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Aspiring actors listen up! This piece of advice is for you.
Do not walk into your audition holding the script. Itโs an immediate, โNo.โ But donโt take our word for it, this advice is straight from Scrubsโ actor Zach Braff.
โListen you actors, as someone who is more often a director these days,โ said Braff on his podcast Fake Doctors, Real Friends with Zach and Donald. โIf youโre trying to audition and you donโt have that stuff memorized and youโre looking down at your page, you donโt have a shot in hell.โ
Being "off book," or not needing a script for a rehearsal/audition, is something his former partner Florence Pugh swore on. Braff recalled that Pughโs auditioning advice was always be "off book."
โI have to give Florence a shoutout for this because sheโs a better actress than I am,โ he said. โShe goes, โI just canโt be present. If there is a part of me that knows I have that crutch there and I can look down, I am not present in the scene enough to perform.โ
โAnd that is coming from an academy award nominated actress,โ said cohost Donald Faison. โSo uh, I am going to be listening to that.โ
Braff said that as a director, actors who come into audition without their scripts are more present. Those who come in looking down at their scripts during their audition donโt stand a chance. But sometimes, the casting decisions have nothing to do with performance, but rather with appearance.
โYou could literally walk in and be the best actor for the part, but you look too much like somebody else,โ Braff said. โOr you are too old, or too young, or we just cast the father and you look nothing like him. Thereโs so many... variables. All you can do is go in and crush and do your best.โ
In the end, it all boils down to being prepared. As both actors point out, it's impossible to control every part of an audition other than your own performance. Assume that the person who came in before you, and the one behind you memorized everything.
Check out โMy Identity Crisisโ to hear the full conversation as well as a breakdown of the Scrubsโ episode of the same name. Fake Doctors, Real Friends with Zach and Donald is working its way through the seventh season of the medical comedy, find it on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you listen to podcasts.
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