we go down that journey in our career, as we go down that road during the journey of our careers, we can take certain steps that are like an armor that we put around ourselves that protects us from, oh, just the horrible emotional and physical and mental toll that this profession can take on us.

And one of the best things that you can do is not allow yourself to be defined by your audition. Not allow yourself to be defined by the outcome of a performance or whether or not the audience laughs at a joke or doesn't laugh at a joke. We know auditioning is a numbers game, right? And so you just got to keep doing it. Most of the auditions you're not going to get, but if you keep going, you're going to pick one up. It just happens. If you stay in long enough, I don't care, you ask all the one-name folks, all the shiny people. One of the major reasons why all of them are who they are is because they stuck in the game longer than anyone else was willing to do it. Longer than maybe was sensible, but luck came their way.

And what is luck? Preparation meeting opportunity. They were fully prepared and they met their opportunity, full force, looked it in the face and grabbed it. Now, let's get back to the whole caring bit. Stop caring so much. I had an experience with the audition for Lil Sweet where I had been in Wicked on Broadway playing Fiyero for about nine months. I was exhausted. I was at the end of my contract. My shoulders hurt from swinging out on the rope, my knees, my everything hurt. And so after nine months of dancing, doing other things, I was in pain. I was tired. I was commuting back and forth between my home in Pennsylvania and New York. That's five hours a day. And I just wanted to go home and have my holidays.

It was late in the fourth quarter. And so I get this audition for this thing, this commercial, I don't know what it is. And it's this character called Lil Sweet. And I look on the breakdown, the character description, and it's like, oh, this 80s rock star and that 80s rock star and this, and I'm thinking, I don't look or sound anything like any of these people. This is ridiculous. I'm tired. I'm not going to do it. And yet my team was like, go in and do it. I said, no. They said, please go in and do it. I said, no, I don't want to do it. They said, go in and do it. I said, fine. I'll go in and do it. Damn it. And so I got myself on the train and I went up to New York and I went to the place and I was bitter.

I walked in and I'm just like, oh, okay. I'm just going to do it to say that I did it. And then I'll do this and then that's it. I'll be done. I can go and have my holidays. Right? And so I'm sitting out there as we all do in the audition room, in the casting, rather the casting office. And I see this person in front of me who's like a dead ringer for an 80s rock star, right? The one of the people that was named in the, oh, we want somebody who kind of looks like this, that, or the other. And I'm thinking, this is, I mean, he had, he had like the little chin strap, goatee, everything, that little thin goatee. I mean, just, oh, and I'm thinking this is, this, that guy's going to get it. He's the one.

And I am just going to go in there and I'm going to make a fool of myself. But a magical thing happened. When I let all of that go, when I just said, this other guy's got it. I'm just going to go in and just do my thing. Just have fun and not care so much. That was when I opened the door to one of the most magical auditions, actually series of auditions that I've ever had in my life. I stopped caring. And now look, I, of course, wanted to do a good job. I wanted to go in and uphold a reputation that I've worked very hard for, but it didn't matter to me whether I booked it or not. It didn't matter to me whether the casting assistant in there thought I was a nice person or thought I was talented or thought anything about me. I didn't care. I just walked in and they handed me this sequined jacket, this yellowy sequined jacket. That's like, you know, you're part of USA.

[8:33] Justin Guarini: And I'm thinking, all right, let's have a good time here. And I asked the casting director, hey, am I, am I, you know, am I still in frame? Am I still in frame? Am I still in frame? And eventually I got out of the frame of the camera and I said, okay, let's go. And he said, wait, go. And I literally slid in on my knees and went, Lil Sweet sliding in on his knees. I just, I don't know. I didn't plan that. I just kind of sang some weird melody that kind of came to me. And in the act of not caring about any of it, other than like, obviously wanting to do a good job, but like who cared what would come from it. I ended up having so much fun and things just happened. I started singing little words and things that were not marked to be sung in the script.

