Crap day

Lesson learnt today: go with your gut instinct. I should have stayed in bed. I was tired anyway, and felt like utter shite, as I have done all week. I did not enjoy the audition at all. It reminded me of everything I dislike about amateur dramatics, and to an extent performing in general. It took the format of 3 workshops - acting, singing and dance, so everyone was split into 3 groups and rotated. They then chose from that who they wanted to see in the afternoon for principal auditions. The acting was ok - I thought I did one of the better auditions in my group in that, but I wasn't terribly keen on the whole format of it. The singing frustrated me - everyone had to sing the same verse of a song, which was very different both stylistically and in range to the parts that many people were auditioning for, which I found frustrating. I get that there were time constraints, but I think it would have been better to ask everyone for 16 bars from the audition song of their choice, so that you could sing something that was actually suitable. I didn't sing particularly well, which frustrated me. Then there was the dance section, which reminded me what a load of pretentious wank performing can be. The choreographer is a drama teacher (yes, I don't know why he is choreographing either - he is a reasonable dancer by amdram standards but he trained as an actor and teaches drama, not dance) and basically the 'dance' workshop took the format of a basic drama class that you would do with 11 year olds. Being a machine and doing a clap pattern, and pretending to be animals. Literally the only dance steps in the entire thing were 2 grapevines and 2 step turn steps, which we had to do whilst pretending to be an inanimate object. I had lines from the song 'Nothing' running through my head the whole time. 'Second week, more advanced, and we had to BE a table...' Except I was a rolling pin. And from that they are supposed to cast the dancers. You can't even tell a dancer from someone with 2 left feet doing a bloody grapevine. So I found the whole thing a bit of a farce really, and was wishing I had stayed in bed, and it actually seemed to be a fairly common opinion when I was discussing it with some of the others in the break. I didn't get recalled for any of the parts I had put my name down for, which pissed me off for multiple reasons - firstly because I was annoyed with myself because I know I could have sung better. Secondly because they put through one girl who had done a really shit singing audition, but is in lovely position of having worked with the MD before. To be fair, she is good. She just did a shit audition, and I kind of feel like if you are going to bother having auditions then you need to judge based purely on them. Otherwise you may as well just give the part out to the person you have had in mind from the beginning. And they also kept back some really random, unsuitable people for some parts. For example 1 girl who was a good 10 years too old for the part, but who also happens to be friendly with the MD. Then for another character, who is supposed to be young, sexy etc, and about whom the audition notes had specifically said 'slim', they kept back a 40 something year old who is definitely not slim, and who would be completely inappropriate casting, and there were several other bizarre choices. I wouldn't be annoyed that I didn't get called back, because I know I didn't do the best audition, but some of the people they did call back just could not have been more unsuitable for the parts that they were recalled for, and that pissed me off and made me feel like the whole thing was a bit of a farce really, and there were other people who were better or more suitable who didn't get recalled. So it was a very frustrating day. Like I said yesterday, it doesn't actually matter since I won't be here when the show is on, but I still don't like not doing my best, and I found the whole audition process irritating to the point where I felt like I wouldn't actually have wanted to be in the show anyway. I just spent the whole day wishing I was at home in bed, rather than at auditions for a show I had no intention of actually doing, and that yet still managed to make me feel even more shit about myself when I didn't get through. I really wish I had just stayed home.

I am absolutely exhausted again. I did manage to get to sleep earlier last night - I took 15mg of Diazepam to try and use it like a sleeping tablet, and it did seem to help, as I got to sleep quite a few hours earlier than I have been other nights recently. But I then had to get up at 8am, which is ridiculously early for me, particularly given how little sleep I have been getting lately. So I am shattered. Have also eaten far too much today then I feel comfortable with, and will have gained weight tomorrow for sure, but I am feeling so shit and so suicidal that it doesn't seem that relevant - what does it matter what I weigh when I am dead? I can't express how relieved I am that the weekend is nearly over. I am seeing L in the morning, which will probably help a bit whilst I am there, but I can't imagine anything actually changing how I feel at the moment, and that is just not to be here. I can't make myself care about anything at all. There are things I should want to live for, but I don't. Every day this week I have felt more and more desperate not to be here, and this weekend in particular has been really hideous, because I have been feeling worse than ever and yet known I couldn't do anything about it. I am just so exhausted. I don't think I have ever been quite this drained and exhausted and desperate. I just feel empty. I don't even feel like me. I am just a shell. I am really glad I am seeing L tomorrow, rather than Tuesday as usual. I need it a lot right now.