And I just had a great time. Did things in that audition that I do for my wife and my kids when they're feeling grumpy or when I just want to be silly and I want to make people laugh and like stuff. So many of my friends, when they first saw that commercial, they're like, oh, that's just Justin being Justin. And it's true. That is a facet of my personality. And I just let it come out because I did not, I was not like, oh, is this person going to like me? Are they going to think I'm talented? And what happens if I get this gig? What happens if I don't get this gig? I mean, all those things did not come into play into the audition room where so many times for me they had in the past. And I know for you and a ton of other performers, that's like the life that we live.

And we have to like, it's like we're slaying dragons the entire time we're trying to sing and act and emote and deliver a great performance. Yet that wasn't the case for me here. And I learned a very valuable lesson. And just to finish up that story, it was such an electric audition and so just real and raw and vulnerable and fun that they called me in the very next day to audition via the internet. Again, it was just one person in the room, but the director was in Spain. The ad agency was in California and the Dr. Pepper Snapple group is in Texas and like all this. And literally I'm just having somebody video conference. I can't see them. It's just audio. And they're just putting me through my paces.

And then the day after that, they're like, we need you on a plane to LA. Let's do this. We're going to, we're going to shoot. It was like a, like a Friday. And they put me on a plane Saturday. We did all of the costume measurements and all this other stuff and the wigs and the everything Saturday and Sunday and Monday. And then Tuesday we started shooting. I think it was or something like that, but it was like literally that after that weekend, we were gone just on. And I owe it all to the fact that I stopped caring so much. And I guarantee you that if you can apply this principle to your performances and your auditions, you're going to have more fun. It's going to be less nerve wracking. And you're going to open the door to creating possibilities and choices that you never thought that you would and never thought that you could.

And here's a little sidebar about that. You know, I have made plenty of mistakes on stage, you know, mistakes on stage, but most of them have been in the service of finally creating and making a choice that I loved and that the audience loved and that really responded to. And that really just was that much more of a lift on this, on the scene. And I don't mean to say mistakes. That's a, that's a bad way of putting it. I have made choices that didn't go over well. How about that on stage? And if you're ever lucky enough to be in a show that has a lengthy preview process, where you get to work out the material, I mean, we do it all the time on Broadway, but that is the greatest place in front of the audience to just play and have a good time.

You don't have to worry about the press. You don't have to worry about, look, you have to worry about the script changing and the music changing all the time. But it is just that moment where all the creatives, and I include the actors in that, get to play with the material and discover it and see what happens before the press comes and before you're open and the show is frozen. And so those choices that didn't go over well in the moment felt like, oh gosh, I'm dying on stage because I didn't get the laugh or it just didn't feel right. Or I got a funny look from the person I was in the scene with, you know, whatever that case is. But I love to tell my students all the time that there is so much success waiting for you on the other side of the willingness to completely fall flat on your face and quote-unquote fail.

I'll say it again. There is so much success for you waiting on the other side of your willingness to completely fall flat on your face, make a choice that doesn't work, just make a mistake, quote-unquote, do something that just you feel like, oh, that was a flop. Because if you are open and brave enough to be able to make that choice, just like with the audition game, it's a numbers game, just like with the choices that we make in life, you got to learn from your, quote-unquote, mistakes. But you're opening the door and you're increasing the courage and the energy and the quickness in your mind that it takes in order to, boom, come up with that brilliant choice. To leave space for brilliance and genius to happen as opposed to trying to tamp down your genius because you want to be safe, because you don't want to be made fun of, because you don't want to be wrong or seen in some sort of light as other than being perfect.

And I got to tell you, folks, that is a losing game. So stop caring so much. Stop acting and start playing. I guarantee you, if you can implement that in your performances and in your auditions, you are going to get more of the jobs you want. And at the very least, you're going to learn more about yourself and you're going to learn what works and what doesn't work and you're going to discover that which makes you unique. And what makes you unique in the audition room and on the stage is what helps you to stand out from all the other people who look like you in the casting room, right? And from all the other people maybe who have played that role, especially if you're, you know, doing a classic, a performance of a classic, right?

What makes you stand out is your unique interpretation, your unique life and thoughts and feelings and who you are and who you bring to the character. All right. Stop caring so darn much. I am Justin Guarini. This is Audition Secrets, the podcast. Thank you so very much for listening. And remember, at the end of the day, you're just one audition away.